A Critical Essay Concerning Itself
(In Seven Parts)


Part I: Overview


The primary subject of A Critical Essay Concerning Itself (hereafter called simply Essay) is its own self-analysis; hence it is a deeply introspective work, and it is in this light that we must consider it. Indeed, some might argue that Essay is concerned with nothing else, though deeper inspection reveals this is not quite true. (Consider, for example, the section on Critical Reaction, which deals with a response to the essay rather than the essay itself. That these two constitute the same text should not be held against the author.)

How, then, shall we approach a work such as Essay? In the end, we must see it for what it is - an analytical piece - and not allow ourselves to be distracted by the more surreal aspects of its complex, interwoven nature. Only by stepping back and considering Essay as a single work can we begin to appreciate its dual nature.


Part II: Structure


Essay is divided into seven sections: Overview, Structure (the present section), Style, Audience, Purpose, Critical Reaction, and Conclusion. We shall examine each separately.

The first section, Overview, serves as the introduction to Essay; it is an attempt to acquaint the reader with the work's general purpose. Its limited success in this regard is due to the author's basic insistence on treating the essay and its analysis as distinct works, whereas they are of course inherently inseparable; this fallacy continues throughout much of the rest of the essay.

The second section deals with the structure of Essay. It is reasonably complete, with one notable exception: it tells us practically nothing about the essay's second section. Consequently we shall say little about it here.

The Style section, by contrast, analyzes itself almost to the point of absurdity, and thus it, too, requires little additioinal treatment at this time.

The fourth section, Audience, is by far the shortest, perhaps because of its unusually strong grounding in actual reality. If true, this explanation would indicate that the author has nothing to offer when confronted by the necessities of pragmatic logic; indeed, it explains much of the rest of the essay.

With this in mind, it should come as no surprise that the section on Purpose is the longest, having also the least to do with anything that could be considered rational. It is paradoxical - though hardly unusual - that Essay nowhere loses its own purpose more completely than in its quest to find it.

Finally, the last two sections - Critical Response and Conclusion - collectively tie together the entire package in a manner that (perhaps deliberately) parallels the conclusion of Section II. More on parallelism in the next section, Style.


Part III: Style


The style of Essay is at once both complex and simplistic, both professional and childish. In this way the author achieves his purpose, which is to obscure his purpose; the devices he employs to this end, however, are ridiculously transparent on nearly every occasion. In Essay we see deliberate, contrived paradoxes of the grossest sort, wholly trivializing what the author clearly believes is a work of great subtlety. These paradoxes, painfully obvious even from the very beginning, only grow more cumbersome as the work progresses.

The prose of Essay, convoluted and technical, complements its stated purpose nicely, especially - as previously noted - in the section on Purpose. The difficult writing, however, does not conceal several blinding fallacies in the text itself. Note, for example, the claim in the previous section that Part III would mention parallelism (it does not). Another good example is the previous sentence, which is inherently false. In light of the essay's postmodern nature, it is not clear whether these fallacies are deliberate or merely oversights, or perhaps some combination of both.

In terms of basic writing style, Essay, unfortunately, has little to offer. Aside from a (somewhat inept) simile in the following paragraph and a brief poetic turn at the end of Section VII, the writing and word choice are dry and uninteresting. Witness, for example, the uninformative title for that same section: "Conclusion." Does the author believe we will somehow miss the fact that his final section concludes his essay? Minor problems such as this are found throughout.

Yet another so-called "problem" is the essay's anchorless, meandering flow. While some areas (like Section IV) are relatively coherent, others seem to have forgotten their purpose completely, interspersing substance with irrelevancy as haphazardly as a finger-painting toddler. This sentence, for example, is entirely pointless. Taken together, the whole affair is enough to test the patience of even the most faithful reader - which leads directly into our next topic.


Part IV: Audience


It is almost a cliche in the field of literary criticism that in order to understand any art, one must first understand its intended audience. Who, then, is the intended audience of Essay? Certainly no reasonable person may be placed in this category, the work having indeed no discernible underlying logic; concordantly, it cannot be intended for unreasonable people, who would be baffled by its logical-seeming facade. Therefore we can only conclude that the author intended that no one whatsoever should read his essay; and in that respect, if no other, he has surely accomplished his goal.


Part V: Purpose


The real goal of any literary analysis, of course, is to assemble the seemingly disparate elements of the piece in question and uncover the underlying theme. What, then, is the glue that binds Essay together, the unified whole that emerges from its many parts? The answer to this question is simple yet manifold, as we are about to see.

At its most basic level, Essay is simple criticism, and its aims are no different from other such works. However, we must not let this view blind us to Essay's unique nature - it is itself the object of its criticism, and that fact must surely form some part of its deeper purpose. Thus the question becomes: for what reason would an author compose an essay whose sole function is to criticize itself?

One possibility is that Essay is simply an exercise in criticism - a model of the method, so to speak, which ilustrates its tools more clearly by the lack of a separate object, allowing the reader to efficiently absorb both sides of the equation simultaneously. This idea, though, breaks down in the face of the actual text, which is so hopelessly verbose and labyrinthine as to preclude any possibility that it might be a template for the genre.

Alternatively, Essay could well be allegorical, symbolizing by its very nature any of several possible themes - raw chaos, perhaps, or Man's own self-awareness, or even the hopelessness of applying reason to an unreasonable world. Yet the very multiplicity of potential allusions speaks against its status as a symbol; after all, what is the purpose of an allegory if not to make the reader aware of a concrete connection between symbol and symbolized? If an allegory, it is at best a poor one.

The most logical interpretation of Essay, of course, is much simpler: perhaps it is meant to be humorous. This accounts for its absurd complexity, circuitous reasoning, difficult language, and apparent lack of purpose. In addition, there are certain signs throughout the text (the previous sentence being one example) that the author himself intends just such an interpretation. However, as that same author is also the one following the present line of reasoning, there is no reason to bow to his own interpretation entirely. After all, why should "the most logical interpretation" (as Essay puts it) be applied to a work that is itself thoroughly illogical?

One possibility remains: self-justification. If we abandon entirely the notion that art requires some external motivation for existence, we see at last the real truth: that it simply is. Just as Essay's subject is its own text, so too may its text be its own reason for being; and there, perhaps, we may say no more.


Part VI: Critical Reaction


At the time of this writing, there has been only one major critical reaction to Essay - namely, Essay itself - and so at present we shall consider it alone.

The work in question has been very harshly criticized by its own author, largely because of the properties of the work which enable him to criticize it in the first place. If this seems ironic, consider that the absence of such criticism would render the essay itself virtually nonexistent, which would (arguably) be to the author's disadvantage.

For this reason - coupled with the suspicions intrinsic to any self-evaluation - many do not consider the current body of Essay criticism to be valid. But, as that opinion seems to corroborate Essay's own opinions of itself, it is no great cause for concern. Therefore if you wish to learn more about the contemporary views on this strange piece of writing, I can do no better than to refer you to Essay itself, and I recommend you read no farther in the present work until you have read the former in its entirety.


Part VII: Conclusion


Scathing reviews notwithstanding, Essay has much of value to offer its readers, especially owing to the possibility that they may not exist (see Section IV). It is a work that is not without flaws; yet its tendency to point out these flaws (indeed, its assertion that such is its sole function) may render its weaknesses more tolerable to its long-suffering audience. Such problems also serve to highlight its strengths: a simple, well-ordered high-level structure; clean prose; deep awareness of its own process; and an endearing sort of stupidity that permeates it all.

Here is the serpent who bites his own tail, the infinitely self-reflecting mirror, the Kleine bottle and the Mobius strip. It is valuable to the extent that it is interesting, no more and no less; yet, that fact being itself interesting, it cannot be wholly valueless. That being the case, and seeing that my criticisms are tied to the essay's own fate, I am well pleased - as I can only hope you are also.