VARIETY
Stephen Spender
REFLECTIONS ON THE
LITERARY LIFE
In the thirties I got into the
habit of writing reviews. I do not
think I reviewed better or worse
than most reviewers, and I tried to
be fair. On looking back, I see
that instead of considering the
book as a whole often I was too
ready to take up certain points I
agreed or disagreed with, and make
them the subject of my review.
If
I read a book with the idea of
writing a review, I approached it
with a different attitude of mind
from when I read out of simple
curiosity. As a reviewer, when read–
ing I was, as it were, interrupting
what the writer had to say, by the
pressure of my need
to
write my
few hundred words, and this had
much the same effect as not lis–
tening to someone's remarks be–
cause one is thinking how to an–
swer them.
Once I had become deeply in–
volved in the literary profession, I
could not help approaching the
works of all but a very few of my
contemporaries, either in a spirit
of rivalry, or by identifying my
aims with theirs. Gone were the
days when I read every new book
which had been recommended to
me, as it were open-mouthed, and
expecting manna to fall. Now that
I myself had appeared in print, I
253
was like the owner of a race horse,
who watches not only the perfor–
mance of his own entrant but also
keeps a sharp eye on the methods
of other trainers.
It never occurred to me that
anything I wrote might annoy the
author I was reviewing. That he
or anyone else should attach im–
portance to my opinions appeared
to me so unlikely that I often over–
stated them. But at a later date I
knew so many writers and had ex–
perienced their hurt sensibilities so
often that I lost my nerve
in
a
way, and found myself unwilling
to criticize the work of those I
knew personally: not that I was
frightened, but because I did not
see how to do so without a certain
awareness of the writer's personal–
ity entering into my own writing
which would destroy its objectivity.
A part of my literary experience
was not just reviewing but being
reviewed. Here I showed all the
vulnerability which I believed im–
possible with other writers. The
good reviews which I received
sometimes gave me a sense of be–
ing recognized with that warmth
which is truly encouraging, but
more often that of having scraped
by the reviewer's defenses, with all
my glaring faults. Adverse criticism
was a terrible blow to me
in
my
early days, and I still find adverse
criticism of my poetry extremely
discouraging. In fact, I think that
it
is
more difficult for a poet than
for other kinds of writer to "take"
criticism. It is impossible to "prove"
that a poem is good, and a refusal
