628
ALAN
LELCHUK
entire section is devoted to Marxist critics and polemics, withe the con–
nections between literature and politics are of obvious and immediate
relevance. Yet, strangely, for a book so deeply immersed in political sub–
jects, one that is continually demanding political understanding and
analysis, there is very little of either. Rhetorical appeals to vague human–
istic ideals are a poor substitute. This absence is crucial, undermining
seriously the coherence of the whole.
Language and Silence
remains
vague and incomplete, impaired by critical confusion and misconception.
And, instead of pertinent analysis, there is a great deal of pontifica–
tion concerning the nature and possibilities of
silence.
Now it is one thing
to invoke the Muse of silence, another to have something to say to her
once She arrives. That is, what
concretely
can be said about silence that
will be of any real value? Indeed, one is surprised at how easily Steiner
is taken in by his own metaphors. Repeatedly there are solemn pro–
nouncements like, "Is the poet's verse not an insult to the naked cry?"
(in reference to a response to bestial experience). Or, from his essay on
Schoenberg's
Moses and Aron:
Moses' despairing cry, his collapse into silence, is that a recognition
-such as we find also in Kafka, in Broch, in Adamov-that words
have failed us, that art can neither stem barbarism nor convey ex–
perience when experience grows unspeakable.
Such statements convey at the very least great naIvete about the place of
art in a society. Steiner vastly overestimates its power and misunder–
stands its goal. It is not the aim of art or literature to stern political
barbarism; for this task, political, not artistic force is required.
There is evidence for believing that Steiner the man is sensitive to
the inadequacies of the critic. That is to say, somewhat paradoxically,
the sensibility here is wiser than tile intelligence. I refer to the broken
logic in many of these essays, where the present argument is intruded
upon by bursts of anger and frustration relating to the past. (This
gives the essays a choppy, uneasy quality that is particularly disconcert–
ing.) As if memory alone, repeated often enough, could replace under–
standing; or assertion, analysis. Because Steiner means so well, it is un–
fortunate that that which appears to be criticism is really not so at all.
It
is lament and nostalgia, qualities which threaten no one and change
nothing.
Alan Lel(huk
