nice interview with Peter Schjeldahl

"'A great critic,' according to Oscar Wilde, 'is susceptible to beauty, and to the various impressions that beauty gives us.' So it is with Schjeldahl, a man burdened with the kind of sensibility that in others turns crippling. 'Give me a Rembrandt in a subway station toilet and a flashlight and I'm happy,' he told me over a diner hamburger. The owner of a contrarian, prickly personality a friend described as 'aggressively shy,' the 65-year-old critic has seen his share of difficulties: a bit of hard-earned penury, a divorce, problems with booze, a lifetime spent nursing his olympically formed doubt. About the latter, Schjeldahl quotes De Kooning: 'No fear but a lot of trembling.' Incredibly for a veteran of the trenches, his 'trembling' extends to writing at length. 'I'm a river navigator,' he told me later over a walk in Central Park. 'I need the bank behind me and one in front. Over 2,000 words and I'm toast...'"