It is wrong to be harsh with the New York critics, unless one admits in the same breath that it is a condition of their existence that they should write entertainingly about something which is rarely worth writing about at all.
Interpretation
Criticism often revolves around the subject being critiqued, suggesting that critics must entertain even when the topic lacks merit.
In this quote, Raymond Chandler addresses the nature of criticism, particularly from New York critics, implying that their harshness is overshadowed by the necessity to engage the audience despite the potentially lackluster quality of the subjects they critique. He highlights a paradox in the world of criticism, where entertainment value often takes precedence over substantive content, leading to a strange coexistence of quality and the requirement to captivate readers.
In practice
During a panel discussion about literature, one might refer to this quote when talking about the role of critics in the industry.
Undoubtedly the stories about them [hard-boiled detectives] had a fantastic element. Such things happened, but not so rapidly, nor to so close-knit a group of people, nor within so narrow a frame of logic. This was inevitable because the demand was for constant action; if you stopped to think you were lost. When in doubt, have a man come through a door with a gun in his hand.
There was a desert wind blowing that night. It was one of those hot dry Santa Anas that come down through the mountain passes and curl your hair and make your nerves jump and your skin itch. On nights like that every booze party ends in a fight. Meek little wives feel the edge of the carving knife and study their husbands' necks. Anything can happen. You can even get a full glass of beer at a cocktail lounge.
Organized crime is the dirty side of the sharp dollar.
When in doubt, have a man come through the door with a gun in his hand.
The flood of print has turned reading into a process of gulping rather than savoring.
If my books had been any worse, I should not have been invited to Hollywood, and if they had been any better, I should not have come.
I am a feather for each wind that blows
I believe that anyone who wants to stand in a national election should receive a course of psychotherapy. Completing the course should be a qualification for office. This wouldn't change the behaviour of psychopaths, but it might prevent some people who exercise power from imposing their own deep wounds on others.
Taxes are what we pay for civilized society
I can't honestly account for the very personal response that I have to one story and not another, a sense of an orbit, the orbit of a world that draws me as my own life recedes.
I have spent years studying what it means to be white in a society that proclaims race meaningless, yet is deeply divided by race.
We find that the Romans owed the conquest of the world to no other cause than continual military training, exact observance of discipline in their camps, and unwearied cultivation of the other arts of war.
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