Do Novelists Make Good Critics?

Yesterday we posted a link to the NYTimes' article, Read Any Good Books Lately?, which featured a bunch of well-known writers talking about the...well, good books that they'd read lately. In the accompanying post, I poked a bit of fun at the idea that a celebrity's recommendation should be taken any more seriously than a friend's or family member's. The Guardian UK took such teasing one step further, blogging an entire piece questioning the literary criticism of Martin Amis and Ian McEwan, while praising the 'playful analysis of all novels' by Milan Kundera in his recently translated, seven-part essay, The Curtain. The barrage of comments that follow are as biting and illuminating as the piece itself, if not more so.