Citizen Critics

The condition of our public discussions about literary and cultural works has much to say about the state of our democracy. Classrooms, newspapers, magazines, Internet forums, and many other places grant citizens a place to hold public discourses-and claim a voice on national artistic matters. Rosa A. Eberly looks at four censorship controversies where professionals asserted their authority to deny citizen critics a voice-and effectively removed discussion of literature from the public sphere. Eberly compares the outrage sparked by the publication of James Joyce'sUlyssesand Henry Miller'sTropic of Cancerwith the relative quiescence that greeted the much more violent and sexually explicit content of Bret Easton Ellis'sAmerican Psychoand Andrea Dworkin'sMercy. Through a close reading of letters to the editor, reviews, media coverage, and court cases, Eberly shows how literary critics and legal experts defused censorship debates-and undercut the authority of citizen critics-by shifting the focus from content to aesthetics and from social values to publicity.