"Incomprehensibility doesn't prove deep thoughts."
It shouldn't come as a shock if a 92 year old man dies, but with Marcel Reich-Ranicki, the literary world has lost a giant.
It's difficult to explain Marcel Reich-Ranicki and his work in a language that's not German. Because he was the language, and very few knew how to use it the way he did. It was a weapon, a sharp sword. He split opinions like Marmite; he pushed and petted his favourite authors and at times trashed the ones he didn't like with the subtlety of a steamroller, but he didn't leave anybody involved with German literature untouched. He could be a choleric and overbearing, he was vain but also very charming and an unique personality.
To call Marcel Reich-Ranicki a "literature critic" wouldn't do him justice. He was a national monument. Born on 2nd June 1920 in Wloclawek to a Polish father and German mother, he moved with his family to Berlin in 1929. As a jew, he was deported to Poland in 1938. Together with his wife Teofila he fled the Warshaw Ghetto in 1943. Both survived the Holocaust by going underground.
As a writer, I have taken many of Reich's words to heart. Yes, he was a harsh critic, but so often, he was right. (Apologies for the probably not very accurate translations).
"Back then, I said to my wife. "I'll begin a very dangerous experiment. I'll write for the audience, and I'll write in such a way that everybody will understand what I mean."
"Honesty is the first duty of the critic."
"One shouldn't believe critics to be murderers. They only issue the death certificate."
"Incomprehensibility doesnt't prove deep thoughts."
"Money can't buy you happiness. But if you're unhappy, it's nicer to cry in a cab than on the tram."
"You can't fertilise a garden by farting through the fence."
"Authors will forgive their colleagues everything but success."
"Anaemia is an illness predominantly suffered from characters in novels."
On author Charlotte Roche: "Her style isn't bad. She doesn't have a style at all."
On "Fifty Shades of Grey": "It was tortorous, abhorrent, terrible."
Molly originally posted this entry at http://joyful-molly.dreamwidth.org/416104.html. You can comment on LJ or DW, using OpenID.
It's difficult to explain Marcel Reich-Ranicki and his work in a language that's not German. Because he was the language, and very few knew how to use it the way he did. It was a weapon, a sharp sword. He split opinions like Marmite; he pushed and petted his favourite authors and at times trashed the ones he didn't like with the subtlety of a steamroller, but he didn't leave anybody involved with German literature untouched. He could be a choleric and overbearing, he was vain but also very charming and an unique personality.
To call Marcel Reich-Ranicki a "literature critic" wouldn't do him justice. He was a national monument. Born on 2nd June 1920 in Wloclawek to a Polish father and German mother, he moved with his family to Berlin in 1929. As a jew, he was deported to Poland in 1938. Together with his wife Teofila he fled the Warshaw Ghetto in 1943. Both survived the Holocaust by going underground.
As a writer, I have taken many of Reich's words to heart. Yes, he was a harsh critic, but so often, he was right. (Apologies for the probably not very accurate translations).
"Back then, I said to my wife. "I'll begin a very dangerous experiment. I'll write for the audience, and I'll write in such a way that everybody will understand what I mean."
"Honesty is the first duty of the critic."
"One shouldn't believe critics to be murderers. They only issue the death certificate."
"Incomprehensibility doesnt't prove deep thoughts."
"Money can't buy you happiness. But if you're unhappy, it's nicer to cry in a cab than on the tram."
"You can't fertilise a garden by farting through the fence."
"Authors will forgive their colleagues everything but success."
"Anaemia is an illness predominantly suffered from characters in novels."
On author Charlotte Roche: "Her style isn't bad. She doesn't have a style at all."
On "Fifty Shades of Grey": "It was tortorous, abhorrent, terrible."
Molly originally posted this entry at http://joyful-molly.dreamwidth.org/416104.html. You can comment on LJ or DW, using OpenID.