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On The Decay Of Criticism: The Complete Essays Of W. M. Spackman
Best known for the sleek, sophisticated novels he wrote in the 1970s and ’80s, W. M. Spackman was also a literary critic of formidable power and slashing wit. Gathered here are all the essays and reviews he published, including those that appeared in his 1967 book of essays On the Decay of Humanism. Ranging from ancient Greek and Latin literature to the latest poetry and novels, these brilliant essays argue that a work of literature should be evaluated on its artistry and craftsmanship, not on its content or ideas. Spackman quotes, with approval, Nabokov’s belief that, “Style and structure are the essence of a book; great ideas are a lot of hogwash,” and insists “aesthetic assessments… must come before everything else.” On those grounds, he finds such celebrated masters as Leo Tolstoy and Henry James inferior to lesser-known artists like Henry Green and Ivy Compton-Burnett. His iconoclastic views are supported with close technical analyses, but in a relaxed style that delights as it instructs.
320 pages, Hardcover
Published November 21, 2017
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December 16, 2017This nugget has been in the drawer since the mid nineties ; it was to have accompanied Complete Fiction of W. M. Spackman.* But alas. Finally now through the magical aegis of Fantagraphics Press, here we go.
and boy howdy!!!
Editor Steven Moore suspects that this collection will be a little too elite for today's reading public. And I dare say so. Even a bit beyond me ; my Greek and Latin and French just ain't what I want them to be and Moore left stuff pretty much untranslated and why knot. A large portion of Spackman's position is that one doesn't read the work when one reads in translation ; because what the work is is style and style is the language. It does take a bit of the wind out of the sails of those who bandy about the importance of reading in translation -- ie, a poor substitute for learning to read in other languages.
Be that as it may ; it's not what gave me so much trouble really but it was the same issue I had with Sorrentino (and any other number of elite critics) ; is that they give such a damn about poetry and I just can't get myself to give a damn about poetry. But again, Spackman himself as the leading light here -- it's not the what, the content, that causes one to read, but the how. And the how of his criticism is of course why one enters this book. Kids today need role models in criticism just like Spackman here.
And you should know, he's no fan of Henry James. Which is fine with me. But you might also be interested in knowing that his two heroes are Henry Green who just recently got the loving NYRB treatment and Ivy Compton-Burnett (nearly BURIED I'm sure). Unfortunately, he writes only on the later and that a short piece on a bio of her. Also, this BURIED nugget gets the nod from ole Spack on more than one occasion :: Yesterday's Burden.
A very worthy collection of reviews and a terribly refreshing return to the question of what the work of literature is.
* I kid you knot (you can look it up) ; booksellers are asking US$488.99 for this thing. I suspect you could assemble a collection of 1st/1st for far less.
and boy howdy!!!
Editor Steven Moore suspects that this collection will be a little too elite for today's reading public. And I dare say so. Even a bit beyond me ; my Greek and Latin and French just ain't what I want them to be and Moore left stuff pretty much untranslated and why knot. A large portion of Spackman's position is that one doesn't read the work when one reads in translation ; because what the work is is style and style is the language. It does take a bit of the wind out of the sails of those who bandy about the importance of reading in translation -- ie, a poor substitute for learning to read in other languages.
Be that as it may ; it's not what gave me so much trouble really but it was the same issue I had with Sorrentino (and any other number of elite critics) ; is that they give such a damn about poetry and I just can't get myself to give a damn about poetry. But again, Spackman himself as the leading light here -- it's not the what, the content, that causes one to read, but the how. And the how of his criticism is of course why one enters this book. Kids today need role models in criticism just like Spackman here.
And you should know, he's no fan of Henry James. Which is fine with me. But you might also be interested in knowing that his two heroes are Henry Green who just recently got the loving NYRB treatment and Ivy Compton-Burnett (nearly BURIED I'm sure). Unfortunately, he writes only on the later and that a short piece on a bio of her. Also, this BURIED nugget gets the nod from ole Spack on more than one occasion :: Yesterday's Burden.
A very worthy collection of reviews and a terribly refreshing return to the question of what the work of literature is.
* I kid you knot (you can look it up) ; booksellers are asking US$488.99 for this thing. I suspect you could assemble a collection of 1st/1st for far less.
August 8, 2018
Anyone who is curious about the quality of American intellectual thought in the second half of the twentieth century could do far worse than a spirited read-through of On the Decay of Criticism: The Complete Essays of W. M. Spackman. An irascible Quaker, Princeton grad (class of ’27), Rhodes Scholar, non-combatant WW II veteran, Classics Professor, and finally critic and novelist, Spackman left behind him (he passed away in 1990) as impressive body of work as any imaginable. His fame as a writer came late in life and was centered principally around his delightful, incomparable fiction, but it was his non-fiction where-in the breadth and width of his learning well and truly shone. Written primarily in the 60s, and 70s, and a smattering scattered across the very early 80s, his essays and reviews gave voice to an ethos of writing that, as editor Steven Moore succinctly states in his appreciative introduction, functions as a “ . . . back-to-basics primer on how to read, and how to write about, literature.”
Moore arranges the essays and reviews chronologically in order of their publication dates thus the book opens with the six essays that make up Spackman’s splendid On the Decay of Humanism published by Rutgers Univ. Press in 1967. It is in one of these delightful essays, “Che Ti Dice Il Wilson?”, an assessment of the critic Edmund Wilson’s fiction, that Spackman hilariously tweaks Aristotle as a “ . . . Macedonian biologist . . .” which pages on in “The Unbristling Beard: Aristotle on Poetry” he sharpens to: “But of what earthly use to the critic or writer is a dissection of literature by a marine biologist?” Take that Ari! This same acerbic wit threads its way through each of these six essays sometimes lightening Spackman’s high tone, and sometimes punctuating in a thoroughly laugh out loud way his assessments of writers much loved by the Academy, such as in his take down of Henry James in “James, James” – “A man with any eye for style must . . . find himself continually baffled that anybody who could on occasion write as well as James could, could also have left so much sheer barbarism unrevised.” James’ fiction never found favor with the demanding Spackman who was highly critical of the perceived flaws that he felt James never grew out of, particularly his turgid pacing, flat tone, and complete inability to write even so much as a single convincing female character. It was this last characteristic that grated most on Spackman leading him to write his own version of James’ The Ambassadors – the sparkling A Difference of Design. Spackman returned to James once again in a 1981 essay for the New England Review, “H. J., O. M. (TV)”. His opinion had not changed.
With the publication of his second novel, the mesmerizing An Armful of Warm Girl, Spackman’s attention was more and more taken up with his fiction but he had found in the mid 70s two sympathetic publishers for his non-fiction, David Van Vactor with Canto and Herbert Leibowitz with Parnassus: Poetry Review, where-in the majority of the essay/reviews that make up the bulk On the Decay of Criticism . . . were to be found. A diverse collection of writers fall under Spackman’s critical gaze in these essays, from Ivy Compton-Burnett to Robert Lowell to Blaise Cendrars the reader is constantly treated to page after page of incisive criticism that ultimately serves to highlight Spackman’s credo that the how a writer writes is more important than the what the writer writes. Style, to Spackman was all, a writer either had it or did not. His own writing, both fiction and non-fiction, stands as an enduring sentinel to this classically trained insistence honed by years of teaching undergraduates to read and speak Latin as well as his own prodigious reading (in the native language) of Greek, Latin, French, Russian, and English literature.
On the Decay of Criticism concludes with an interview of Spackman and an interesting but too brief reflection by Spackman on his fiction where-in the reader can catch a glimpse or two the same polished expectations that characterized his non-fiction.
What’s the old expression, “They don’t make ‘em like they use to!” This seems a tailor-cut description of W. M. Spackman. Erudite and witty his work harkens back to a time when the expression -- a man (or woman) of letters -- was a distinction any writer would wear with pride and honor. But that was then. Although it is less than thirty years since his passing public education in this country may as well be light years removed from that what Spackman experienced and continued to write about. The dumbing down of the American educational experience was another favorite topic of his and one that curious reader referenced above will be amply rewarded with in this book. But his was not a troglodytic reaction. As revealed in these essays and reviews he well knew that literature, as well as life, moves on. Change he understood, willful ignorance not so much.
In publishing On the Decay of Criticism Fantagraphics Press has done an inestimable service to American Literature, it has brought back into light the brilliant work of an American intellectual who gave that expression a poise and sparkle not always heretofore associated with it. On top of that they put it the hands of America’s leading literary scholar – Steve Moore – who performed the editor’s duty to perfection. All that remains is for the rest of you to read it . . .
Moore arranges the essays and reviews chronologically in order of their publication dates thus the book opens with the six essays that make up Spackman’s splendid On the Decay of Humanism published by Rutgers Univ. Press in 1967. It is in one of these delightful essays, “Che Ti Dice Il Wilson?”, an assessment of the critic Edmund Wilson’s fiction, that Spackman hilariously tweaks Aristotle as a “ . . . Macedonian biologist . . .” which pages on in “The Unbristling Beard: Aristotle on Poetry” he sharpens to: “But of what earthly use to the critic or writer is a dissection of literature by a marine biologist?” Take that Ari! This same acerbic wit threads its way through each of these six essays sometimes lightening Spackman’s high tone, and sometimes punctuating in a thoroughly laugh out loud way his assessments of writers much loved by the Academy, such as in his take down of Henry James in “James, James” – “A man with any eye for style must . . . find himself continually baffled that anybody who could on occasion write as well as James could, could also have left so much sheer barbarism unrevised.” James’ fiction never found favor with the demanding Spackman who was highly critical of the perceived flaws that he felt James never grew out of, particularly his turgid pacing, flat tone, and complete inability to write even so much as a single convincing female character. It was this last characteristic that grated most on Spackman leading him to write his own version of James’ The Ambassadors – the sparkling A Difference of Design. Spackman returned to James once again in a 1981 essay for the New England Review, “H. J., O. M. (TV)”. His opinion had not changed.
With the publication of his second novel, the mesmerizing An Armful of Warm Girl, Spackman’s attention was more and more taken up with his fiction but he had found in the mid 70s two sympathetic publishers for his non-fiction, David Van Vactor with Canto and Herbert Leibowitz with Parnassus: Poetry Review, where-in the majority of the essay/reviews that make up the bulk On the Decay of Criticism . . . were to be found. A diverse collection of writers fall under Spackman’s critical gaze in these essays, from Ivy Compton-Burnett to Robert Lowell to Blaise Cendrars the reader is constantly treated to page after page of incisive criticism that ultimately serves to highlight Spackman’s credo that the how a writer writes is more important than the what the writer writes. Style, to Spackman was all, a writer either had it or did not. His own writing, both fiction and non-fiction, stands as an enduring sentinel to this classically trained insistence honed by years of teaching undergraduates to read and speak Latin as well as his own prodigious reading (in the native language) of Greek, Latin, French, Russian, and English literature.
On the Decay of Criticism concludes with an interview of Spackman and an interesting but too brief reflection by Spackman on his fiction where-in the reader can catch a glimpse or two the same polished expectations that characterized his non-fiction.
What’s the old expression, “They don’t make ‘em like they use to!” This seems a tailor-cut description of W. M. Spackman. Erudite and witty his work harkens back to a time when the expression -- a man (or woman) of letters -- was a distinction any writer would wear with pride and honor. But that was then. Although it is less than thirty years since his passing public education in this country may as well be light years removed from that what Spackman experienced and continued to write about. The dumbing down of the American educational experience was another favorite topic of his and one that curious reader referenced above will be amply rewarded with in this book. But his was not a troglodytic reaction. As revealed in these essays and reviews he well knew that literature, as well as life, moves on. Change he understood, willful ignorance not so much.
In publishing On the Decay of Criticism Fantagraphics Press has done an inestimable service to American Literature, it has brought back into light the brilliant work of an American intellectual who gave that expression a poise and sparkle not always heretofore associated with it. On top of that they put it the hands of America’s leading literary scholar – Steve Moore – who performed the editor’s duty to perfection. All that remains is for the rest of you to read it . . .
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