The Art of Perceiving

It seems to me dangerous to believe that a play must be this or that or the other thing because it interferes with your ability to perceive. Listen to the work when it lays down its own criteria, as works always do. They always imply how they are to be judged. Now these criteria themselves can also be judged, but you have to start by trying to see what kind of a thing it is, and not demanding that it be one particular kind of thing. When you see what kind of thing it is, then quite irrespecitve of your judgment of how good or bad it is at being the kind of thing it is, you can make a judgment about it as a good kind of thing to be or not. But I think it is dangerous to come in with a rigid set of rules. And one further thing. In addition to what the artist has tried to do, you've often got to say what has the writer done that he didn't try to do. What is his unconscious doing behind his back? You have to keep open to the possibility of totally unexpected things happening that turn out well. - Julius Novick.