Clerical Critic Gifts

'Transistional Pope. Is that nice way of saying they hope he doesn't live too long?'

"That's the guy I hired to read Proust for me."

Bob encounters one of the bugs in the Jean Paul Sartre fan website.

'I hate to be so skeptical, but I still think the seance business is a hoax!'

Thomas Mann.

First Novels.

Reading my Critics

Jean-Paul Sartre

Blue Stockings

"Now I really hate poetry."

Why we need poetry. . .

German Expressionist Breakfast

"And on the eighth day, God sat back with a scotch and soda and waited for the critical reviews."

"Your usually vicious sarcasm is weak. Go pump some irony."

"It turns out everyone here is self-published."

Shakespeare was bisexual

It's Dostoevsky. It's Melville. It's Flaubert. But it doesn't dance.

The Forbidden Joyce Kilmer

"I did the math. If we want to read all of Proust in this lifetime, we have to start tomorrow morning."

"Oh, this old thing?"

The Proust of Twitter

Emily Dickinson: Mime - "I think she's saying something about death."

"Never mind, Harry. Just remember, the 'Saturday Review' loved it."

"Nevermore." "You don't have to use 'air quoths' every time."

'It's cutting edge theatre.'

"Maybe I don't like stunning debuts."

"Heads up! It's another tidal wave of overwrought critical hyperbole!"

"Mom, please! I'm a married woman whose friends have been reviewed favourably by the New York Times."

Beckett for Beginners: "Waiting for Thumbkin"

"I’ve seen better metaphors in my litter box."

"Tracey, this is Gene. He also read the Nancy Reagan book in unbound galleys."

"The moral of the story, honey, is that being a celebrity does not make you a credible children’s book author."

"It's felt to be his most thought provoking work."