Motivational Quotes

Criticism

Hardly a book of human worth, be it heaven's own secret, is honestly placed before the reader; it is either shunned, given a Periclean funeral oration in a hundred and fifty words, or interred in the potter's field of the newspapers back pages.

- Dahlberg, Edward

Best Quotes about Criticism

Writing about music is like dancing about architecture; it's a really stupid thing to want to do.

Costello, Elvis

Asking a working writer what he thinks about critics is like asking a lamppost how it feels about dogs.

Christopher Hampton

You know what the critics are. If you tell the truth they only say you're cynical and it does an author no good to get a reputation for cynicism.

Maugham, W. Somerset

It is from the womb of art that criticism was born.

Baudelaire, Charles

The dread of criticism is the death of genius.

Simms, William Gilmore

All the world's a stage, and all the clergymen critics.

Nunn, Gregory

When everyone is against you, it means you are absolutely wrong -- or you are absolutely right.

Guinon, Albert

A sneer is the weapon of the weak.

Lowell, James Russell

For every action, there is an equal and opposite criticism.

10.

It is critical vision alone which can mitigate the unimpeded operation of the automatic.

Mcluhan, Marshall

11.

Do not use a hatchet to remove a fly from your friend's forehead.

Proverb, Chinese

12.

I'd rather be hissed at for a good verse, than applauded for a bad one.

Hugo, Victor

13.

A drama critic is a person who surprises the playwright by informing him what he meant.

Mizner, Wilson

14.

Criticism comes easier than craftsmanship.

Zeuxis

15.

Honest criticism is hard to take, particularly from a relative, a friend, an acquaintance, or a stranger.

Franklin P. Jones

16.

Much literary criticism comes from people for whom extreme specialization is a cover for either grave cerebral inadequacy or terminal laziness, the latter being a much cherished aspect of academic freedom.

Galbraith, John Kenneth

17.

Now, in reality, the world have paid too great a compliment to critics, and have imagined them to be men of much greater profundity than they really are.

Henry Fielding

18.

Post-modernism has cut off the present from all futures. The daily media add to this by cutting off the past. Which means that critical opinion is often orphaned in the present.

Berger, John

19.

Never criticize a man until you've walked a mile in his moccasins.

Native American Proverb

20.

To avoid criticism, do nothing, say nothing, be nothing.

Hubbard, Elbert

21.

Let me walk three weeks in the footsteps of my enemy, carry the same burden, have the same trials as he, before I say one word to criticize.

22.

I consider criticism merely a preliminary excitement, a statement of things a writer has to clear up in his own head sometime or other, probably antecedent to writing; of no value unless it come to fruit in the created work later.

Pound, Ezra

23.

In my conscience I believe the baggage loves me, for she never speaks well of me herself, nor suffers any body else to rail at me.

Congreve, William

24.

If the end brings me out all right, what is said against me won't amount to anything. If the end brings me out wrong, then ten angels swearing I was right would make no difference.

Lincoln, Abraham

25.

That is what the highest criticism really is, the record of one's own soul. It is more fascinating than history, as it is concerned simply with oneself. It is more delightful than philosophy, as its subject is concrete and not abstract, real and not vague. It is the only civilized form of autobiography.

Wilde, Oscar

26.

The rule in carving holds good as to criticism; never cut with a knife what you can cut with a spoon.

Buxton, Charles

27.

The great critic must be a philosopher, for from philosophy he will learn serenity, impartiality, and the transitoriness of human things.

Maugham, W. Somerset

28.

It is just as hard to do your duty when men are sneering at you as when they are shouting at you.

Wilson, Woodrow T.

29.

I remember when I was in college, people told me I couldn't play in the NBA. There's always somebody saying you can't do it, and those people have to be ignored.

Cartwright, Bill

30.

Many great ideas have been lost because the people who had them could not stand being laughed at.

31.

Neither praise or blame is the object of true criticism. Justly to discriminate, firmly to establish, wisely to prescribe, and honestly to award. These are the true aims and duties of criticism.

Simms, William Gilmore

32.

Pay no attention to what the critics say... Remember, a statue has never been set up in honor of a critic!

Jean Sibelius

33.

Satire is often the reflection of a kind of moral nausea.

Briton, Crand

34.

When I am abroad, I always make it a rule to never criticize or attack the government of my own country. I make up for lost time when I come home.

Churchill, Winston

35.

He cannot be strict in judging, who does not wish others to be strict judges of himself.

Cicero, Marcus T.

36.

God knows people who are paid to have attitudes toward things, professional critics, make me sick; camp following eunuchs of literature. They won't even whore. They're all virtuous and sterile. And how well meaning and high minded. But they're all camp followers.

Hemingway, Ernest

37.

Criticism is an indirect form of self-boasting.

Fox, Dr. Emmit

38.

Men over forty are no judges of a book written in a new spirit.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

39.

Never retract, never explain, never apologize; get things done and let them howl.

Mcclung, Nellie

40.

The critic has to educate the public; the artist has to educate the critic.

Wilde, Oscar

41.

The critical method which denies literary modernity would appear -- and even, in certain respects, would be -- the most modern of critical movements.

Man, Paul De

42.

Nature, when she invented, manufactured, and patented her authors, contrived to make critics out of the chips that were left.

Holmes, Oliver Wendell

43.

I never met anybody who said when they were a kid, "I wanna grow up and be a critic."

Richard Pryor

44.

The critical opinions of a writer should always be taken with a large grain of salt. For the most part, they are manifestations of his debate with himself as to what he should do next and what he should avoid.

Auden, W. H.

45.

No man ever got very high by pulling other people down. The intelligent merchant does not knock his competitors. The sensible worker does not work those who work with him. Don't knock your friends. Don't knock your enemies. Don't knock yourself.

Tennyson, Lord Alfred

46.

We protest against unjust criticism but we accept unarmed applause.

Narosky, Jose

47.

Though by whim, envy, or resentment led, they damn those authors whom they never read.

Churchill, Charles

48.

Never make the mistake of assuming the critters will beat a path to your door.

Mascotte, John P.

49.

To avoid criticism do nothing, say nothing, be nothing.