Double Agent: The Critic and Society

In recent decades, an enormous gulf has opened up between academic critics addressing their professional colleagues, often in abstract and technical terms, and the kind of public critic who writes about books, films, plays, music, and art for a wider audience. How did this breach develop between specialists and generalists, between theorists and practical critics, between humanists and anti-humanists? What, if anything, can be done to repair it? Can criticism once again become part of a common culture, meaningful to scholars and general readers alike?

Morris Dickstein's new book, Double Agent, makes an impassioned plea for criticism to move beyond the limits of poststructuralist theory, eccentric scholarship, blinkered formalism, opaque jargon, and politically motivated cultural studies. Emphasizing the relation of critics to the larger world of history and society, Dickstein takes a fresh look at the long tradition of cultural criticism associated with the "man of letters," and traces the development of new techniques of close reading in the aftermath of modernism. He examines the work of critics who reached out to a larger public in essays and books that were themselves contributions to literature, including Matthew Arnold, Walter Pater, H.L. Mencken, I.A. Richards, Van Wyck Brooks, Constance Rourke, Lewis Mumford, R.P. Blackmur, Edmund Wilson, Philip Rahv, Lionel Trilling, F.W. Dupee, Alfred Kazin, and George Orwell. This, he argues, is a major intellectual tradition that strikes a delicate balance between social ideas and literary values, between politics and aesthetics. Though marginalized or ignored by academic histories of criticism, it remains highly relevant to current debates about literature, culture, and the university. Dickstein concludes the book with a lively and contentious dialogue on the state of criticism today.

In Double Agent, one of our leading critics offers both a perceptive look at the great public critics of the last hundred years as well as a deeply felt critique of criticism today. Anyone with an interest in literature, criticism, or culture will want to read this thoughtful volume.

Double Agent is a watershed in the recent revival of interest in the role of the public critic and intellectual who writes about culture, politics, and the arts for an intelligent general audience. Offering acute portraits of critics both famous and neglected, Dickstein traces the evolution of cultural criticism over the last century from Matthew Arnold to New Historicism. He examines the development of practical criticism, the rise and fall of literary journalism, and the growth of American Studies, and rereads the work of critics like Arnold, Walter Pater, I.A. Richards, Roland Barthes, Edmund Wilson, R.P. Blackmur, Lionel Trilling, Alfred Kazin, and George Orwell. In essays and books that are themselves works of literature, these writers made criticism central to the public sphere, balancing social and literary values, politic commitment and aesthetic judgment. Though marginalized or ignored by academic histories of criticism, their example has proved immensely valuable for younger critics eager to find a personal voice and reach a wider public. Dickstein concludes with a lively and provocative dialogue that weighs the claims of recent literary theory and the importance of renewing public culture.

Double Agent is a watershed in the recent revival of interest in the role of the public critic and intellectual who writes about culture, politics, and the arts for an intelligent general audience

Morris Dickstein is best known for his book on the 1960s, Gates of Eden, which was nominated for a National Book Critics Circle Award and named one of the best books of the year by The New York Times Book Review. His essays and reviews have appeared frequently in journals ranging from the Times Book Review and the Times Literary Supplement to Critical Inquiry and Partisan Review. He teaches English and film at Queens College and at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York, where he coordinates the American Studies program.