Imagine a republic that bans commentary, 'a society, a politics of the primary' peopled with 'citizens of the immediate'. In this aesthetic utopia, writer and reader share the same 'philo-logy' and the interpretative impulse gives rise not to criticism but to 'an enactment of answerable understanding'. The citizenry dance dances, recite poems by heart, produce paintings to register their experience of paintings and novels to answer novels. Their response is as complete an individual expression as the artwork they respond to; text and counter-text live equally through each other. The parasitism of academic criticism and journalistic reviewing ceases, the unmanageable flood of unreadable dissertations subsides, and the interposition of professional opinion between work and audience is eliminated. The cultural establishment expands to a cultured populace, and consumption gives way to creativity.

LRB 1 June 1989 | PDF Download