Not Even Joseph Epstein Speaks Freely about the Conservative Movement

Finally, Epstein bemoans literary criticism’s dethroning as the preeminent intellectual pursuit.  The fault may lie more with artists than critics.  The last great creative burst in West came and went with Modernism, which mid-20th century intellectuals so imperiously championed.  Nothing comparable has arisen since.  No wonder, then, that comparatively few feel compelled to form opinions on the latest works of literature.  There is less worth forming an opinion about.

Nor is it even clear that criticism should be venerated.  Sorry to say, but the mid-20th century intellectuals are overrated.  Their pre-occupations  — Marx and Freud — now seem embarrassing, even faddish. They succumbed to rather elementary confusions, such as that “highbrow” is synonymous with “better.” It’s not even true that it requires some demanding training — what Epstein calls “being cultured”– to understand them. They excelled in the diverting essay rather than the groundbreaking paper or book. The very word “intellectual” denotes a trafficker rather than producer of ideas.

To say that the New York intellectuals were merely intellectuals is not to demean them.  It is to say that it’s hard to understand, in hindsight, how they managed to cow their contemporaries so effectively.  They produced entertainment no less than the “masscult” figures they derided — and no less than the “public intellectuals” that Epstein scorns today.

So much for Epstein’s surface account of Commentary’s decline.  I suspect that, for all his genuine admiration for Commentary in his heyday, Epstein does not seriously believe that one cannot find “genuine intellectuals” today. What he really means, though he stops short of saying it, is that one cannot find “genuine intellectuals” today at Commentary. Commentary and its affiliates would rightly take umbrage at that assessment.  Shrewdly, Epstein preserves plausible deniability by (somewhat feebly) blaming society for Commentary’s deficiencies. He insinuates rather than indicts. Why jeopardize one’s regular writing outlets, not to mention the many favorable reviews for one’s next book from the sequacious conservative press?

Do not suppose John Podhoretz et al. oblivious to Epstein’s subtext. Conservative movement leaders sense when they are being criticized, however obliquely. Hence their intemperate overreactions when someone like Jim Manzi rebukes a mere talk radio host like Mark Levin. They know that they are the real targets.  When even a famous critic like Joseph Epstein can only hint at his misgivings, you can depend upon it that others in the movement are not expressing them at all. For all but most naive loyalist, the movement is something one can’t live with, but can’t live without.