It’s a devil’s bargain if we’ve ever seen one. The literary world has been bemoaning the death of the book review section for years. The Los Angeles Times. The Washington Post. Who would revive the newspaper book review?

Now John Koblin of The New York Observer reports that The Wall Street Journal is about to publish a stand-alone books review section, a move that can only be seen as another direct assault on The New York Times by the Times hating/coveting Rupert Murdoch.

One might have wished for a better savior than Murdoch, a man who, according to biographer Michael Wolff, has “almost no interest in [reading] at all.” One might wish for higher founding principles than spite and jealousy. But none of this will matter to the reviewers reviewing the books. So we say, hesitantly, hooray. Let’s see what the WSJ can do.