Script Tease. Eric Nicol

newborn author knows that his book’s getting a laudatory review from Mom, or a person who owes the author money, is not to be trusted as evaluation.

      But how trustworthy is the review of your work by a complete stranger who doesn’t care whether you cry easily? Here it is useful to understand that literary critics come in two varieties: professional and amateur. They are often hard to distinguish, solely by their sneer. And much of their publishing space may have been lost to TV and film reviews, making them even snarlier.

      With the wane of professional literary criticism — a fairly respectable genre of nitpicking dating from Aristotle through William Hazlitt, I.A. Richards, et al. — the sometime job has fallen to a reviewer. This is usually a writer who is between royalty cheques and glad to get his teeth into something, having been denied a decent steak.

      What the reviewer writes is called a critique (cree-teek). A certain amount of prestige is won by your work, just to have it cree-teeked at all. Even an unfavourable review is better than drawing no notice whatever. In fact, some people make a point of reading only books that have received a scathing review. They recognize that many book reviewers are essentially attention-seekers, people whose mission in life is to stand out from the herd, even if this means leaping off a cliff.

      Another comfort: the book critic is ill paid for his work, often receiving no compensation other than the copy of the book he is reviewing. Why should the author respect the judgment of a person who is earning less than a real garbage collector?

      Anyway, if we are unfortunate enough to have our work receive a negative book review, what should be our reaction to this pretentious drivel? First — and memorize this counsel — remember that a critic gains a wide reputation only by being egregiously vicious. Mr. (or Ms.) Nice Guy has no future as a book critic. The late Nathan Cohen of the Toronto Star gained fame as a veritable fountain of acerbic criticism. He caused more tears than an onion-peeling contest. Formidable, but he wasn’t well loved by writers.

      So if you have no history of pulling the wings off insects as recreation, literary criticism may not be your bent.

      As for finding yourself on the receiving end of a nasty critique, you need to develop the mental epidermis of the thick-skinned. Keep a stiff upper lip. (If you have a chronically limp upper lip, you can have it stiffened surgically, but may find it harder to whistle for your dog, or a waiter.)

THE LITERARY AGENT

      The agony of the rejected lover is naught compared to the anguish of the rejected author. This is reason enough to engage a literary agent to flog our work. The agent will take the brunt of the rejection by a publisher and will comfort the author with a second opinion, such as that the publisher has suffered a mental breakdown, blinding him to our unique talent.

      It is, of course, possible for the author to be rejected by a literary agent. There is no shame in this, and it is certainly not grounds for jumping off a bridge unless you have additional sources of acute depression.

      However, it is difficult to overestimate the value of having an agent. Especially an agent who has a good track record, among publishers, for submitting potential bestsellers. The agent is assumed to have screened out the garbage so that the publisher is, in effect, providing a second opinion and can head to the golf course earlier.