A great quote (and a great quote within the great quote)

From About Last Night, the blog of Terry Teachout, drama critic for the Wall Street Journal (among other things):

More and more I question the ultimate value of any criticism whose immediate purpose is not to bring its readers into direct contact with beauty (or shorten the amount of time they spend in contact with ugliness). The purpose of my professional life is to make people happier, and I try not to let myself forget that my way of bringing it about can never be anything more than an imperfect means to a blessed end. C.S. Lewis said it better than I can: “If we have to choose, it is always better to read Chaucer again than to read a new criticism of him.”

Sounds like a darn good philosophy for a critic.

Permanent link to this article: https://edwardwillett.com/2005/08/a-great-quote-and-a-great-quote-within-the-great-quote/

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