Some British literature professors say literature has no value, according to a new book by Rónán McDonald, The Death of the Critic. It’s “a polemic in favour of the critic as a ‘knowledgeable arbiter.’ In McDonald’s account, it is a reason for sharp regret that no one cares any more about ‘the critic.'”

In a section on blogs, online reviews, and the prominence of reader groups, McDonald “argues that the demise of critical expertise brings not a liberating democracy of taste, but conservatism and repetition. ‘The death of the critic’ leads not to the sometimes vaunted ’empowerment’ of the reader, but to ‘a dearth of choice.'” Not that critics just have better taste than everyone else, that their judgments are purely subject to their whims. Critics should have the knowledge to help us see the value of some books over others. “McDonald proposes that cultural value judgements, while not objective, are shared, communal, consensual and therefore open to agreement as well as dispute. But the critics who could help us to reach shared evaluations have opted out.”