A French writer arrives at a crowded restaurant and asks a critic if he can sit at his table. The critic, who eats a dozen oysters, says to him: “Sorry, but I always dine alone. The writer replies: “How dare you tell me that when there are thirteen of you at the table?” »
Posted yesterday at 7:15 a.m.
Yes, the writer calls the critic a mollusk. The irony is that the writer, Jules Barbey d’Aurevilly, a controversial dandy, is also a literary critic. Journalist and artist, like so many others before and after him. The talent of the author of diabolical was hailed in the 19the century by his contemporary Baudelaire. But he was hated by Hugo, Zola and Flaubert. For a very ordinary reason: he had criticized their novels. Hard.
“No one dreams of becoming a critic as a child,” wrote an actress I really like on Facebook this week. I replied that, as absurd as it may seem to an artist, I always wanted to be a critic. I founded a newspaper in fifth grade elementary school called Primary Pressin which I was already writing about culture.
I would not have wanted to be an artist, contrary to what Claude Dubois sang in my childhood. Does that make me a sympathetic failure, as Robert Charlebois claimed even before I was born? Some will answer me that they don’t find me likeable…
This week, on the same Facebook page, another actress that I really like expressed regret that the works criticized by The Press are now rated on a scale of 1 to 10 rather than a scale of one to five stars. His comment made many react, favorably, actors, playwrights and directors.
I dared to play devil’s advocate by pointing out that a rating of 8 out of 10 was equivalent, from a strict mathematical point of view, to a rating of 4 stars out of 5. And I dared to add that the ratings have been widely used for decades, in Quebec as well as in the United States and Europe, from To have to to Guardian via the reference music review site, Pitchfork, which rates the albums out of 10, to the nearest decimal.
Some reacted strongly, like René Richard Cyr in our Debates pages. The director finds it “a pity and deplorable that creative work is quantified in such an infantilizing way”, whereas in primary schools, there is a tendency to assess students more with letters than with grades. I understood that I was underestimating the trauma for some of the school system and the impression of artists being judged more by being awarded a number rather than a star.
What amazed me was obviously not that artists didn’t like ratings, ratings and charts. What surprised me was to see that my profession is still misunderstood and despised by certain artists. On the microphone of Paul Arcand at 98.5 FM on Thursday morning, René Richard Cyr, a little less diplomatic, described the work of my colleagues as “critical moods”, more inclined to speak of the “beige decor” than of the essence of a piece like The sonwhich he staged.
“Ideally, one should not read The Press “, said a speaker on the Facebook page I mentioned at the beginning of the column. His commentary was appreciated by actors and at least one director (who is not René Richard Cyr). “We do not want notes, but a report or an impression of the work, in order to arouse the interest of readers to go see the play in theaters”, wrote an actor, who also hosts a cultural program.
This sums up a great misunderstanding about the nature of the work of the critic. This job is not to arouse readers’ interest in going to see a play, a show, a concert or a film. There are press officers and promotion agents for that. My job, when I criticize, is to analyze a work, with my background and my critical spirit, in the most honest and frank way possible.
I don’t write reviews for artists. Even if they have undoubtedly encountered hardships, overcome obstacles, had to make compromises in their long process of creation. I write for the reader, who deserves more from me than an infomercial and who is guided, yes, by the words, but also by the universal convention of star rating or number.
Sometimes, yes, I am tough. Because contrary to what advertisements and press releases suggest, all is not always great and extraordinary. Artists are lucid and they know it. Besides, I don’t know a journalist who is more critical of an artist’s work… than another artist.
Nobody likes to be criticized. But as Beaumarchais said: “Without the freedom to blame, there is no flattering praise. Artists are not primary school students who must be protected from the impact of failure.
What would be “infantilizing”, as René Richard Cyr claims about the mark out of 10, would be to attach a star in the Canada notebook of an artist for the sustained effort and the great enthusiasm in his participation.
Dimensions are one element among many others that allow different points of view to be compared on a work. The discussion of art is inseparable from art. If a play is never reviewed and only exists in the memory of the spectators, does the theater lose out? I think so. Word of mouth can fill a room. But it is the critical discourse on art that allows a work to exist over time and to be part of its time and history.
I was speaking just this week with my friend and colleague from To have to Manon Dumais, on Émilie Perreault’s radio show on Radio-Canada, films made by Quebec women who should climb the ranks of the famous Mediafilm ratings to 2 (remarkable). Mediafilm has been assigning ratings on a scale of 1 to 7… since 1968. Artists have had time to get used to it.
I’m not fooled. Some artists will continue to call me a mollusk, a parasite or a leech. They are allergic to the wasp that I am. I sting sometimes, but whether they like it or not, I’m part of their ecosystem.