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Fantasy Aspects, issue 2, November 1947
Page 7
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FROM FAN-TODS HOW NOT TO BELIEVE A CRITIC by BOB TUCKER I hesitated somewhat (a lengthy matter of two or three seconds) before bursting into print with the following essay on why critics as a whole are about as reliable as a groundhog in February, because not so long ago Don Wollheim reprinted a professional review of one of his books and was promptly damned as an ego-boo seeker of the first water, I cam to the first water. I cam to the conclusion, though, that the results of this couldn't be much worse than a crushing attack or 2 similiar to the one made by Harry Warner, commenting on the Wollheim reviews. Believing these old shoulders able to withstand such a jolt after the padding I am shamelessly going to give them herewith, I forge ahead. Critics aren't worth a damn. No two of them agree on anything. As Exhibit "A" we will by chance ---oh, purely by chance mind you -- show you the professional reviews given a book picked at random -- purely by random, mind you. The book is "The Chinese Doll." The name of the author escapes me at the moment. Review #1:: "Suspicious drowning of Chinese chaufferette for Ill. gambling den gets imaginative private eye Horn into all sorts of trouble. Horne tells capitally mystifying yarn in letters to gal he loves in spite of all temptations. Payoff is real sockeroo. Well worth reading." --Saturday Review of Literature. Sounds good enough to make you want to rush out any buy two or three copies doesn't it? Ackerman bought four. But tarry a moment, loose money, and listen to another critic. Review #2: ". .Doll. . . is a new entry in the moderate tough vein but a regrettably clumsy one contrived to swing finally into a gigantic surprise which is, unfortunately, neither surprising or sensible. It telegraphs itself as a possibility almost from the first and when it comes it is flatly unconvincing and labored. Meantine the action has jumped about erratically and busily, but uninterestingly. The style is familiar, nudging toward literacy in that nervously lordly way which transmits staccato converstaion in stilted polysyllables." --- Philadelphi Record. Upon reading that, Ackerman will ship back all four copies. The review gives rise to the impression that the reviewer is a frustrated English professor who owns a trunck packed with rejected novels. But away with such thoughts: the above is an honest opinion of an honest reviewer. Look how wrong the Saturday Review was, look how their reviewer was taken in by my foul cunning. Let's try again below. Review#3: "Sound the gongs for the most ingen- (page 7)
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FROM FAN-TODS HOW NOT TO BELIEVE A CRITIC by BOB TUCKER I hesitated somewhat (a lengthy matter of two or three seconds) before bursting into print with the following essay on why critics as a whole are about as reliable as a groundhog in February, because not so long ago Don Wollheim reprinted a professional review of one of his books and was promptly damned as an ego-boo seeker of the first water, I cam to the first water. I cam to the conclusion, though, that the results of this couldn't be much worse than a crushing attack or 2 similiar to the one made by Harry Warner, commenting on the Wollheim reviews. Believing these old shoulders able to withstand such a jolt after the padding I am shamelessly going to give them herewith, I forge ahead. Critics aren't worth a damn. No two of them agree on anything. As Exhibit "A" we will by chance ---oh, purely by chance mind you -- show you the professional reviews given a book picked at random -- purely by random, mind you. The book is "The Chinese Doll." The name of the author escapes me at the moment. Review #1:: "Suspicious drowning of Chinese chaufferette for Ill. gambling den gets imaginative private eye Horn into all sorts of trouble. Horne tells capitally mystifying yarn in letters to gal he loves in spite of all temptations. Payoff is real sockeroo. Well worth reading." --Saturday Review of Literature. Sounds good enough to make you want to rush out any buy two or three copies doesn't it? Ackerman bought four. But tarry a moment, loose money, and listen to another critic. Review #2: ". .Doll. . . is a new entry in the moderate tough vein but a regrettably clumsy one contrived to swing finally into a gigantic surprise which is, unfortunately, neither surprising or sensible. It telegraphs itself as a possibility almost from the first and when it comes it is flatly unconvincing and labored. Meantine the action has jumped about erratically and busily, but uninterestingly. The style is familiar, nudging toward literacy in that nervously lordly way which transmits staccato converstaion in stilted polysyllables." --- Philadelphi Record. Upon reading that, Ackerman will ship back all four copies. The review gives rise to the impression that the reviewer is a frustrated English professor who owns a trunck packed with rejected novels. But away with such thoughts: the above is an honest opinion of an honest reviewer. Look how wrong the Saturday Review was, look how their reviewer was taken in by my foul cunning. Let's try again below. Review#3: "Sound the gongs for the most ingen- (page 7)
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