The Lively Arts: Gilbert Seldes and the Transformation of Cultural Criticism in the United States

In his 1924 book The Seven Lively Arts, Seldes (1893-1970) made the then-controversial claim that popular entertainment and culture should be treated just as seriously, and as rigorously, as the so-called high arts. Krazy Kat and Irving Berlin were worthy of critical attention, he said; and arts criticism in America hasn't been the same since. Kammen, a historian, stresses the ""hands-on"" aspect of Seldes's long and versatile career. He was a historian, novelist, playwright, filmmaker, scriptwriter, journalism school dean, newspaper and magazine columnist and CBS's first director of television. Although at times Kammen seems curiously defensive, his balanced and insightful account of Seldes's professional life--from the early '20s at the Dial magazine (and the beginning of long-running feuds with both Hemingway and the Algonquin Round Table set) to the 1950s debates on the role of ""mass culture""--is a story of a life as well as a history of pop culture on the rise. Seldes, Kammen says, thought of himself as ""a highbrow populist"" and was a ""compulsively candid critic."" Kammen weights Seldes's contributions fairly but can be equally candid. Photos. (Mar.)