Previous Post So is your point now that professional writing should not be criticized? Do you apply those same standards to every commercial product?

No my point (here) is that the standards for criticism should be at least half as high as the standard for the writing. I can't help but be bowled over by the irony of people who have ardent, stringent demands that art has to meet and if doesn't it's offensive detritus... while simultaneously wanting criticism to have virtually no standard.

Making art is hard. Criticism is cheap. It costs you nothing. That doesn't mean criticism has no place, but it's an important context.

cheers,
---the late great Donald Blake