John Lanchester Quotes

But you know, really, if you think about it Roger and I and all critics really have one absolute essential part of our credentials and that is that you believe that that is actually what we think.

My father basically had two ways of judging anything. Either something was poetic or it wasn't.

In my reviews, I feel it's good to make it clear that I'm not proposing objective truth, but subjective reactions; a review should reflect the immediate experience.

I don't care about the bare fact that anyone liked or didn't like a book or movie; they can only interest me in that bare fact by writing an intelligent review.

When somebody comes along and says, "I think Washington, DC, sucks," that's not wrong.

Reviewers and critics can be overly cynical. If something the least bit sentimental comes up, they'll often start flying off the handle. But I'm like, 'Wait a minute, you've had those times in your life. Everybody has.'

Whether my columns are worth reading isn't for me to say.

It is not my job to compare my movies. I don't like to compare my films with other movies because I don't really have that perspective. It is an intellectual exercise, but it doesn't intuitively come to me.

Like most people, I've always felt using words like 'best' when applied to art is a fun way for critics to stay busy at the end of the year, and I guess a good way to help get ratings for awards shows, which is fine.

You know, I'm really not interested in someone telling me that something's good or bad.

If I think something is beautiful, there must be somebody out there who will agree with me.

Critics have their purposes, and they're supposed to do what they do, but sometimes they get a little carried away with what they think someone should have done, rather than concerning themselves with what they did.

How much of a book review is about the reviewer? Sometimes it's mostly about the reviewer!

Have you ever noticed how most critics disagree with the public? That should tell you a lot about critics.

When judging a product, we rarely have exhaustive scientific data to go by. As a result, if we are to form a complete picture, we must fill in the blanks, just as we must in our visual perception.

I often don't read reviews.

I never want to be in a position where I have to defend my material. It's too subjective. It's for other people to defend or not defend.

The idea of 'advice,' in terms of telling people advice or asking people for advice, has become not comprehensible to me, to a certain degree, due to feeling, like, for something to be accurately defined as 'good' or 'bad,' I would want to know the context, goal, perspective for it.

I never read reviews of something I want to see.

Wine is similar to music in that it's a purely experiential realm, and it's a purely subjective practice. That's sort of the funny thing about wine criticism or, for that matter, music criticism. At times, those are useful guides, but ultimately it's all about how you react to that music or wine.

Even with ex-fighters as judges, it doesn't mean they can score a fight, you'd still end up with debate and opinion.

I don't read reviews anymore.

Whether something is sensible or not is subjective. What is sensible to me might not be for others.

Just because you’re offended, it doesn’t mean you’re right.

I am not a critic; to me criticism is so often nothing more than the eye garrulously denouncing the shape of the peephole that gives access to hidden treasure.