he'd thought it through, reflected on it. If that, at times, could keep us at a distance, it was the clearest expression of who he was.This is why, of all his contemporaries, Updike was the most effective critic; for more than 40 years, he reviewed books and art for the New Yorker and the New York Review of Books with acuity and grace.
from David L. Ulin: Los Angeles Times: For better or worse, John Updike produced a nearly endless stream of work
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"The trouble with today's snarky pipsqueaks who break off a sentence or two, or who write a couple of mean paragraphs," [David] Denby notes, in a snarky aside of his own, "is that they don't go far enough; they don't have a coherent view of life. Spinning around in the media from moment to moment, they don't stand for anything, push for anything; they're mere opportunists without dedication, and they don't win any victories."
What Denby's really talking about is consciousness, the idea that writers, thinkers, commentators ought to have a point of view. This seems obvious enough, but it tends to get lost in the noise of constant conversation, all the commenting and cross-posting, the tiny feuds and insignificant disputes.
from David L. Ulin: The Houston Chronicle: Snark by David Denby
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