So after 38 years at The New York Times
Michiko Kakutani stepped down as their
resident, Pulitzer Prize-winning, book
critic. This sparked a flurry of think
pieces that examined her role in
literary criticism and put forth the
argument that she is perhaps the most
powerful and influential book critic in
the English-speaking world. Now I have to
take their word for it. She doesn't have
the same name recognition of someone
like a Roger Ebert. But she's got enough
cred to get mentioned in episodes of Sex in
the City, Girls, as well as The O.C. She's
the Platonic ideal of a literary critic. The Edna Mode of the bookish set.
A review from her couldn't boost the book
sale like a single mention from Oprah
could, she's still credited with
launching the careers of David Foster
Wallace, Jonathan Franzen, George Saunders,
Zadie Smith among others and a positive
review from her was likened to having the good
fairy touch you on the shoulder with her
wand. But a bad review could be equally
devastating and is likened to having
surgery without anesthesia. Kakutani
could be ruthless in her criticism.
Scathing but never cruel, critical but
not contemptuous. She wasn't hurling
snark down from her ivory tower but
still that didn't stop her from calling
out books as loose baggy monsters,
corrosive, cacophonous, portentous, and
lumpy. And I like that. I mean here at The
Poptimist I tend towards the
enthusiastic. I mean with the sheer
number of books that are out there, a
lamentable number that I will never read
in my lifetime, and the subjective nature
of criticism I wonder why I'd even bother
with the negative review. I mean I would
never smear a debut authors work and
there's that argument that unless you've
written a book yourself you can't
appreciate the sheer amount of effort
and craft that goes into that particular
endeavor. And the amateur criticism that
goes on here on booktube and on
Goodreads is akin to handing a child a
loaded weapon and is something best left
to professionals. Okay maybe. I mean there
are bad reviewers out there but I mean
criticism is just part of a larger
conversation I mean how else do
center books unless you talk about them.
The thing is talking about them is hard.
Improving the language of thoughtful
criticism gives us better tools to
discuss books and I think that's a good
thing. It's one thing to preach to the converted here on booktube, it's another
to engage with individuals outside of
our online
sphere. I mean I like thinking about books.
I review everything I read on Goodreads
and the ones that really like I tend to
talk about here on booktube. I've talked
in the past how most of my reviews cluster
around three to four star range because
anything less than that I tend to DNF. So
I'm rarely scathing in my reviews. But
there is something to be said for a reviewer tearing a book a new one. I mean
it's always open season on Twilight and
Fifty Shades of Grey. Those are easy
pickings. Far harder to eviscerate the
latest buzzy read in an objective way.
Done well this is hugely informative,
wildly entertaining, and I wish I was
better at it but I guess it's just as
well considering how thin-skinned
authors can be at people who are
leveling criticism at their baby.
Franzen called Kakutani the "stupidest
person in New York" and Susan Sontag,
after a particularly blistering review,
dismissed it as "stupid, shallow, and not
to the point" But you do not have to be a
New York Times critic to garner the ire
of authors. Ann Rice famously wrote a
1,200 word screed on Amazon after a bunch
of bad reviews of her book The Blood
Canticle and she said in part, "Your
stupid, arrogant assumptions about me and
what I'm doing are slander. You've used
the site as if it were a public urinal
to publish falsehood and lies." But that
is mild compared to super stalker
Richard Britton, who after a poor review
of his debut novel The World Rose did
some research, found out who the
eighteen-year-old critic was, flew from
London to Scotland, staked out her place of
work at the grocery, crept up behind her,
and smashed her over the head with a
wine bottle. So maybe that's why Kakutani
is famously reclusive. Kakutani was
notoriously camera shy. The photo used to
accompany those pieces announcing her
departure tended to be a photo that's
nearly a decade old and her invisibility
in the real world extended to the page
as well. Kakutani never appears in her
reviews. I is a pronoun you will never see in a Kakutani review and that's what
makes it feel all the more academic and
sharp. Now you contrast that with booktube
where we regularly trade in our personality. The I of the reviewer is always
evident, front and center on screen and
that is honestly part of the charm of
booktube. I do
love all the individual personalities
and getting to know them in a non-stalkery
sort of way, and I like these loopy, tangential
conversations that we have. That
is the charm of booktube but at the same
time I know for myself I need to stop
trying to hide behind the personal
pronoun as much. Where I'm saying "Oh it's
just my opinion, it's just what I thought."
It's a way of shutting down objective
discussion for and against. It's a crutch,
a built-in defense against detractors,
hiding behind that "it was just my
opinion" I have a tendency to insert
myself, weave a personal narrative,
tell an amusing anecdote, but I think
that's important. How the Wangs vs. the
World resonated for me as a second
generation Asian was significant but I have
to be careful not to veer too far into
memoir. There are those that believe that
memoir and confessional have no place in
a review. We are here for the books after
all. But where do you stand?
Who does reviewing right? Who reads outside
your wheelhouse and can convince you
nonetheless the merits of a particular
book by their sheer force of argument.
I'd love to know. I like a meaty
discussion around books but it is hard
to do well and I'm finding I'm
appreciating those people that can take
a hard stance without softening it with
caveats and concessions. I don't have to
agree with you but I appreciate a
well-thought-out critique that goes beyond
simply recounting plot points and then a
string of effusive adjectives. Anyway I'm
getting back on track as far as my
reading. I'm  looking forward to talking about
some of the books that I finished
recently. But in the meantime I hope you
all have a great week of reading and we will
talk to you soon bye
