The business of the critic is to get the reader into contact the… — Jotted onto a page addressed “Dear reader” found in the U of T Quarterly, January, 1950, in Eric McLuhan’s library, retrieved and published by Andrew McLuhan

A dictionary of Marshall McLuhan’s quotations

The business of the critic is to get the reader into contact then to mold him, to constrain what he contacts. This is to assume no more for literature than for music. The critic-teacher has to know at least as much about the technologies and forms of literature as a symphony conductor about scores and instruments.

Jotted onto a page addressed “Dear reader” found in the U of T Quarterly, January, 1950, in Eric McLuhan’s library, retrieved and published by Andrew McLuhan

Quote #7056

Year: 1950

Chapters: Education | Literary Criticism | Training of Perception

↪ Also at #1686, #3546