ON EMPSON

Are literary critics writers? As Michael Wood says, Not all critics are writers--perhaps most of them are not--and some of them are better when they don't try to be. The British critic and poet William Empson (1906-84), one of the most important and influential cr itics of the twentieth century, was an exception--a critic who was not only a writer but also a great one. In this brief book, Wood, himself one of the most gifted writers among contemporary critics, explores Empson as a writer, a distinguished poet whose criticis m is a br...[Read more]