An arts article is hereby deemed dead? Well, hell, aren't they all? It is the magnifying glass, the burning glass--functioning here as an external act of scrutiny--that has seen through the everyday posturings of criticism and pronounced them lifeless. Criticism is a vast echo-chamber. Critics write for one another (the profession with its tail in its mouth). Critical writing is the sound of one ego clapping. One ego clapping in an empty auditorium..
Better to light out for the territory, as Huck Finn once recommended. Better to take the dark, too-late highway to some more solid place.
