What Does a Critic Do?

notes for an essay

For a few weeks, I’ve been wanting to write an essay around the following quotes from director Lindsay Anderson (above). The quick excuse is that we have just finished the visitation, funeral, and interment of my mother. So, this is a Write Your Own Essay. Think over the three quotes below and what they suggest about the role, duties, and importance of critics. We get a terrible rap, but that’s because most people (including many working critics) don’t understand these things themselves.

“One of the marks of a good film, or a good piece of art, is that it is susceptible to being interpreted in a variety of ways. This shows it has the richness or ambiguity of a real experience—that it isn’t in any way a tract.”

“This seems to me one of the functions of an artist—perhaps the most important function: to prophesy. As the most important function of a critic is not to judge but to interpret.”

“I don’t think one can ever say what one’s work is ‘about’ … It is for the critic to decide what it’s ‘about.’”