Caustic Critic

Q. I write music reviews for a popular magazine. Sometimes I think a disk is really crummy. Can I write my honest opinion?

A.This delicate question is faced not only by critics but at some time by virtually any columnist. The way to the ethical answer is to examine the job of the critic, and to whom he owes loyalty.

One way to examine this question is to consider a negative review a kind of slander, or damaging speech. Then we would judge it according to the usual standard for this kind of criticism: is the damaging statement necessary to obtain some constructive benefit, without resulting in undeserved harm? Here the benefit of panning the work in print would be that prospective buyers know that the album doesn't really meet your standards of quality and taste. But going overboard would cause more damage than deserved and so would be forbidden.

There is much truth in this approach, but I don't favor it because it focuses on your loyalty to the artist. In my opinion, this is not the main consideration. In most cases when a publication publishes a review of a book or album, it is based on the explicit or implicit request of the author or artist. Publishers intentionally send review copies to the largest publications, and are generally happy to provide copies to any legitimate publication which is interested in providing objective criticism. So you don't owe the performer any debt of gratitude to praise his or her output. A sincere negative review is not a "damaging statement" at all.

The responsibility of the critic is generally to the audience. It's your job to give them accurate information about the album which will help them decide if they want to buy it or listen to it. However, this doesn't absolve the critic of the obligation to be balanced and reserved. In fact, it only heightens it.

An exaggerated emphasis on the failings of any artistic creation is not only unfair to the artist; most of all it is unfair to the audience. Any work of art will have admirers and detractors; most people don't need to be warned to stay away from something they aren't enamored of. A lukewarm review will keep away most who are not "true believers"; anything more caustic will probably turn off readers who would really have enjoyed the album.

In my experience, when a reviewer writes a witty piece demolishing or ridiculing a book or performance, his main objective is to showcase his own wit and writing ability, not to provide the reader with information that will help him decide if he wants to obtain the recording.

I know that I use this as a criterion in my own writing. I have a weekly newspaper column on the topic of ethics in business and public life (in the Jerusalem Post), and not surprisingly I find no lack of what to criticize. Whenever I am particularly proud of a column, feeling that I have really done an exceptionally fine job battling the forces of evil, I know that is the time to e-mail the draft to myself instead of my editor. A second, objective look at these columns almost always convinces me that I haven't done justice to the subject, given the complex context of our ethical decisions. I may have written something witty and entertaining, but not something informative and journalistic.

Honest and informative criticism is a vital contribution to the progress of art. But caustic, one-sided criticism is virtually certain to fail to do justice to the artist and, even more importantly, to the audience.

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