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/ The Least Perceptive Literary Critic    \
|                                         |
| The most important critic in our field  |
| of study is Lord Halifax. A most        |
| individual judge of poetry, he once     |
| invited Alexander Pope round to give a  |
| public reading of his latest poem.      |
|                                         |
| Pope, the leading poet of his day, was  |
| greatly surprised when Lord Halifax     |
| stopped him four or five times and      |
| said, "I beg your pardon, Mr. Pope, but |
| there is something in that passage that |
| does not quite please me."              |
|                                         |
| Pope was rendered speechless, as this   |
| fine critic suggested sizeable and      |
| unwise emendations to his latest        |
| masterpiece. "Be so good as to mark the |
| place and consider at your leisure. I'm |
| sure you can give it a better turn."    |
|                                         |
| After the reading, a good friend of     |
| Lord Halifax, a certain Dr. Garth, took |
| the stunned Pope to one side. "There is |
| no need to touch the lines," he said.   |
| "All you need do is leave them just as  |
| they are, call on Lord Halifax two or   |
| three months hence, thank him for his   |
| kind observation on those passages, and |
| then read them to him as altered. I     |
| have known him much longer than you     |
| have, and will be answerable for the    |
| event."                                 |
|                                         |
| Pope took his advice, called on Lord    |
| Halifax and read the poem exactly as it |
| was before. His unique critical         |
| faculties had lost none of their edge.  |
| "Ay", he commented, "now they are       |
| perfectly right. Nothing can be         |
| better."                                |
|                                         |
| -- Stephen Pile, "The Book of Heroic    |
\ Failures"                               /
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