Criticism
Glenn Stout argues that the idea of a "curse" was rooted originally in antisemitism. Because Harry Frazee was from New York and involved in theatre, it was assumed he was a Jew (he actually was a Presbyterian). Then–American League president Ban Johnson disliked Frazee for this reason, saying he was "too New York" and making reference to the "mystery" of his religion—polite code that would have been well understood in the 1920s. Though Frazee was well respected in Boston, Henry Ford's Dearborn Independent ran a series of articles purporting to expose how Jews were destroying America, and among these were articles lambasting Frazee, saying that with his purchase of the Red Sox "another club was placed under the smothering influences of the 'chosen race.'" These articles turned the tide of both baseball owners and public opinion against Frazee, and Fred Lieb's vilification of Frazee in his biography of the Red Sox portrayed him implicitly as a Jew.
Read more about this topic: Curse Of The Bambino
Famous quotes containing the word criticism:
“People try so hard to believe in leaders now, pitifully hard. But we no sooner get a popular reformer or politician or soldier or writer or philosopher—a Roosevelt, a Tolstoy, a Wood, a Shaw, a Nietzsche, than the cross-currents of criticism wash him away. My Lord, no man can stand prominence these days. It’s the surest path to obscurity. People get sick of hearing the same name over and over.”
—F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896–1940)
“Of all the cants which are canted in this canting world—though the cant of hypocrites may be the worst—the cant of criticism is the most tormenting!”
—Laurence Sterne (1713–1768)
“Good criticism is very rare and always precious.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)