Richard Posner > Quotes

“The moralistic critic thinks that the most important thing about literature is its moral or political message or impact. The aesthetist thinks that the moral or political content of a work of literature or of art has little or nothing to do with either the value of the work or the pleasure to be derived from it. The aesthetist's slogan is Wilde's dictum, in the preface to The Picture of Dorian Gray, that 'there is no such thing as a moral or immoral book. Books are well written, or badly written. That is all'. In other words, immersion in literature doesn't make us better citizens or better people... conversely, a work of literature is not maimed or even marred by expressing odious moral views, and by the same token a mediocre work of literature is not redeemed by expressing moral views of which we approve.”
― Richard Posner