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How To Destroy Creativity With Criticism
… Human gullibility is truly astounding. It might be reasonable enough to believe in a ruler or a judge or a mayor. When we see them wandering, in their long, wide dresses brushing the ground, in their wigs, with lots of heralds and men bystanders, our knees begin to tremble and our sight becomes clouded. But it’s impossible to say for what reason you believe critics. They have neither heralds nor backup men. Seeing them in person, they are no different than the rest of us. Yet, it is enough that these insignificant creatures, our fellows, lock themselves in a room, take a pen in their hands and start writing using the “us”, and here we believe they are superior, inspired, infallible beings. Wigs grow on their heads. Long wide dresses cover their bodies. No greater miracle was performed by human faith. And, like most miracles, this too affects the mind of the “believer”. This guy wakes up and starts to think that the critics, because that’s how they define themselves, are right. Start to think that a book acquires importance only after it has been positively judged or denigrated in the press. He begins to doubt his own emotional valuations, by holding them down, if they contradict with his critics’ judgement. …
— Virginia Woolf “On Literary Criticism”
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