Sharp Criticism Quotes

I am grateful for even the sharpest criticism as long as it addresses the point.

If certain Critics were as clearsighted as they are malignant, how great would be the benefit to be derived from their writings!

Criticism even should not be without its charms. When quite devoid of all amenities, it is no longer literary.

Biography should be written by an acute enemy.

The sharpest criticism often goes hand in hand with the deepest idealism and love of country.

As a writer, you have to be mean and vicious. Use the pen as your gun. Sometimes the people you write about get hurt.

When you edit, you imagine your enemy is seated on the other side of the table. Your enemy! And your enemy is going to read that with a viciousness, because he knows where you didn't work on it. He's going to shake it and really aim for that jugular. So you are going to polish, and revise, and rewrite, and cut out, and shape it, so that your enemy has no place to grip it. That's how you revise.