10/20/2008

I'm tired and it's late, so don't expect great thoughts out of this, O wise me of the future. I just know that starting now is worth any quantity of wanting to start later.

According to the OED, the modern meaning of the word "critic" appears in my period. I find that inconceivable. What's more, the word basically doesn't exist in any form (besides the medical "cretic" before that.) The critic, as such, seems to appear between 1598 and 1607, with Love's Labor's Lost a slightly earlier outlier--attributed to 1588 in the OED. (1595, according to Wikipedia.)

That's remarkable. And, it seems to be born with a completely modern sense. Biron uses it twice--once as to refer to Timon and once in apposition to "a domineering pedant." Theseus in Midsummer talks about a "satire keen and critical." Iago tries to refuse to deliver an epigram on Desdemona because he, too, is critical:

• Desdemona. What wouldst thou write of me, if thou shouldst
  praise me?

• Iago. O gentle lady, do not put me to't;
  For I am nothing, if not critical.

EEBO is even weirder--the word doesn't even appear until 1596, when it seems already to have the current meaning. I don't know what to make of this--I think what I'm worried about is that I may be on to something.

If the critic first appears as a threat in 1596, it's not obvious that that's instantly a subject position that people can /write/ from. A critic here is just a complainer, on artificial grounds. What does it mean that that word reads so easily in contemporary terms?

What does it mean that everyone started using it all of a sudden? Is it just a fad? Is there an economic explanation? Is it the end of the sonnet tradition?