No One Deserves Criticism Quotes & Sayings

I got a number of very thoughtful responses to the email I sent out last night, most of which I don't have time to respond to right now. Thanks everyone for the encouragement, questions, criticism. Daniel's response was particularly inspiring to me and deserves to be shared. The resistance of Israeli Jewish people to the occupation and the enormous risk taken by those refusing to serve in the Israeli military offers an example, especially for those of us living in the United States, of how to behave when you discover that atrocities are being commited in your name. Thank you. — Rachel Corrie

What deserves my loyalty, art or prestige? — Anis Shivani

A good book deserves an active reading. The activity of reading does not stop with the work of understanding what a book says. It must be completed by the work of criticism, the work of judging. The undemanding reader fails to satisfy this requirement, probably even more than he fails to analyze and interpret. He not only makes no effort to understand; he also dismisses a book simply by putting it aside and forgetting it. Worse than faintly praising it, he damns it by giving it no critical consideration whatever. — Mortimer J. Adler

The Lives of the Poets are, on the whole, the best of Johnson's works. The narratives are as entertaining as any novel. The remarks on life and on human nature are eminently shrewd and profound. The criticisms are often excellent, and, even when grossly and provokingly unjust, well deserve to be studied. For, however erroneous they may be, they are never silly. They are the judgments of a mind trammelled by prejudice and deficient in sensibility, but vigorous and acute. They therefore generally contain a portion of valuable truth which deserves to be separated from the alloy; and, at the very worst, they mean something, a praise to which much of what is called criticism in our time has no pretensions. — Samuel Johnson

They always use the word 'insult' with me, but I don't hurt anybody. I wouldn't be sitting here if I did. I make fun of everybody and exaggerate all our insecurities. — Don Rickles

Never criticize. Remember that no one deserves it more than the one who is criticizing. — Debasish Mridha

No work deserves to be criticized that has not much in it that deserves to be applauded. — Christian Nestell Bovee

I never have thought of myself as a brand. I've thought of myself as an artist. — Tim Daly

Small things are best: Grief and unrest To rank and wealth are given; But little things On little wings Bear little souls to Heaven. — Frederick William Faber

SOYINKA WON THE NOBEL PRIZE
ACHEBE, LITERARY COMMANDER
P.D. JAMES, WE LOVE HER
AGATHA CHRISTIE, QUEEN OF CRIME — S.A. David

We artists stick ourselves out. This in itself deserves respect. — Robert Genn

The thing about stereotyping is it's usually just throwing rocks into a crowd hoping to hit somebody who deserves it. — Criss Jami

You do have great love within you at this very moment. — Doreen Virtue

It's never too late for stalking — Madeleine Urban

The first demand any work of art makes upon us is surrender. Look. Listen. Receive. Get yourself out of the way. (There is no good asking first whether the work before you deserves such a surrender, for until you have surrendered you cannot possibly find out.) — C.S. Lewis