Introduction
Leah Jing McIntosh on the Liminal Review of Books
To write about literary criticism on this continent is a difficult task. There is a tradition of conservatism that runs deep within the literary industry, in form, content, identity. I am not convinced that to offer specific examples of shoddy literary criticism (though it would be somewhat amusing) would not get me into a fair amount of trouble, and trouble is not something I’m looking for. I will admit, I’m very tired. I have been thinking of Bartleby lately: I would prefer not to.
Let me put it another way: Glissant wasn’t fucking around when he proposed one’s right to opacity. Staying with the trouble is one thing, but sometimes I’d just like my heart to stop beating so hard. I am loathe to be a coward, but there is a weight, a heaviness, an exhaustion which comes with holding others accountable, with being honest, or even direct. I would tell you what I think, but, as a racialized person, there is always so much more to lose.
Do I go around looking for trouble? I don’t like to think so, but the trouble inevitably finds me, my friends, my colleagues. It is not that we are not seeking indiscretions, but it is just that sometimes they appear. It’s just—I’m so tired of the mess.
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In a futile attempt to eschew the politics around Australian literary criticism, to stay away from the trouble—from defamation or litigation, public disregard or private screenshots— I write around something which feels plain to me, but perhaps becomes buried in the worry.
This is to say, in form, the Liminal Review of Books is a kind of criticism; not of a book, or of a critic, but of an industry. I have spent the last few years querying structures which guide 'Australian' writing and produce 'Australian' writers. The fiction and nonfiction prizes I have established as a part of my work as an editor of Liminal have been minor interventions—I am interested in pointing out the many historical (and not-so-historical) biases that accompany the awarding of literary prizes, while also recognising excellence. The awarding of such prizes, as many of us know by now, can be non-existent for writers of colour in this colony. And sometimes they are weaponised: ‘Literary prizes may also make publishing appear more diverse than it actually is.’
This aside, prizes seem the final resting place in any literary ecosystem: you’re awarded, you’re seen, you’re celebrated (and sometimes elevated), you enter the canon, you’re forgotten. If, historically, literary prizes have been disproportionately awarded to white writers, then perhaps we can ask: which systems, cultural practices, and/or racialized supremacies have allowed, nurtured, established these biases? Literary criticism and literary critics would surely be among those implicated.
If, historically, there have been few opportunities for writers of colour to write to be published or to succeed within the realms of literature in the anglophone world, then I wonder where or how critics of colour might fall, might have fallen, might be falling.
I’m intrigued by what it means to be a critic while also existing as a racialized person. For me sometimes it means being pulled between these two ideas: of staying with the trouble, while feeling a full-body desire to hide. Depending on who you are, critique is so easily repackaged as complaint, and, as Sara Ahmed writes—‘to complain is not only to be negative; it is to be stuck on being negative. To complain is how you would stop yourself from being happy, to stop others from being happy too, complaint as a killjoy genre.’
I don’t want to make these arguments because they are tiresome, and they make me tiresome. They are expected, and I do not have the time nor the desire; I am staying away from the trouble. You can count the violences for yourself.
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I’ll be honest. One of the main reasons I applied for grant funding for this little series was really just to have some fun. I might complain, but I still have silly desires. The idea of criticism existing in an elastic and thrilling and joyous space seemed nice. I mostly just wanted to know: what if I asked critics to reach back into their bookshelves, to chase a mood?
In 1952, Theodor W. Adorno wrote ‘The Stars Down to Earth’, an analysis of the LA Times Astrology Forecasts. For this first Liminal Review of Books, Lucy Van traces this gesture, pulling apart a predilection for HGTV’s House Hunters International.
We move from house hunting to the figure of the exile, as James Jiang continues his work on Edward Said, leaving us with a sombre warning of the potential disappearance of the ‘intellectual’. In a similar mood of movement and displacement, Elizabeth Flux re-reads Madeleine Thien’s Do Not Say We Have Nothing (2016) after five years, and reconsiders the shape of tragedy.
Woven into the series is a thread of joyous, generous intimacies; Andrew Brooks writes on the poems by his comrade, Elena Gomez (2020); Robert Wood brings literary criticism to B.K.S. Iyengar (1966) to articulate an understanding of his mother.
When I asked Cher Tan to write something on anything, (either a dream commission, or perhaps the worst thing you can do to a writer) she didn’t know who to write on. A few weeks later, during a zoom meeting, when she asked for suggestions, I pulled out a random book from the shelf and told her to write on it. She took the suggestion, and the final piece is astounding. They all are.
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Look, I’ll tell you what I think, just for a moment. To critique is a refusal to endure, a refusal to be silent, to admit one’s desire to be a part of it all, to admit, to admit, to be open and honest and true. Of this I am certain.
We are lucky for these literary critics, for their talent and work and generosity, for their willingness to untangle, to share. I hope you enjoy the series. It is, as always, a pleasure.
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Works Cited
✷ Richard Jean So and Gus Wezerek, ‘How White Is the Book Industry?’ The New York Times, Dec. 11, 2020.
✷ Sara Ahmed, Complaint!, Duke University Press, 2021.
Leah Jing McIntosh is a critic, researcher, and the founding editor of Liminal.