rsonal malice towards him. The phrase 'literary gentleman' is a vile
phrase, but let that pass.

I accept quite readily your assurance that your critic was simply
criticising a work of art in the best way that he could, but I feel that
I was fully justified in forming the opinion of him that I did. He
opened his article by a gross personal attack on myself. This, I need
hardly say, was an absolutely unpardonable error of critical taste.

There is no excuse for it except personal malice; and you, Sir, should
not have sanctioned it. A critic should be taught to criticise a work of
art without making any reference to the personality of the author. This,
in fact, is the beginning of criticism. However, it was not merely his
personal attack on me that made me imagine that he was actuated by
malice. What really confirmed me in my first impression was his
reiterated assertion that my book was tedious and dull.

Now, if I were criticising my book, which I have some thoughts of doing,
I think I would consider it my duty to point out that it is far too
crowded with sensational incident, and far too paradoxical in style, as
far, at any rate, as the dialogue goes. I feel that from a standpoint of
art these are true defects in the book. But tedious and dull the book is
not.

Your critic has cleared himself of the charge of personal malice, his
denial and yours being quite sufficient in the matter; but he has done so
only by a tacit admission that he has really no critical instinct about
literature and literary work, which, in one who writes about literature,
is, I need hardly say, a much graver fault than malice of any kind.

Finally, Sir, allow me to say this. Such an article as you have
published really makes me despair of the possibility of any general
culture in England. Were I a French author, and my book brought out in
Paris, there is not a single literary critic in France on any paper of
high standing who would think for a moment of criticising it from an
ethical standpoint. If he did so he would stultify himself, not merely
in the eyes of all men of letters, but in the eyes of the majority of the
public.

You have yourself often spoken against Puritanism. Believe me, Sir,
Puritanism is never so offensive and destructive as when it deals with
art matters. It is there that it is radically wrong. It is this
Puritanism, to which your critic has given expression, that is always
marring the artistic instinct o