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The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages
Literary critic Harold Bloom's The Western Canon is more than a required reading list—it is a vision. Infused with a love of learning, compelling in its arguments for a unifying written culture, it argues brilliantly against the politicization of literature and presents a guide to the great works of the western literary tradition and essential writers of the ages. The Western Canon was nominated for the National Book Critics Circle Award.
546 pages, Paperback
First published August 31, 1994
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About the author
Harold Bloom
1,693 books1,893 followersHarold Bloom was an American literary critic and the Sterling Professor of Humanities at Yale University. In 2017, Bloom was called "probably the most famous literary critic in the English-speaking world." After publishing his first book in 1959, Bloom wrote more than 50 books, including over 40 books of literary criticism, several books discussing religion, and one novel. He edited hundreds of anthologies concerning numerous literary and philosophical figures for the Chelsea House publishing firm. Bloom's books have been translated into more than 40 languages. He was elected to the American Philosophical Society in 1995.
Bloom was a defender of the traditional Western canon at a time when literature departments were focusing on what he derided as the "school of resentment" (multiculturalists, feminists, Marxists, and others). He was educated at Yale University, the University of Cambridge, and Cornell University.
Bloom was a defender of the traditional Western canon at a time when literature departments were focusing on what he derided as the "school of resentment" (multiculturalists, feminists, Marxists, and others). He was educated at Yale University, the University of Cambridge, and Cornell University.
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September 17, 2021
There was an old critic called Harold Bloom,
Who thought Great Literature faced Final Doom,
He resented all Schools,
Other than his own Fools,
So killed what he loved, and emptied the Room!
My reading experience after finishing has not changed the overall impression, but it has made me think, and I took away the second star, which initially was awarded for writing style and erudition. Too much hatred, too much bias, and too much bigotry and repetition to get more than a solitary star for being a printed book with letters in it.
What makes Bloom seem like an "impressive scholar", when he is clearly just repeating his mantra over and over again? He has two main themes, actually. The first is that Shakespeare is in every single work of fiction of any importance, and that Shakespeare always "wins" in an unspecified aesthetic value contest. The other theme is that the School of Resentment is destroying great literature. I added quotes from almost all parts of the book to the reading updates to show the consistency of his fixation, even when it seems absurd. Here's a random quote that keeps repeating itself in every chapter in its myopic implied misogyny and monoculturalism bordering on open racism:
"Pragmatically, the "expansion of the Canon" has meant the destruction of the Canon, since what is being taught includes by no means the best writers who happen to be women, African, Hispanic or Asian, but rather the writers who offer little but the resentment they have developed as part of their sense of identity: There is no strangeness and no originality in such resentment: even if there were, they would not suffice to create heirs to the Yahwist and Homer, Dante and Shakespeare, Cervantes and Joyce."
Apart from the irony that Bloom's book is immersed in his own identity-shaping and unoriginal resentment, the problem also is that he can't SHOW the aesthetic distinction at all. Despite the fact that he is obsessed with ranking authors on a scale with Shakespeare at the top, he cannot name a single objective criteria for doing that. And he cannot offer any argument as to why he is blind to literary qualities outside his chosen circle (obviously blindness prevents you from seeing what you don't see, so that is his disability rather than a fault, in a way, but can I really take a "scholar" seriously who has such a blindfold and proudly dons it too?)
Midway through my reading process, I began to believe that Bloom pokers on exactly that kind of blindness in his worshippers. How many of his followers have actually read the works he is referring to? I can see that the comparisons between Don Quixote and The Divine Comedy, between Goethe's Faust, First Part and Kafka's works may seem like a display of boundless erudition if you can't really relate to the proper works he is talking about, to verify the arguments directly. I suspect most people start with Bloom, and get to the Canon in a second step. In that case, they will be impressed. In my case, it was the opposite. I have read (almost) all books he mentions in his text, and they are among my favourite all time reading experiences. I do not challenge his choice of authors at all, just the exclusive and vindictive attitude he has to the rest of the literary universe, and I dislike the subjective, even chatty and unprofessional mode of analysis he applies to works I know and love. He won't ever see them as masterpieces in their own right. He always has to put them on a scale that is as vulgar as: "this one is better than that one", without following up with any proof (as there is none, it is a matter of preference, not of substance). That reminds me of my toddlers (back in the day), when they argued whose drawing was "best", and got into fistfights over it. They have outgrown that stage of silly agon, and are now able to see different qualities in different works, but Bloom remains psychologically stuck in that mindset.
Bloom's toddler rages started to amuse me once I knew what to expect. The first pages were shocking, as I honestly thought it would be a literary analysis that can be taken seriously. Now that I know better, I enjoyed the delusional journey of the dogmatic literature warrior more. It is interesting from a social study point of view that Harold Bloom misunderstands the idea of literary agon to fit the American conservative concept of "winners" and "losers" in politics and business. He keeps fretting that "the war is lost", and that his side (the army of Bloomian Shakespearianism (aka Shakespearian Bloomianism), a fraction of literary criticism presumably comparable to a sub-group of Mormonism in the context of Christianity) has lost to The School of Resentment (comprised of the world community of all the other literary confessions and the confessionless global reading citizens too).
There is such a great fear in his heart that what he considers the only way to perceive literature will die out with him. And he is right, of course. His highly subjective, hysterically emotional approach to Shakespeare and Dante et alii will indeed not survive his generation of angry white men protecting their inner circle by gaslighting whoever raises a reasonable argument for a more diverse and inclusive approach to the world of literature. Throwing an "aesthetic value" smoke bomb in the face of Alice Walker readers is as meaningless as it is effective to divert from the difficulties of his own arguments for esoteric preferences. Judging literature from a purely aesthetic point of view is all well, but Harold Bloom simply can't see that this is not a synonym for "what Harold Bloom likes". Writing socially important fiction (like Alice Walker or Toni Morrison or Virginia Woolf or Chinua Achebe or ...) can be and is aesthetically valuable in the same way as writing for the sake of aesthetic value alone. (Which his heroes did not do, by the way!)
So here is my status quo at this point: Shakespeare is great despite his somewhat delusional prophet and missionary Bloom. And luckily there are more ways to read Shakespeare than through the eyes of this overprivileged whiny grump!
He can be almost comical when he writes about Virginia Woolf, though, claiming she was not a feminist other than as an aesthete who does not see any social conditions working on art (and this by quoting from A Room of One's Own which famously shows the social conditions of Shakespeare's times stifling women so that an "imaginary sister" of the Bard would have been impossible, never mind the aesthetic "genes" of the twin). When he tries to do away with Woolf's strong arguments for an equal and fair society, he uses arguments that can be turned into a perfect summary against his own method, while it has absolutely nothing to do with the multifaceted literature that Woolf produced against all odds in a society dominated by Blooms in legion:
"Woolf strongly insinuates that your disagreement with her urgency is founded on imperceptiveness".
Bloom strongly insinuates that your disagreement with his urgency is founded on imperceptiveness!
If I were to give him something for his birthday, it would be a telescope, so he can watch the multitude of the stars of the literary sky. As it is now, he is sitting there mumbling in front of his microscope, seeing nothing but Shakespeare mirrored in his own Bloomagnifying glass. (And yes, to add to his theory of literary influence, my gift is of course influenced by the wonderful Steinbeck and Mack and the boys, in Sweet Thursday!)
Who thought Great Literature faced Final Doom,
He resented all Schools,
Other than his own Fools,
So killed what he loved, and emptied the Room!
My reading experience after finishing has not changed the overall impression, but it has made me think, and I took away the second star, which initially was awarded for writing style and erudition. Too much hatred, too much bias, and too much bigotry and repetition to get more than a solitary star for being a printed book with letters in it.
What makes Bloom seem like an "impressive scholar", when he is clearly just repeating his mantra over and over again? He has two main themes, actually. The first is that Shakespeare is in every single work of fiction of any importance, and that Shakespeare always "wins" in an unspecified aesthetic value contest. The other theme is that the School of Resentment is destroying great literature. I added quotes from almost all parts of the book to the reading updates to show the consistency of his fixation, even when it seems absurd. Here's a random quote that keeps repeating itself in every chapter in its myopic implied misogyny and monoculturalism bordering on open racism:
"Pragmatically, the "expansion of the Canon" has meant the destruction of the Canon, since what is being taught includes by no means the best writers who happen to be women, African, Hispanic or Asian, but rather the writers who offer little but the resentment they have developed as part of their sense of identity: There is no strangeness and no originality in such resentment: even if there were, they would not suffice to create heirs to the Yahwist and Homer, Dante and Shakespeare, Cervantes and Joyce."
Apart from the irony that Bloom's book is immersed in his own identity-shaping and unoriginal resentment, the problem also is that he can't SHOW the aesthetic distinction at all. Despite the fact that he is obsessed with ranking authors on a scale with Shakespeare at the top, he cannot name a single objective criteria for doing that. And he cannot offer any argument as to why he is blind to literary qualities outside his chosen circle (obviously blindness prevents you from seeing what you don't see, so that is his disability rather than a fault, in a way, but can I really take a "scholar" seriously who has such a blindfold and proudly dons it too?)
Midway through my reading process, I began to believe that Bloom pokers on exactly that kind of blindness in his worshippers. How many of his followers have actually read the works he is referring to? I can see that the comparisons between Don Quixote and The Divine Comedy, between Goethe's Faust, First Part and Kafka's works may seem like a display of boundless erudition if you can't really relate to the proper works he is talking about, to verify the arguments directly. I suspect most people start with Bloom, and get to the Canon in a second step. In that case, they will be impressed. In my case, it was the opposite. I have read (almost) all books he mentions in his text, and they are among my favourite all time reading experiences. I do not challenge his choice of authors at all, just the exclusive and vindictive attitude he has to the rest of the literary universe, and I dislike the subjective, even chatty and unprofessional mode of analysis he applies to works I know and love. He won't ever see them as masterpieces in their own right. He always has to put them on a scale that is as vulgar as: "this one is better than that one", without following up with any proof (as there is none, it is a matter of preference, not of substance). That reminds me of my toddlers (back in the day), when they argued whose drawing was "best", and got into fistfights over it. They have outgrown that stage of silly agon, and are now able to see different qualities in different works, but Bloom remains psychologically stuck in that mindset.
Bloom's toddler rages started to amuse me once I knew what to expect. The first pages were shocking, as I honestly thought it would be a literary analysis that can be taken seriously. Now that I know better, I enjoyed the delusional journey of the dogmatic literature warrior more. It is interesting from a social study point of view that Harold Bloom misunderstands the idea of literary agon to fit the American conservative concept of "winners" and "losers" in politics and business. He keeps fretting that "the war is lost", and that his side (the army of Bloomian Shakespearianism (aka Shakespearian Bloomianism), a fraction of literary criticism presumably comparable to a sub-group of Mormonism in the context of Christianity) has lost to The School of Resentment (comprised of the world community of all the other literary confessions and the confessionless global reading citizens too).
There is such a great fear in his heart that what he considers the only way to perceive literature will die out with him. And he is right, of course. His highly subjective, hysterically emotional approach to Shakespeare and Dante et alii will indeed not survive his generation of angry white men protecting their inner circle by gaslighting whoever raises a reasonable argument for a more diverse and inclusive approach to the world of literature. Throwing an "aesthetic value" smoke bomb in the face of Alice Walker readers is as meaningless as it is effective to divert from the difficulties of his own arguments for esoteric preferences. Judging literature from a purely aesthetic point of view is all well, but Harold Bloom simply can't see that this is not a synonym for "what Harold Bloom likes". Writing socially important fiction (like Alice Walker or Toni Morrison or Virginia Woolf or Chinua Achebe or ...) can be and is aesthetically valuable in the same way as writing for the sake of aesthetic value alone. (Which his heroes did not do, by the way!)
So here is my status quo at this point: Shakespeare is great despite his somewhat delusional prophet and missionary Bloom. And luckily there are more ways to read Shakespeare than through the eyes of this overprivileged whiny grump!
He can be almost comical when he writes about Virginia Woolf, though, claiming she was not a feminist other than as an aesthete who does not see any social conditions working on art (and this by quoting from A Room of One's Own which famously shows the social conditions of Shakespeare's times stifling women so that an "imaginary sister" of the Bard would have been impossible, never mind the aesthetic "genes" of the twin). When he tries to do away with Woolf's strong arguments for an equal and fair society, he uses arguments that can be turned into a perfect summary against his own method, while it has absolutely nothing to do with the multifaceted literature that Woolf produced against all odds in a society dominated by Blooms in legion:
"Woolf strongly insinuates that your disagreement with her urgency is founded on imperceptiveness".
Bloom strongly insinuates that your disagreement with his urgency is founded on imperceptiveness!
If I were to give him something for his birthday, it would be a telescope, so he can watch the multitude of the stars of the literary sky. As it is now, he is sitting there mumbling in front of his microscope, seeing nothing but Shakespeare mirrored in his own Bloomagnifying glass. (And yes, to add to his theory of literary influence, my gift is of course influenced by the wonderful Steinbeck and Mack and the boys, in Sweet Thursday!)
reviews-of-books-i-didnt-read
February 27, 2023GREAT LESSER KNOWN BOOKS BY WELL KNOWN AUTHORS
I think these are probably not in Mr Bloom's book, and I want to know why!
1. Ray Bradbury’s history of British sport Something Wicket This Way Comes
2. Charles Dickens novel on the ravages caused by tuberculosis, Great Expectorations
3. Dostoievski’s biography of George Bush, The Idiot (I prefer that one to Raymond Chandler’s The Big Creep)
4. Mary Shelley on the current crisis in capitalism Investment Bankenstein
5. Dickens again on the same topic Our Mutual Fund
6. Emily Bronte’s furious denunciation of the condition of workers in a globalised economy Withering Rights
7. Gustave Flaubert’s true crime classic about an international IVF racket They Called Her Madame Ovary
8. Jerome K Jerome’s exposure of internet bestiality sites Three Men and a Goat (not for the squeamish)
9. Jack Kerouac’s freewheeling journal of travels in pre-Roman Britain On the Woad
10. Jack Kerouac’s account of the problems of travelling with a speech impediment On the Woad
11. Vladimir Nabokov’s standard technical manual on industrial temperature control in large indoor areas Blowheater
12. Gunther Grass’ expose of poor standards in British 1950s catering The Grim Bun
13. V S Naipaul’s searing study of male sexual dysfunction A Bend in the Penis
14. Alice Sebald’s monograph on contemporary traffic management systems The Lovely Cones
15. Jodi Picault’s classic comedy of the 1980s My Sister’s Beeper
16. Elizabeth Gilbert’s moving account of the life of an Italian goat Bleat, Graze, Glove
Something for everyone I think. Why aren't these better known?
I think these are probably not in Mr Bloom's book, and I want to know why!
1. Ray Bradbury’s history of British sport Something Wicket This Way Comes
2. Charles Dickens novel on the ravages caused by tuberculosis, Great Expectorations
3. Dostoievski’s biography of George Bush, The Idiot (I prefer that one to Raymond Chandler’s The Big Creep)
4. Mary Shelley on the current crisis in capitalism Investment Bankenstein
5. Dickens again on the same topic Our Mutual Fund
6. Emily Bronte’s furious denunciation of the condition of workers in a globalised economy Withering Rights
7. Gustave Flaubert’s true crime classic about an international IVF racket They Called Her Madame Ovary
8. Jerome K Jerome’s exposure of internet bestiality sites Three Men and a Goat (not for the squeamish)
9. Jack Kerouac’s freewheeling journal of travels in pre-Roman Britain On the Woad
10. Jack Kerouac’s account of the problems of travelling with a speech impediment On the Woad
11. Vladimir Nabokov’s standard technical manual on industrial temperature control in large indoor areas Blowheater
12. Gunther Grass’ expose of poor standards in British 1950s catering The Grim Bun
13. V S Naipaul’s searing study of male sexual dysfunction A Bend in the Penis
14. Alice Sebald’s monograph on contemporary traffic management systems The Lovely Cones
15. Jodi Picault’s classic comedy of the 1980s My Sister’s Beeper
16. Elizabeth Gilbert’s moving account of the life of an Italian goat Bleat, Graze, Glove
Something for everyone I think. Why aren't these better known?
December 21, 2021
„Viața abia ne mai ajunge pentru a citi doar o selecție a marilor autori... Cel care citește trebuie să aleagă, odată ce, literalmente, nu există timp suficient pentru a citi tot, chiar dacă el n-ar face altceva decît să citească”.
Oare de ce cumpărăm cărți? Răspunsul lui Harold Bloom e luminos: ca să avem cu ce ne ocupa timpul dacă eșuăm pe o insulă pustie. Transcriu: „Fiecare ar trebui să aibă o listă de cărți pentru acea zi cînd, fugind de propriii dușmani, debarcă pe o insulă pustie și, odată lupta încheiată, își va petrece restul timpului citind” (p.520).
Harold Bloom trimite la așa-numitul „Joc al insulei pustii”. Jocul pornește de la întrebarea încuietoare: „Care sînt cele 10 cărți pe care le-ați lua pe o insulă pustie?”. Întrebarea îți cere să alegi, să-ți ierarhizezi biblioteca (de cîteva sute sau cîteva mii de cărți) și să te rezumi la numai 10 titluri. Cu ele vei merge pe insula misterioasă. Ele îți vor ține loc de prieteni. Jocul e, deci, mai serios decît pare. Din păcate, simțul discriminării nu e spontan, nu e înnăscut, el se formează prin lectură și reflecție metodică. Asta presupune că meditația asupra unei cărți (post-lectura) e mai importantă decît simpla ei lectură. Virginia Woolf, cronicar literar la Times Literary Supplement timp de decenii, a susținut ceva asemănător: „E o nesăbuință să crezi că partea a doua a lecturii (care înseamnă să judeci, să compari) e la fel de simplă ca prima. Și nu o poți lăsa în seama altora (chiar dacă poți învăța de la ei)” („How Should One Read a Book?”, 1925). Așadar, fericitul necaz de a eșua pe o insulă pustie trebuie pregătit din vreme.
Alte fragmente din Canonul occidental:
„Această carte nu e destinată academicienilor, pentru că foarte puțini dintre ei mai citesc pentru plăcerea lecturii. Dar ceea ce Johnson şi Virginia Woolf numeau cititorul obişnuit încă mai există şi încă e deschis sugestiilor referitoare la ceea ce ar trebui citit. Un astfel de cititor nu citeşte pentru a găsi o plăcere facilă şi nici pentru a scăpa de vina socială, ci pentru a-şi face mai cuprinzătoare existenţa socială. [...] Ca om dependent de literatură, care citeşte totul... revin acum nu pentru a vă spune ce şi cum să citiţi, ci ceea ce am citit eu şi cred că merită recitit (iar asta ar putea fi singurul test real al canonicităţii)“ (pp.513-514).
„Cred că omul, în încercarea de a fi liber și solitar, citește cu un singur scop: confruntarea cu măreția” (p.519).
P. S. Ca de obicei, librăriile online prezintă cartea fără a menționa traducătorul. Pe Goodreads, la fel. Traducerea Canonului occidental aparține doamnei Delia Ungureanu.
September 14, 2022
Soooo looks like I haven’t updated #read since February of last year hmmmm I see and updated read count in our near futures dudes!
4/11 I’m really curious about how many I’ve read. It’s been two years now and I’ve been plugging away. I may try to count them this week. Im afraid I’m just going to get discouraged.
27/21 I’m close to 500 people!
5/7/20. UPDATE I have read about 400 from this list! I’m slowly getting there!
I. WILL. NEVER. READ. ALL. OF. THESE. BOOKS. EVER.
FAIL
“Who reads must choose, since there is literally not enough time to read everything, even if one does does nothing but read.” CHALLENGE ACCEPTED
1/19/22
Still plugging thru this list. Part of me wants to attempt to count how many I’ve read now. It’s been a year. I really need to figure out this spreadsheet but I’m working from prob over 10 lists, so neither way is easy.
4/11 I’m really curious about how many I’ve read. It’s been two years now and I’ve been plugging away. I may try to count them this week. Im afraid I’m just going to get discouraged.
27/21 I’m close to 500 people!
5/7/20. UPDATE I have read about 400 from this list! I’m slowly getting there!
I. WILL. NEVER. READ. ALL. OF. THESE. BOOKS. EVER.
FAIL
“Who reads must choose, since there is literally not enough time to read everything, even if one does does nothing but read.” CHALLENGE ACCEPTED
1/19/22
Still plugging thru this list. Part of me wants to attempt to count how many I’ve read now. It’s been a year. I really need to figure out this spreadsheet but I’m working from prob over 10 lists, so neither way is easy.
September 23, 2016
Tradition is not only a handing-down or process of benign transmission; it is also a conflict between past genius and present aspiration, in which the prize is literary survival or canonical inclusion.
As far as I know, Harold Bloom is the last major proponent of the ‘Great Books’ paradigm of higher education. This makes him something of an apocalyptic prophet. With great solemnity, he predicted (this was in 1994) that the Western world was about to enter into a new cultural era, a new Theocratic Age, wherein dogmatism would drive out aesthetic criteria from literature departments. Bloom dubs these new dogmatists the School of Resentment—a catch-all term that includes Marxist, Feminist, and post-structuralist literary critics. All of these approaches, says Bloom, seek to replace an aesthetic motive for a social or political one, and thus miss the point of literature.
Bloom sets out to defend his familiar Western Canon, and does so by analyzing twenty-six writers to see what makes them canonical. Why do we keep reading Shakespeare, Dante, Cervantes, and Tolstoy? The answer, Bloom finds, is because these works are strange: “One mark of an originality that can win canonical status for a literary work is a strangeness that we either never altogether assimilate, or that becomes such a given that we are blinded to its idiosyncrasies.” Canonical works are those that are always beyond us somehow, those that are too rich, deep, and original to fully absorb.
How do artists achieve this exquisite strangeness? Bloom’s answer is that authors creatively misread the works of their predecessors to clear a creative space for themselves. This is Bloom’s famous anxiety of influence. Every writer feels anxiety about what they owe to their predecessors, so they attempt to find a weakness or a shortcoming—a place where there is still room for originality. But almost no author is original enough to outperform every one of their literary forebears. In Bloom’s opinion, there have only been two writers who have done so: Dante and Shakespeare. (I would add a few others to the list, personally.)
While Dante is given his due, Shakespeare is the real center of this book. Bloom is obsessed with Shakespeare: he worships him. For Bloom, Shakespeare invented the modern human. By this he means (I think) that Shakespeare’s characters redefined what we think of as personality and the self. Every writer since Shakespeare has so deeply internalized Shakespeare’s version of human nature that we can’t portray people in any other light. Shakespeare’s mind was too vast, acute, and convincing for us to get beyond it. Thus all writers after Shakespeare are forced to misread and misunderstand him in order to find a space for creativity.
Since Bloom thinks Shakespeare is so inescapably central, he discusses Shakespeare in every chapter—even the chapters on writers who predated Shakespeare: Dante, Chaucer, Cervantes, and Montaigne. But Shakespeare is not the only writer whose influence Bloom discusses. Bloom’s whole model of literary originality consists of reading and misreading, influence and anxiety, so he is constantly comparing and contrasting writers. One of his favorite activities is to trace out literary ancestries, saying which writer descended from which.
It is hard for me to know what to make of all this. I find Bloom’s model of the anxiety of influence really compelling. But it is clearly the theory of an avid reader, not a writer. As is obvious on every page, Bloom is obsessed with reading; so it’s natural for him to reduce the writing process to reading and misreading. Bloom’s approach also leads to a rather inordinate amount of name-dropping. He mentions scores of poets, playwrights, and novelists on every page, often in long lists, and sometimes this seems to be for purposes of intimidation rather than illumination. What is more, Bloom’s approach requires a great deal of comparing and contrasting between different authors, which can make it seem as though he is more interested in connections between authors rather than authors themselves.
Bloom’s writing style, while appealing, can also be off-putting. There is something incantatory about it. He repeats similar observations, drops the same names, inserts the same quotations, and asserts the same points in different contexts and to slightly different purposes. His mind seems always to be swirling and buzzing rather than traveling in a straight line. He also has the bad habit of arguing from authority rather than with reasons. His treatment of the so-called School of Resentment is dismissive at best. He does not address their arguments, but rather talks of them as lost souls, blinded by worldly things. Another fault is that he makes assertions about authors that are not properly substantiated. The most noticeable of these was his claim that all of Freud’s theories are contained in Shakespeare—something he says repeatedly, but never adequately demonstrates.
I found Bloom to be consistently good in his criticism, but not great. There are many excellent and thought-provoking observations about writers and books here. But all too often Bloom’s criticism consists of little more than repeatedly insisting that this author is one of the best. His belief is that aesthetic appreciation can’t be taught; thus if you are not so endowed, you simply have to trust Bloom that certain writers are better than others. To be fair I think it’s impossible to “prove” that Shakespeare is better than Dan Brown. Nevertheless, Bloom’s attitude of authority can be seriously disagreeable. To question the motivation of your opponents (which he does) and to position yourself as an oracle and a prophet (which he also does) are not healthy attitudes for an intellectual.
Despite all of these misgivings, however, I still largely agree with Bloom’s judgments. In my experience the writers in Bloom’s canon are in a league of their own for the depth of literary pleasure they can provide. And although I am not so convinced of the autonomy of the aesthetic, I also think that aesthetic criteria are ultimately the most important in literary judgments.
February 26, 2008
"The only spirit in 'Ulysses' is Shakespeare."
"In conversation with John Dryden, [Milton] once confessed rather too readily that Spenser was his 'Great Original,' a remark that I have come to understand as a defense against Shakespeare."
"Oedipus, I suggest, was hauled in by Freud and grafted onto Hamlet largely in order to cover up an obligation to Shakespeare."
"Except for Shakespeare, Chaucer is foremost among writers in the English language."
'Knowing more English would not have enlightened Tolstoy; his fury at Shakespeare was defensive, though presumably he was unaware of it.'
Harold Bloom represents everything that is wrong with everything I usually tend to hold dear - intelligence, literature, higher education, lofty pretension, the belief that writing about artwork can be just as important as the artwork itself, the notion that the critic is something akin to a holy man. He is the parasite suckling the sweet nectar of the gods out of the wide expanse of literature. We are all very, very lucky that he has never deigned to notice any but the most obvious modern authors (Pynchon, Roth, Delillo, and McCarthy.)
Of course, that would involve writing about people who are alive and could defend themselves, and Bloom has the courage of a dozen Grail knights when it comes to making the most far-spanning assumptions about very great, very intelligent, very talented, very dead men. I'm not quite sure how it is that Bloom has become so highly regarded in the study of literature, because he basically has one weapon in his arsenal which he pulls out at nearly every juncture. The man writes "Shakespeare" often enough to demand a drinking game. In the very first paragraph of his essay on Milton, he writes "Shakespeare" 9 times. This is a rare moment of restraint for Bloom.
Okay, okay, I am not simple. I understand that Bloom has chosen to frame his western canon through the prism of Shakespeare. In this way, Bloom's writing is very strikingly similar to the writing of one of my favorite non-fiction novelists, David Thomson, who, in "The Whole Equation," views the history of Hollywood through the double lens of F. Scott Fitzgerald's "The Last Tycoon" and Robert Towne's "Chinatown." The difference is that Thomson is focusing on their treatment of Los Angeles, whereas Bloom is focusing on how Shakespeare invented literature, awareness, and humanity (one of his books is "Shakespeare: the Invention of the Human").
There is another important difference between Thomson and Bloom: Thomson would have been a great novelist if he weren't so obsessed with the movies (he says as much, or comes close to saying that, very often in his writing); Bloom would have been a second-rate used car salesman if someone, somewhere, hadn't given him the awful idea that he should write about writing.
I realize Bloom knows more about literature than practically anyone on the face of the earth. This does not hide the fact that he understands literature less than your average ten-year-old and, moreover, that he is so unremittingly insistent upon some unchanging interpretation of literature, and so humorless in his consideration of writers and their writing, that his continued presence in the literary world is an insult to every single author he claims to praise in the book, Will Shakespeare included.
Over and over again, like a king besieged by madness in an empty castle, he rails against the numerous people and forces who are arrayed against him - feminists, marxists, culturists (he references African-American academics specifically and all non-white academics generally.) This at first seems peppy and un-PC, then lightly racist and sexist, before it settles in that Bloom simply has very little interest in most non-Caucasian, non-male, non-Bloom concepts.
And there's the Shakespeare. You could argue (Bloom doesn't, but strongly implies to the point of embarrassment) that Shakespeare's influence has trickled down through the ages and social strata, so that an illiterate Sudanese orphan or a third-generation Turkish "guest worker" immigrant in Berlin or Paris Hilton all live and breathe in his influence, just as you can argue that a butterfly in Brazil flaps a hurricane into existence on the other side of the world or that, when no one is around, trees that fall in forests hum "Stairway to Heaven" on their way down. Because you can't really prove anything, you can say everything. David Thomson gets away with this kind of thing because he is witty, because he carries himself like a fellow traveler, and because he has a certain British self-deflation which gives his most madcap suggestions a twinkle - as when, in his biography of Orson Welles, he casually notes that young Orson was racing through local Irish lassies in a small province just about nine months before Peter O'Toole was born.
Above all, David Thomson (and I am talking about him so much only because there is so little to say about Bloom) is daring, and perhaps self-loathing, enough to question whether or not his primary influence - the filmic art - is actually rather silly, if not ruinous. Bloom, conversely, declares, "We owe to Shakespeare not only our representation of cognition but much of our capacity for cognition." Bloom is openly declaring literature as religion, Shakespeare as God (and the other way around, too) - which would place him, humbly, as the great outspoken prophet of a debased age - a Daniel in Babylon.
Too bad the tigers would just spit him back out.
"In conversation with John Dryden, [Milton] once confessed rather too readily that Spenser was his 'Great Original,' a remark that I have come to understand as a defense against Shakespeare."
"Oedipus, I suggest, was hauled in by Freud and grafted onto Hamlet largely in order to cover up an obligation to Shakespeare."
"Except for Shakespeare, Chaucer is foremost among writers in the English language."
'Knowing more English would not have enlightened Tolstoy; his fury at Shakespeare was defensive, though presumably he was unaware of it.'
Harold Bloom represents everything that is wrong with everything I usually tend to hold dear - intelligence, literature, higher education, lofty pretension, the belief that writing about artwork can be just as important as the artwork itself, the notion that the critic is something akin to a holy man. He is the parasite suckling the sweet nectar of the gods out of the wide expanse of literature. We are all very, very lucky that he has never deigned to notice any but the most obvious modern authors (Pynchon, Roth, Delillo, and McCarthy.)
Of course, that would involve writing about people who are alive and could defend themselves, and Bloom has the courage of a dozen Grail knights when it comes to making the most far-spanning assumptions about very great, very intelligent, very talented, very dead men. I'm not quite sure how it is that Bloom has become so highly regarded in the study of literature, because he basically has one weapon in his arsenal which he pulls out at nearly every juncture. The man writes "Shakespeare" often enough to demand a drinking game. In the very first paragraph of his essay on Milton, he writes "Shakespeare" 9 times. This is a rare moment of restraint for Bloom.
Okay, okay, I am not simple. I understand that Bloom has chosen to frame his western canon through the prism of Shakespeare. In this way, Bloom's writing is very strikingly similar to the writing of one of my favorite non-fiction novelists, David Thomson, who, in "The Whole Equation," views the history of Hollywood through the double lens of F. Scott Fitzgerald's "The Last Tycoon" and Robert Towne's "Chinatown." The difference is that Thomson is focusing on their treatment of Los Angeles, whereas Bloom is focusing on how Shakespeare invented literature, awareness, and humanity (one of his books is "Shakespeare: the Invention of the Human").
There is another important difference between Thomson and Bloom: Thomson would have been a great novelist if he weren't so obsessed with the movies (he says as much, or comes close to saying that, very often in his writing); Bloom would have been a second-rate used car salesman if someone, somewhere, hadn't given him the awful idea that he should write about writing.
I realize Bloom knows more about literature than practically anyone on the face of the earth. This does not hide the fact that he understands literature less than your average ten-year-old and, moreover, that he is so unremittingly insistent upon some unchanging interpretation of literature, and so humorless in his consideration of writers and their writing, that his continued presence in the literary world is an insult to every single author he claims to praise in the book, Will Shakespeare included.
Over and over again, like a king besieged by madness in an empty castle, he rails against the numerous people and forces who are arrayed against him - feminists, marxists, culturists (he references African-American academics specifically and all non-white academics generally.) This at first seems peppy and un-PC, then lightly racist and sexist, before it settles in that Bloom simply has very little interest in most non-Caucasian, non-male, non-Bloom concepts.
And there's the Shakespeare. You could argue (Bloom doesn't, but strongly implies to the point of embarrassment) that Shakespeare's influence has trickled down through the ages and social strata, so that an illiterate Sudanese orphan or a third-generation Turkish "guest worker" immigrant in Berlin or Paris Hilton all live and breathe in his influence, just as you can argue that a butterfly in Brazil flaps a hurricane into existence on the other side of the world or that, when no one is around, trees that fall in forests hum "Stairway to Heaven" on their way down. Because you can't really prove anything, you can say everything. David Thomson gets away with this kind of thing because he is witty, because he carries himself like a fellow traveler, and because he has a certain British self-deflation which gives his most madcap suggestions a twinkle - as when, in his biography of Orson Welles, he casually notes that young Orson was racing through local Irish lassies in a small province just about nine months before Peter O'Toole was born.
Above all, David Thomson (and I am talking about him so much only because there is so little to say about Bloom) is daring, and perhaps self-loathing, enough to question whether or not his primary influence - the filmic art - is actually rather silly, if not ruinous. Bloom, conversely, declares, "We owe to Shakespeare not only our representation of cognition but much of our capacity for cognition." Bloom is openly declaring literature as religion, Shakespeare as God (and the other way around, too) - which would place him, humbly, as the great outspoken prophet of a debased age - a Daniel in Babylon.
Too bad the tigers would just spit him back out.
July 28, 2021
S-a tot vorbit de canon, dar nimeni nu citește după un canon (id est o listă de cărți valoroase care ar trebui studiate negreșit, cam ca listele de lecturi pentru vacanță) decît în școală. De aceea urîm cărțile din liceu, fiindcă am fost „constrînși” să le citim. După ce terminăm școlile, citim cam la întîmplare, de curiozitate, în căutarea unei plăceri sau a unui gînd folositor.
Ceea ce s-a pierdut astăzi nu e simțul canonului (există nenumărate canoane, chiar azi am văzut că un prieten citea Invitation to the Classics: A Guide to Books You've Always Wanted to Read de Louise Cowan), ceea ce s-a pierdut e plăcerea lecturii. Există o mulțime de lucrări care discută despre „nocivitatea” canoanelor (sub îndemnul „read at whim”!), dar nici una nu ne învață cum să citim de plăcere.
Orice listă de autori e discutabilă, inclusiv cea a lui Harold Bloom. De altfel, autorul însuși spunea că s-a săturat să citească recenzii critice la cartea sa, în care e investigată și trecută prin ciur doar lista celor 26 de autori canonici comentați de el. E o greșeală. Singurul lucru care s-ar cuveni reținut din cartea polemică a lui HB este respectarea cu strictețe a criteriului estetic, cînd recomanzi celorlalți cititori un titlu (sau mai multe).
În rest, pentru cei care nu au răsfoit acest volum deja canonic, ofer lista lui Bloom. Voi nota cu un plus (+) autorii care îmi plac.
1. William Shakespeare +
2. Dante Alighieri
3. Geoffrey Chaucer
4. Miguel de Cervantes +
5. Michel de Montaigne +
6. Molière
7. John Milton
8. Samuel Johnson
9. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
10. William Wordsworth
11. Jane Austen +
12. Walt Whitman +
13. Emily Dickinson
14. Charles Dickens
15. George Eliot +
16. Lev Tolstoi +
17. Henrik Ibsen
18. Sigmund Freud
19. Marcel Proust
20. James Joyce
21. Virginia Woolf
22. Franz Kafka +
23. Jorge Luis Borges +
24. Pablo Neruda
25. Fernando Pessoa
26. Samuel Beckett
P. S. După mintea mea, Sigmund Freud nu are ce căuta într-un canon literar. E o prezență exotică, imposibil de justificat. Numai un reprezentant al „școlii resentimenului” l-ar lua în calcul, fiindcă unui astfel de savant nu-i pasă de distincția dintre literatură și non-literatură, dintre o carte bună și una proastă. Dacă-l acceptăm pe Freud, atunci trebuie să-i acceptăm în canon și pe Darwin, și pe Bergson (a luat premiul Nobel pentru literatură), și pe Bertrand Russell (și el a luat Nobelul). Toți au scris cărți...
Ceea ce s-a pierdut astăzi nu e simțul canonului (există nenumărate canoane, chiar azi am văzut că un prieten citea Invitation to the Classics: A Guide to Books You've Always Wanted to Read de Louise Cowan), ceea ce s-a pierdut e plăcerea lecturii. Există o mulțime de lucrări care discută despre „nocivitatea” canoanelor (sub îndemnul „read at whim”!), dar nici una nu ne învață cum să citim de plăcere.
Orice listă de autori e discutabilă, inclusiv cea a lui Harold Bloom. De altfel, autorul însuși spunea că s-a săturat să citească recenzii critice la cartea sa, în care e investigată și trecută prin ciur doar lista celor 26 de autori canonici comentați de el. E o greșeală. Singurul lucru care s-ar cuveni reținut din cartea polemică a lui HB este respectarea cu strictețe a criteriului estetic, cînd recomanzi celorlalți cititori un titlu (sau mai multe).
În rest, pentru cei care nu au răsfoit acest volum deja canonic, ofer lista lui Bloom. Voi nota cu un plus (+) autorii care îmi plac.
1. William Shakespeare +
2. Dante Alighieri
3. Geoffrey Chaucer
4. Miguel de Cervantes +
5. Michel de Montaigne +
6. Molière
7. John Milton
8. Samuel Johnson
9. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
10. William Wordsworth
11. Jane Austen +
12. Walt Whitman +
13. Emily Dickinson
14. Charles Dickens
15. George Eliot +
16. Lev Tolstoi +
17. Henrik Ibsen
18. Sigmund Freud
19. Marcel Proust
20. James Joyce
21. Virginia Woolf
22. Franz Kafka +
23. Jorge Luis Borges +
24. Pablo Neruda
25. Fernando Pessoa
26. Samuel Beckett
P. S. După mintea mea, Sigmund Freud nu are ce căuta într-un canon literar. E o prezență exotică, imposibil de justificat. Numai un reprezentant al „școlii resentimenului” l-ar lua în calcul, fiindcă unui astfel de savant nu-i pasă de distincția dintre literatură și non-literatură, dintre o carte bună și una proastă. Dacă-l acceptăm pe Freud, atunci trebuie să-i acceptăm în canon și pe Darwin, și pe Bergson (a luat premiul Nobel pentru literatură), și pe Bertrand Russell (și el a luat Nobelul). Toți au scris cărți...
March 27, 2019
The Religion of Good Writing
Incomparable Bloom. Inspiring and informative in equal (and large) measure. Bloom's religion is literature; this is its originating text. Don't miss it.
Incomparable Bloom. Inspiring and informative in equal (and large) measure. Bloom's religion is literature; this is its originating text. Don't miss it.
March 11, 2021
Harold Bloom really is a cantankerous old thing, so hard to please and yet so seemingly pleased with himself. I actually enjoy reading Bloom, if only because I like arguing with him in my head. He makes plenty of good points in this massive exploration of Literature with a capital "L," but he also highlights many of the reasons the "dead white male" pantheon persists, and why he thinks it should. Many of his arguments are in complete opposition to the idea of diversity in literature that I hold near and dear, and his lack of faith in the future of great writing is, I think, short sighted and elitist.
The concept of escapist reading completely, well, escapes him. To think that someone may read a book to enjoy the stories or the characters without making any life-shattering discoveries concerning human nature and the complexities of existence is nearly blasphemous. Yes, Shakespeare is great, but I would really love it if Bloom could pull his head out of the Bard's ass for five minutes. To Bloom, reading for pure enjoyment is a waste of time, and is a regrettable condition into which our once-literate society has fallen. Never mind the issues of class and race that have stilted literature in favor of the few; he dismisses it off-hand and condemns those that adhere to the belief in the possibility of literary equality. He makes some grudging concessions for Jane Austen, but that's where his open-mindedness ends. Sure, few works can compare to The Divine Comedy, or Paradise Lost, or nearly anything by his beloved Shakespeare in terms of complexity or standing, but why is this the only measure of greatness? He'll tell you why, but it's too long winded for me to summarize here.
Why would I give this three stars when I so obviously disagree with most of it? Easy: it is not necessary to agree with something to appreciate it, or at least take something useful away from it amongst the more obnoxious and closed-minded bits. Bloom is a vastly well-read scholar, with troves of knowledge and a great deal of experience under his belt. All of those Bloom's Guides to (insert classic work here) that helped you get through your high school/college reading lists? He wrote them, and there must be more than a hundred by now. Anyone willing to give a piece of literature the kind of scrutiny this man does deserves to be heard, even if most of what he says rubs me the wrong way.
The concept of escapist reading completely, well, escapes him. To think that someone may read a book to enjoy the stories or the characters without making any life-shattering discoveries concerning human nature and the complexities of existence is nearly blasphemous. Yes, Shakespeare is great, but I would really love it if Bloom could pull his head out of the Bard's ass for five minutes. To Bloom, reading for pure enjoyment is a waste of time, and is a regrettable condition into which our once-literate society has fallen. Never mind the issues of class and race that have stilted literature in favor of the few; he dismisses it off-hand and condemns those that adhere to the belief in the possibility of literary equality. He makes some grudging concessions for Jane Austen, but that's where his open-mindedness ends. Sure, few works can compare to The Divine Comedy, or Paradise Lost, or nearly anything by his beloved Shakespeare in terms of complexity or standing, but why is this the only measure of greatness? He'll tell you why, but it's too long winded for me to summarize here.
Why would I give this three stars when I so obviously disagree with most of it? Easy: it is not necessary to agree with something to appreciate it, or at least take something useful away from it amongst the more obnoxious and closed-minded bits. Bloom is a vastly well-read scholar, with troves of knowledge and a great deal of experience under his belt. All of those Bloom's Guides to (insert classic work here) that helped you get through your high school/college reading lists? He wrote them, and there must be more than a hundred by now. Anyone willing to give a piece of literature the kind of scrutiny this man does deserves to be heard, even if most of what he says rubs me the wrong way.
March 19, 2008
I finally had to read Bloom because he seems to irritate so many people. He is the torchbearer of literary aesthetics, or rather an aesthetic literary canon. He repeatedly denigrates and teases the contemporary schools of thought: feminism, new historicism, deconstructionism, etc. As such, mention of this book most frequently invokes a scoff, usually by someone who hasn’t read it. I urge you to. Bloom has read with extraordinary breadth and depth and seems to remember it all. I cannot vouch for his more specific works of literary criticism, but in this book he constructs an image of the western canon through a series of essays highlighting the major players. Influence is the key word in this book. It’s Bloom’s specialty. Anxiety and strangeness are indicators. The strangeness of certain writers overwhelms and causes anxiety for subsequent writers. This is how Bloom constructs the western canon.
If you are a serious reader, particularly if you are a twenty-something and find yourself reading random books in no particular order, I highly recommend pushing through this book as a means of organizing yourself (and for most of us, as a means of patching the gaping holes in our literary education). Bloom will inform and excite you and challenge the liberal, multicultural idea of Literature that is currently considered normal.
If you are a serious reader, particularly if you are a twenty-something and find yourself reading random books in no particular order, I highly recommend pushing through this book as a means of organizing yourself (and for most of us, as a means of patching the gaping holes in our literary education). Bloom will inform and excite you and challenge the liberal, multicultural idea of Literature that is currently considered normal.
January 19, 2025
Of course I readily agree with author Harold Bloom in The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages considering William Shakespeare as one of the greatest (dramatic) authors ever (or thus far) and also in fact in any language. And I can to at least a certain point even be on board with Bloom therefore placing Shakespeare at the centre of his envisioned Western literary canon. Nevertheless though, part of me also rather chafes a bit at this, since William Shakespeare is really known only for his admittedly spectacular plays and somewhat for his lovely and delightful sonnets, but should not the author at the Western literary canon’s centre be someone a bit more versatile, an author known for not only poetry and dramatics but also for his or her prose (and maybe even other types of writing as well, such as memoirs, philosophy etc.), someone like for example Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, who is often considered Germany’s answer to William Shakespeare, but who unlike the latter was known not just for his dramatic and lyrical output but also for his novels, his autobiography and his science, art and philosophical themed writings?
And thus, within the pages of The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages, it really and totally (and also pretty frustratingly) flabbergasts me that Harold Bloom only seems interested in Johann Wolfgang von Goethe with regard to his Faust and only with the second part of the play at that, that none of Goethe’s other plays, that his poetry, his prose etc. seem to Harold Bloom to be not remotely worthwhile being even mentioned in The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages (which for me kind demonstrates that Harold Bloom is pretty lacking regarding his knowledge of German literature and that not only Johann Wolfgang von Goethe but indeed many many German language authors need to be, deserve to be placed front and centre in The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages, authors like Friedrich Schiller, Gotthold Ephraim Lessing, Thomas Mann, Christa Wolff etc.). But actually, finally, and of course also and only in my own humble opinion, this book, The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages is not so much about the Western literary canon, but mostly about English language and primarily male authors, ALL of whom of course definitely deserve to be included in ANY literary canon, but I do find it pretty ridiculous and misogynistic of Harold Bloom that hardly ANY women authors are mentioned in The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages and if so, very much in passing, as an afterthought.
However and to tell the truth, even if I do have my issues with what or whom has been ignored by Harold Bloom, my main reason for rating The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages with only one star is actually mostly due to Harold Bloom himself. For I really and truly simply cannot stand Bloom’s constant and unrelenting arrogance and utterly cringe-worthy academic snobbery and that The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages is simply replete and utterly teeming with academic nastiness, with put-downs, with an attitude of author superiority and a my way or the proverbial highway kind of perspective, something that I might be able to grudgingly handle if it happens only very occasionally, but the pretty much incessant presence of Harold Bloom tooting his own horn so to speak and that he obviously respects no one but himself (and maybe his chosen acolytes), this has most definitely and lastingly totally soured and turned me off of Harold Bloom and so much so that I almost do wish I were allowed to rate The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages with negative stars (because Bloom certainly would deserve this).
And thus, within the pages of The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages, it really and totally (and also pretty frustratingly) flabbergasts me that Harold Bloom only seems interested in Johann Wolfgang von Goethe with regard to his Faust and only with the second part of the play at that, that none of Goethe’s other plays, that his poetry, his prose etc. seem to Harold Bloom to be not remotely worthwhile being even mentioned in The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages (which for me kind demonstrates that Harold Bloom is pretty lacking regarding his knowledge of German literature and that not only Johann Wolfgang von Goethe but indeed many many German language authors need to be, deserve to be placed front and centre in The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages, authors like Friedrich Schiller, Gotthold Ephraim Lessing, Thomas Mann, Christa Wolff etc.). But actually, finally, and of course also and only in my own humble opinion, this book, The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages is not so much about the Western literary canon, but mostly about English language and primarily male authors, ALL of whom of course definitely deserve to be included in ANY literary canon, but I do find it pretty ridiculous and misogynistic of Harold Bloom that hardly ANY women authors are mentioned in The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages and if so, very much in passing, as an afterthought.
However and to tell the truth, even if I do have my issues with what or whom has been ignored by Harold Bloom, my main reason for rating The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages with only one star is actually mostly due to Harold Bloom himself. For I really and truly simply cannot stand Bloom’s constant and unrelenting arrogance and utterly cringe-worthy academic snobbery and that The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages is simply replete and utterly teeming with academic nastiness, with put-downs, with an attitude of author superiority and a my way or the proverbial highway kind of perspective, something that I might be able to grudgingly handle if it happens only very occasionally, but the pretty much incessant presence of Harold Bloom tooting his own horn so to speak and that he obviously respects no one but himself (and maybe his chosen acolytes), this has most definitely and lastingly totally soured and turned me off of Harold Bloom and so much so that I almost do wish I were allowed to rate The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages with negative stars (because Bloom certainly would deserve this).
August 22, 2019
Una guida per lettori consapevoli
"La teoria della poesia è la teoria della vita" (W. Stevens)
H. Bloom è considerato il maggior critico letterario contemporaneo. "Canone occidentale" è probabilmente la sua opera principale.
Egli, in questo interessante libro, si rifà alla teoria di Vico che identifica un ciclo della Storia in tre fasi : teocratica, aristocratica, democratica ; seguito da un periodo di 'caos' , dal quale emergerà una nuova Età teocratica.
Disponiamo di numerosi scrittori importanti, ma alcuni lo sono di più, perché formano il percorso che ha caratterizzato la nostra cultura occidentale. "Il Canone è (...) l'autentico fondamento del pensiero culturale" .
L'Età aristocratica, succeduta a quella teocratica, va da Dante a Goethe, quando artisti e intellettuali dipendevano dalla protezione e dal mecenatismo della nobiltà.
Shakespeare e Dante sono considerati i maggiori scrittori di quest'epoca.
Bloom precisa che "l'universalità è la caratteristica fondamentale del valore poetico". Un rimando, mi pare, all'afflato cosmico crociano.
L'Età democratica, che copre gran parte dell'Ottocento, vede insigni scrittori e segna il trionfo del romanzo, con Austin, Dikens, Hugo, Balzac, Manzoni, Tolstoj, Dostoevskij, Zola, Flaubert, H. James.
Fra l'Età democratica e l'Età "caotica" , Bloom pone "quella pericolosa transizione" chiamata "Età estetica", col prevalere dell'irrazionalismo e la predilezione dell'estetica rispetto all'etica. E come opera più rappresentativa cita "Edda Gabler" di Ibsen.
L' "Età caotica", che segna lo smarrimento di valori e punti di riferimento, va da Freud a Beckett, e vede Kafka come autore centrale.
Già una ventina di anni fa, l'autore captava fermenti spirituali, religiosi, di un percorso destinato a condurre verso l'affermazione di una nuova Età teocratica.
Oggi siamo ancor più convinti di vivere in questo momento di transizione.
"La teoria della poesia è la teoria della vita" (W. Stevens)
H. Bloom è considerato il maggior critico letterario contemporaneo. "Canone occidentale" è probabilmente la sua opera principale.
Egli, in questo interessante libro, si rifà alla teoria di Vico che identifica un ciclo della Storia in tre fasi : teocratica, aristocratica, democratica ; seguito da un periodo di 'caos' , dal quale emergerà una nuova Età teocratica.
Disponiamo di numerosi scrittori importanti, ma alcuni lo sono di più, perché formano il percorso che ha caratterizzato la nostra cultura occidentale. "Il Canone è (...) l'autentico fondamento del pensiero culturale" .
L'Età aristocratica, succeduta a quella teocratica, va da Dante a Goethe, quando artisti e intellettuali dipendevano dalla protezione e dal mecenatismo della nobiltà.
Shakespeare e Dante sono considerati i maggiori scrittori di quest'epoca.
Bloom precisa che "l'universalità è la caratteristica fondamentale del valore poetico". Un rimando, mi pare, all'afflato cosmico crociano.
L'Età democratica, che copre gran parte dell'Ottocento, vede insigni scrittori e segna il trionfo del romanzo, con Austin, Dikens, Hugo, Balzac, Manzoni, Tolstoj, Dostoevskij, Zola, Flaubert, H. James.
Fra l'Età democratica e l'Età "caotica" , Bloom pone "quella pericolosa transizione" chiamata "Età estetica", col prevalere dell'irrazionalismo e la predilezione dell'estetica rispetto all'etica. E come opera più rappresentativa cita "Edda Gabler" di Ibsen.
L' "Età caotica", che segna lo smarrimento di valori e punti di riferimento, va da Freud a Beckett, e vede Kafka come autore centrale.
Già una ventina di anni fa, l'autore captava fermenti spirituali, religiosi, di un percorso destinato a condurre verso l'affermazione di una nuova Età teocratica.
Oggi siamo ancor più convinti di vivere in questo momento di transizione.
August 7, 2017
Avete letto Shakespeare?
"In un momento storico così tardo, che cosa deve provare a leggere l’individuo che ha ancora voglia di leggere? I settant’anni biblici bastano appena per leggere una selezione dei grandi scrittori appartenenti alla cosiddetta tradizione occidentale, per non parlare poi di quelli appartenenti a tutte le tradizioni mondiali. Chi legge deve fare una scelta, poiché non vi è il tempo materiale di leggere tutto, nemmeno se non si fa altro che leggere. Lo splendido verso di Mallarmé («La carne è triste, ahimè! E ho letto tutti i libri») è divenuto un’iperbole"
In questo poderoso saggio, forse il suo più importante scritto, l'influente critico americano Harold Bloom descrive quello che chiama il "canone occidentale", ossia l'insieme degli autori e delle letture che costituiscono a suo dire la colonna portante della letteratura del mondo occidentale (del mondo?).
Cosa ci racconta Bloom?
* Che nella nostra vita dobbiamo selezionare i libri che leggiamo, concentrandoci su quei pochi considerati "imprescindibili", in grado di accrescere la nostra conoscenza e di "fare scuola". Forse le nostre librerie si svuoterebbero irrimediabilmente se fossimo costretti a tenere solamente quei libri che ci hanno cambiato il nostro modo di giudicare la realtà.
* Che gli autori e i libri devono essere sviscerati e capiti a fondo.
* Che i libri migliori ci consentono di "origliarci quando parliamo con noi stessi" (questo lo ripete fino allo sfinimento, manco fossimo completamente rimbambiti)
* Che il canone occidentale è basato su Shakespeare e Dante
* Che dobbiamo leggere Shakespeare
* Che tutti gli autori devono tutto a Shakespeare
* Che la lettura non ha senso se non leggiamo Shakespeare
* Non ricordo se l'ho detto: dobbiamo leggere Shakespeare
* Shakespeare era il meglio di tutti (Shakespeare percepiva più di chiunque altro, pensava in maniera più profonda e originale di chiunque altro e aveva una padronanza quasi naturale del linguaggio, un ambito in cui superava tutti, persino Dante) e che tutti i suoi personaggi origliano sé stessi...
In sostanza, direi che invece di leggere il canone occidentale avrei fatto più in fretta a leggere Shakespeare: meno fatica e più risultato...
Insomma, per quanto moltissime delle cose che dice siano interessanti, il saggio è a mio parere troppo pesante, troppo ripetitivo, troppo "rigido", troppo catalogante, troppo intransigente, troppo opinabile, troppo origliante. E direi incentrato un po' troppo sulla letteratura anglosassone.
August 4, 2010
Harold Bloom is like your ornery grandpa: he's very old-fashioned, and goes on uncomfortable rants about the blacks and the feminists a lot, but if you keep listening you realize that he has real wisdom and an experience that you can learn something from. You always complain about him when he's not around, but when he's gone*, you wish you had stayed in his world a little longer.
*This is referring to the end of the book, not Bloom's undoubtedly iminent death by rage-induced heart attack. What I mean here is that despite this book being 500 pages I ended up wishing it was twice that length, which despite all of its faults earns it four stars. Bloom's ugly rants about "political correctness" aren't as bad as they initially seem, as he does include most of the great authors of black and feminist literature in his "canonical prediction" at the end of the book. It really just seems like someone somewhere put Alice Walker on a syllabus and Bloom hulked out.
*This is referring to the end of the book, not Bloom's undoubtedly iminent death by rage-induced heart attack. What I mean here is that despite this book being 500 pages I ended up wishing it was twice that length, which despite all of its faults earns it four stars. Bloom's ugly rants about "political correctness" aren't as bad as they initially seem, as he does include most of the great authors of black and feminist literature in his "canonical prediction" at the end of the book. It really just seems like someone somewhere put Alice Walker on a syllabus and Bloom hulked out.
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July 28, 2020Šioje knygoje garsus amerikiečių literatūros kritikas Haroldas Bloomas aptaria kūrinius ir autorius, kurie, jo nuomone, sudaro Vakarų civilizacijos literatūros kanoną. Didelių siurprizų pačiame sąraše nėra, bet ši knyga verta dėmesio dėl to, kaip šiuos kūrinius analizuoja Bloomas.
Galbūt nesuklysiu sakydamas, jog Bloomas savo teorijomis sukūrė tam tikrą literatūros analizavimo įrankį (metodą, būdą), per kurį ir žvelgia į kūrinius. Šitą įrankį sudaro tokios dalys:
– Bloomas mano, kad rašytojo kūrinys (jis akcentuoja poemas) pasakoja ne apie tikrovę ar fikciją, bet, vienaip ar kitaip, apie kito rašytojo kūrinį. Bloomas mano, kad rašytojas gali rašyti tik apie kito rašytojo sukurtą darbą;
– Bloomas tvirtina, kad visi rašytojai patiria savo pirmtakų įtaką, kuri atsiliepia visiems kūrybos ir kūrybinio gyvenimo aspektams. Todėl kanoniškais rašytojais (arba kanoniškais kūriniais) tampa tie, kurie neteisingai interpretuoja savo pirmtakus, — ir, žinoma, yra pakankamai talentingi, kad savo neteisingą interpretaciją paverstų kanonu;
– Neteisingas interpretavimas nulemia, kad kūrinys turi keistumo, – Bloomas vartoja būtent šį žodį, keistumas. Kanoniškas kūrinys turi būti keistas. Kai kurių kanoninių kūrinių keistumas yra nebepastebimas šių dienų skaitytojui, nes pirminis kūrinio keistumas, vėliau patapęs įtaka, pasklido po kitų rašytojų tekstus ir tapo įprastu.
O toliau Bloomas visus rašytojus lygina su Shakespeare'u. Jeigu tikėtume Bloomu, tai Vakaruose gimęs ir augęs rašantis žmogus, nesvarbu skaitęs Shakespeare'ą ar ne, turi tik du pasirinkimus savo kūryboje:
– Arba pripažinti, kad Shakespearas yra visuotinė literatūros esmė, o tai pripažinus – sąmoningai savo kūriniuose interpretuoti Shakespeare'o kūrinius;
– Arba šito nepripažinti, maištauti prieš Shakespeare'ą ir taip visą gyvenimą paskirti nesąmoningai Shakespeare'o kūrinių interpretacijai.
Tiesą sakant, Bloomas žengia netgi dar toliau. Jis sako, kad šiuolaikiniai Vakarų civilizacijos žmonės savo jausmus suvokia ir apibūdina taip, kaip suvokia ir apibūdina, tik todėl, kad šitaip jausmus vaizdavo Shakespeare'as.
Bloomas netiesiogiai sako, kad Shakespeare'as jau sukūrė visus personažus, kurie kada nors bus sukurti literatūroje, ir visus dramatiškus konfliktus, ir visas istorijas; ir netgi Freudo teorijų pirmtakas buvo Shakespeare'as.
Tai va tokia ši knyga :)
Nors buvo labai, labai įdomu išgirsti kai kurių kūrinių interpretacijas, – pavyzdžiui, „Prarasto laiko beieškant“ Bloomas siūlo suvokti kaip ironišką tragikomediją, kurios ašis yra seksualinis pavydas, – tačiau tas nuolatinis visų rašytojų ir visų kūrinių lyginimas su Shakespeare'u palieka kaži kokį nemalonų ataskonį. Tartum tai būtų kokia anglosaksiško nacionalizmo forma, kurios šaltinis – pasąmonėje tūnantis įgimtas pyktis, kad Homeras ir Biblijos apaštalai rašė ne anglų kalba. Juokauju, žinoma. Tam tikra prasme.
O ir pats Bloomas šioje knygoje primena genialų intelektualą, kuris daugiau energijos skiria ne savo viso gyvenimo teorijai, bet galvojimui apie tai, kad visiems aplinkui ta teorija atrodys perdėm beprotiška; todėl, susidaro įspūdis, Bloomas kiekviename sakinyje stengiasi kišti ir kišti savo teoriją, kad jos prieštaringumas išbluktų nuo nuolatinio kaišaliojimo.
Nevertinau žvaigždutėmis, nes kas aš toks, kad vertinčiau Haroldą Bloomą :) Man patiko. Rekomenduoju, kas mėgstate gerą literatūrą apie literatūrą.
P. S. Patiko, kad Bloomas kanoniškumą apibrėžia ir savo sąrašą sudaro visiškai ignoruojamas politines ideologijas — ir dabar madingas, (liberalizmas, feminizmas ir t.t.), ir dabar smerkiamas (komunizmas, antisemitizmas ir t.t.) Jam visai nerūpi rašytojo pažiūros, religija, odos spalva, lytiškumas ir kiti dalykai.
Galbūt nesuklysiu sakydamas, jog Bloomas savo teorijomis sukūrė tam tikrą literatūros analizavimo įrankį (metodą, būdą), per kurį ir žvelgia į kūrinius. Šitą įrankį sudaro tokios dalys:
– Bloomas mano, kad rašytojo kūrinys (jis akcentuoja poemas) pasakoja ne apie tikrovę ar fikciją, bet, vienaip ar kitaip, apie kito rašytojo kūrinį. Bloomas mano, kad rašytojas gali rašyti tik apie kito rašytojo sukurtą darbą;
– Bloomas tvirtina, kad visi rašytojai patiria savo pirmtakų įtaką, kuri atsiliepia visiems kūrybos ir kūrybinio gyvenimo aspektams. Todėl kanoniškais rašytojais (arba kanoniškais kūriniais) tampa tie, kurie neteisingai interpretuoja savo pirmtakus, — ir, žinoma, yra pakankamai talentingi, kad savo neteisingą interpretaciją paverstų kanonu;
– Neteisingas interpretavimas nulemia, kad kūrinys turi keistumo, – Bloomas vartoja būtent šį žodį, keistumas. Kanoniškas kūrinys turi būti keistas. Kai kurių kanoninių kūrinių keistumas yra nebepastebimas šių dienų skaitytojui, nes pirminis kūrinio keistumas, vėliau patapęs įtaka, pasklido po kitų rašytojų tekstus ir tapo įprastu.
O toliau Bloomas visus rašytojus lygina su Shakespeare'u. Jeigu tikėtume Bloomu, tai Vakaruose gimęs ir augęs rašantis žmogus, nesvarbu skaitęs Shakespeare'ą ar ne, turi tik du pasirinkimus savo kūryboje:
– Arba pripažinti, kad Shakespearas yra visuotinė literatūros esmė, o tai pripažinus – sąmoningai savo kūriniuose interpretuoti Shakespeare'o kūrinius;
– Arba šito nepripažinti, maištauti prieš Shakespeare'ą ir taip visą gyvenimą paskirti nesąmoningai Shakespeare'o kūrinių interpretacijai.
Tiesą sakant, Bloomas žengia netgi dar toliau. Jis sako, kad šiuolaikiniai Vakarų civilizacijos žmonės savo jausmus suvokia ir apibūdina taip, kaip suvokia ir apibūdina, tik todėl, kad šitaip jausmus vaizdavo Shakespeare'as.
Bloomas netiesiogiai sako, kad Shakespeare'as jau sukūrė visus personažus, kurie kada nors bus sukurti literatūroje, ir visus dramatiškus konfliktus, ir visas istorijas; ir netgi Freudo teorijų pirmtakas buvo Shakespeare'as.
Tai va tokia ši knyga :)
Nors buvo labai, labai įdomu išgirsti kai kurių kūrinių interpretacijas, – pavyzdžiui, „Prarasto laiko beieškant“ Bloomas siūlo suvokti kaip ironišką tragikomediją, kurios ašis yra seksualinis pavydas, – tačiau tas nuolatinis visų rašytojų ir visų kūrinių lyginimas su Shakespeare'u palieka kaži kokį nemalonų ataskonį. Tartum tai būtų kokia anglosaksiško nacionalizmo forma, kurios šaltinis – pasąmonėje tūnantis įgimtas pyktis, kad Homeras ir Biblijos apaštalai rašė ne anglų kalba. Juokauju, žinoma. Tam tikra prasme.
O ir pats Bloomas šioje knygoje primena genialų intelektualą, kuris daugiau energijos skiria ne savo viso gyvenimo teorijai, bet galvojimui apie tai, kad visiems aplinkui ta teorija atrodys perdėm beprotiška; todėl, susidaro įspūdis, Bloomas kiekviename sakinyje stengiasi kišti ir kišti savo teoriją, kad jos prieštaringumas išbluktų nuo nuolatinio kaišaliojimo.
Nevertinau žvaigždutėmis, nes kas aš toks, kad vertinčiau Haroldą Bloomą :) Man patiko. Rekomenduoju, kas mėgstate gerą literatūrą apie literatūrą.
P. S. Patiko, kad Bloomas kanoniškumą apibrėžia ir savo sąrašą sudaro visiškai ignoruojamas politines ideologijas — ir dabar madingas, (liberalizmas, feminizmas ir t.t.), ir dabar smerkiamas (komunizmas, antisemitizmas ir t.t.) Jam visai nerūpi rašytojo pažiūros, religija, odos spalva, lytiškumas ir kiti dalykai.
December 18, 2011
In the (unlikely) event that literary theory again becomes relevant to mainstream society, or even mainstream academia for that matter, should there ever be a FOX News of theory, Harold Bloom would be the ideal candidate for the role of anchor.
The Western Canon is just so antiquated and conservative, in the very worst way. It's as if one's great-grandfather is lecturing from beyond the grave. For instance:
Finding myself now surrounded by professors of hip-hop; by clones of Gallic-Germanic theory; by ideologues of gender and of various sexual persuasions; by multiculturalists unlimited, I realize that the Balkanization of literary studies is irreversible.
The entire book reeks of racism and sexism, and, to clarify, that is not an attack on the traditional canon, but rather an attack on Bloom's defense of it. "The School of Resentment," as Bloom deems them, is comprised of all people or groups that dare to so much as question the legitimacy of the traditional canon. If nothing else, The Western Canon is an angry book. This is no poetic elegy to the slow death of the canon, but an ideological tirade directed at the aforementioned "School of Resentment."
It's a shame that Bloom's anger so dominates the book, too. Despite disagreeing with all of his ideological views, particularly those concerned with his condemnation of feminist and post-colonial theory, there is no doubt that Bloom is intelligent and possesses a nearly encyclopedia knowledge of the traditional canon. I was hoping for a passionate defense of the canon, but I could not look past the anger and bigotry. I've read that other critics can tire of his Shakespeare-worship, and this book certainly supports that worship, but ultimately I find a lot of his chain-of-influence arguments compelling.
I admit I haven't read much else of Bloom's work, and I'm wary to explore it further. His work is compelling in its comprehensiveness, but his conservatism, and more significantly, his anger towards all those who do not share his ideology, is off-putting. I don't expect I'll be reading any more of his work in the future.
The Western Canon is just so antiquated and conservative, in the very worst way. It's as if one's great-grandfather is lecturing from beyond the grave. For instance:
Finding myself now surrounded by professors of hip-hop; by clones of Gallic-Germanic theory; by ideologues of gender and of various sexual persuasions; by multiculturalists unlimited, I realize that the Balkanization of literary studies is irreversible.
The entire book reeks of racism and sexism, and, to clarify, that is not an attack on the traditional canon, but rather an attack on Bloom's defense of it. "The School of Resentment," as Bloom deems them, is comprised of all people or groups that dare to so much as question the legitimacy of the traditional canon. If nothing else, The Western Canon is an angry book. This is no poetic elegy to the slow death of the canon, but an ideological tirade directed at the aforementioned "School of Resentment."
It's a shame that Bloom's anger so dominates the book, too. Despite disagreeing with all of his ideological views, particularly those concerned with his condemnation of feminist and post-colonial theory, there is no doubt that Bloom is intelligent and possesses a nearly encyclopedia knowledge of the traditional canon. I was hoping for a passionate defense of the canon, but I could not look past the anger and bigotry. I've read that other critics can tire of his Shakespeare-worship, and this book certainly supports that worship, but ultimately I find a lot of his chain-of-influence arguments compelling.
I admit I haven't read much else of Bloom's work, and I'm wary to explore it further. His work is compelling in its comprehensiveness, but his conservatism, and more significantly, his anger towards all those who do not share his ideology, is off-putting. I don't expect I'll be reading any more of his work in the future.
October 19, 2011
One of the most useful works of non-fiction to be published in recent decades, written by the sturdy Yale professor Harold Bloom. Camille Paglia said that this work was as much about Bloom himself as it was about the "best that has been written"(one of many phrases that Bloom is quite of fond of using again and again), and this is certainty true, as the irascible scholar's personality comes through in every supple sentence. If there is a flaw in Bloom's work, it is repetition, as the reader is bombarded with constant statements on the School of Resentment, Shakespeare's unsurpassed Canonical centrality, and so on. However, Bloom makes a compelling case for all of the central arguments of the book: that Feminism, New Criticism and their ilk have destroyed the Humanities and aesthetic appreciation, that Shakespeare is the greatest and most unavoidable of all writers, and that the importance of the Canon is so great that if we let it be destroyed we could descend into Vico's Theocratic Age, a possible happening which frightens Bloom to no end throughout the text. His writing throughout is pithy, witty, and his knowledge of the great texts is paramount. He is truly an inspiring figure, and it is hard to argue with his general philosophy of Literature as he expresses it here, however controversial a figure he remains. He, and his student a spiritual successor Paglia, are wrongly associated with cultural conservationism; rather, they are radicals in the field of letters, fighting a noble battle against theoretical criticism mas it's students attempt to destroy the importance of greatest written works that have been made. Any book that fought this trend would have my approval, but Bloom is always a scintillating writer, making The Western Canon a healthy and necessary book for our climate.
December 23, 2013
Harold Bloom is one of the most well known literary critics in the US, and in my opinion an unfortunate national embarrassment. One problem with him is that he sees literature as a precise and objective science rather than an art. In Bloom's world, books and authors are not only objectively good or bad, but can be easily ranked from best to worst like runners in a race. For Bloom, there is only 1 possible interpretation of a work and that is what the author intended. If Cervantes was being truthful when he stated that he only intended for Don Quixote to be slapstick parody of "Books of Chivalry" like Orlando Furioso, then in Bloom's opinion Don Quixote loses any and all value as a work of literature. Oddly enough, Bloom includes Don Quixote as one of the greatest novels of all time, so either he believes Cervantes was just being modest or he is rather inconsistent in his views. An even worse problem with Bloom is his EXTEME Anglo-American bias which ranges from frustrating to nauseating to downright comical. In my opinion, to place Walt Whitman as equal to Pushkin and Jane Austen as equal to Dostoevsky would be stupid. To actually place the first 2 ABOVE the latter 2 as Bloom does, borders on clinically insane. This is a moron who ranks Samuel Johnson and Thomas Jefferson as greater writer/philosophers than Nietzsche and Kierkegaard! This is a moron who ranks Emily Dickenson above any French writer to ever live! Bloom also bafflingly places Freud as the greatest German writer/philosopher to ever live. Not only is this extremely odd from an aesthetic viewpoint, since the Land of Poets and Thinkers has produced FAR better, but Freud is a psychologist and social scientist!!! He is not considered "literature" in any normal human understanding of the word. Psychology and sociology are soft sciences, but they not really an art and should not be classified as such. The more one reads of Bloom, the more one realizes that any White American or Briton could take a steaming dump in a plastic bag and this mouth breather would rank that above the work of GOD Himself incarnated into a Black or Eastern European author. At least Bloom does deviate from this pattern once and seems to have a soft spot for the Latin American writer Pablo Neruda...go figure that one. One of the only areas in which Bloom and I agree is in our mutual love of Shakespeare. I don't consider it at all a stretch to place Shakespeare as the greatest writer in the English language, and it isn't even entirely unreasonable to place him as the greatest writer in any language, or at the very least the greatest playwright. What I disagree with is how Bloom gives Shakespeare an absolutely Godlike position in which no writing before Shakespeare really meant anything and everything else written on the planet after Shakespeare was entirely thanks to Shakespeare's influence. I would have said before reading Bloom that it is impossible to overstate Shakespeare's influence on Western Literature, but Bloom has astoundingly accomplished this feat! Overall, I can't provide a mathematical formula or draw a chemical reaction to "prove" that this book sucks balls. If I tried to do that, I will have become Bloom himself. I can say though that this is STRONGLY my opinion on the matter.
July 11, 2020
batı kanonu değerli bir çalışma. çok tartışılan, çok tartışmacı ve övgü kadar sert eleştiriler alan, her ikisini de hak eden bir kitap.
bloom'a göre edebiyat eleştirisinde tek kriter var: estetik. başta marksist ve feminist yaklaşımları dışlıyor, kültürel ve tarihsel okumalara karşı duruyor (bu dışlama ve karşı duruşların tehlikeli sınırlarda dolaştığını söylemek gerek). estetik dışı yaklaşımların edebiyatın içini boşaltması gibi haklı gerekçeleri var. estetikten kopuşun edebiyatı getirdiği yerle ilgili kaygıları var. kaygının da ötesinde içinde bulunduğumuz çağı kaos çağı diye adlandıran bloom, bu çağı yeni bir teokratik çağın izleyeceği öngörüsünde bulunuyor. kanonun da bu anlamda bir ağıt olduğunu vurguluyor.
bloom'un kanonunda merkez shakespeare. bu sembolik bir atama değil. shakespeare öncesi dahil ele aldığı tüm eserleri, kanonu ve tüm batı edebiyatını shakespare üzerinden okuyor bloom. shakespeare seçimine itiraz etmek, başka bir isim düşünmek imkansız. ancak batı kanonu eşittir shakespeare ve hatta batı edebiyatı eşittir shakespeare olunca seçimlerde ve incelemelerde zorlamadan ya da indirgemeden tamamen kaçınmak mümkün olmuyor.
kanona seçilen-seçilmeyen eserler de tartışma konusu elbette. bloom kendinden önce yapılmış işlevsel bir dönem ayrımını kullanıyor: teokratik çağ, aristokratik çağ, demokratik çağ ve kaos çağı. teokratik çağı es geçip shakespeare'i merkez olarak ilk sıraya koyduktan sonra kronolojik olarak 26 yazar ve şairi genellikle birer eserlerini öne çıkararak inceliyor. sayısız dev yazarın dışarıda kaldığı edebiyat kanonunda freud'a başlı başına bir bölüm ayırılması gibi tuhaflıklar var. net itirazlarda bulunulacak başka isimler var. kitabın sonunda bloom'un incelemediği ancak kanonsal gördüğü yazarların bir listesi bulunuyor.
burada yazar-eser incelemelerinin geniş kapsamlı olmadığını kanon mantığında öncüller-ardıllar, etkilenmeler-bağlantılar üzerinden ilerlediğini belirtmek gerek. bloom karşı olduğu akademik dilden, kuramlardan, kavramlardan tamamen uzak. sıradan okur için açık, sade bir dil kullanıyor. bu anlamda kitabın tamamının sıradan okura övgü olduğu söylenebilir. bloom'a göre sıradan okur, okuma aşkı için okuyan okur demek. okumayı başka bir bağlama oturtmayan okur edebiyatın gerçek okuru bloom'a göre. (bana göre de, diye eklemekten kendimi alamıyorum.)
bana göre de yaratıcı edebiyat okumanın kendi hazzından daha önemli bir sebebi yok. bana göre de, estetikten kopuşun hayrı olmadı edebiyata. estetizm elitizmdir derken daha beteriyle karşılaştık, evet. ancak bloom'un dışlayıcılığını, muhafazakarlığını da savunmayız bugün. orada başka ve tehlikeli şeyler var.
bloom'a göre edebiyat eleştirisinde tek kriter var: estetik. başta marksist ve feminist yaklaşımları dışlıyor, kültürel ve tarihsel okumalara karşı duruyor (bu dışlama ve karşı duruşların tehlikeli sınırlarda dolaştığını söylemek gerek). estetik dışı yaklaşımların edebiyatın içini boşaltması gibi haklı gerekçeleri var. estetikten kopuşun edebiyatı getirdiği yerle ilgili kaygıları var. kaygının da ötesinde içinde bulunduğumuz çağı kaos çağı diye adlandıran bloom, bu çağı yeni bir teokratik çağın izleyeceği öngörüsünde bulunuyor. kanonun da bu anlamda bir ağıt olduğunu vurguluyor.
bloom'un kanonunda merkez shakespeare. bu sembolik bir atama değil. shakespeare öncesi dahil ele aldığı tüm eserleri, kanonu ve tüm batı edebiyatını shakespare üzerinden okuyor bloom. shakespeare seçimine itiraz etmek, başka bir isim düşünmek imkansız. ancak batı kanonu eşittir shakespeare ve hatta batı edebiyatı eşittir shakespeare olunca seçimlerde ve incelemelerde zorlamadan ya da indirgemeden tamamen kaçınmak mümkün olmuyor.
kanona seçilen-seçilmeyen eserler de tartışma konusu elbette. bloom kendinden önce yapılmış işlevsel bir dönem ayrımını kullanıyor: teokratik çağ, aristokratik çağ, demokratik çağ ve kaos çağı. teokratik çağı es geçip shakespeare'i merkez olarak ilk sıraya koyduktan sonra kronolojik olarak 26 yazar ve şairi genellikle birer eserlerini öne çıkararak inceliyor. sayısız dev yazarın dışarıda kaldığı edebiyat kanonunda freud'a başlı başına bir bölüm ayırılması gibi tuhaflıklar var. net itirazlarda bulunulacak başka isimler var. kitabın sonunda bloom'un incelemediği ancak kanonsal gördüğü yazarların bir listesi bulunuyor.
burada yazar-eser incelemelerinin geniş kapsamlı olmadığını kanon mantığında öncüller-ardıllar, etkilenmeler-bağlantılar üzerinden ilerlediğini belirtmek gerek. bloom karşı olduğu akademik dilden, kuramlardan, kavramlardan tamamen uzak. sıradan okur için açık, sade bir dil kullanıyor. bu anlamda kitabın tamamının sıradan okura övgü olduğu söylenebilir. bloom'a göre sıradan okur, okuma aşkı için okuyan okur demek. okumayı başka bir bağlama oturtmayan okur edebiyatın gerçek okuru bloom'a göre. (bana göre de, diye eklemekten kendimi alamıyorum.)
bana göre de yaratıcı edebiyat okumanın kendi hazzından daha önemli bir sebebi yok. bana göre de, estetikten kopuşun hayrı olmadı edebiyata. estetizm elitizmdir derken daha beteriyle karşılaştık, evet. ancak bloom'un dışlayıcılığını, muhafazakarlığını da savunmayız bugün. orada başka ve tehlikeli şeyler var.
December 7, 2018
Il libro in estrema sintesi (capitolo per capitolo):
1. UN’ELEGIA PER IL CANONE
Più una ferocissima critica verso le tendenze allora (come oggi) in voga nelle accademie umanistiche americane. Condivisibili, anche se un po’ ossessive.
2. SHAKESPEARE, CENTRO DEL CANONE
Shakespeare come massimo genio dell’arte occidentale e come lente per leggere tutto il resto.
3. LA SINGOLARITÀ DI DANTE: ULISSE E BEATRICE
Lettura di Dante in chiave shakespeariana.
4. CHAUCER: LA COMARE DI BATH, L’INDULGENZIERE, E PERSONAGGIO SHAKESPEARIANO
Lettura di Chaucer in chiave shakespeariana.
5. CERVANTES: LA RECITA DEL MONDO
Lettura di Cervantes in chiave shakespeariana.
6. MONTAIGNE E MOLIÈRE: LA CANONICA ELUSIVITÀ DEL VERO
Lettura di Montaigne e Molière in chiave shakespeariana.
7. IL SATANA DI MILTON, E SHAKESPEARE
Lettura di Milton in chiave shakespeariana.
8. IL DOTTOR SAMUEL JOHNSON, IL CRITICO CANONICO
Lettura di Samuel Johnson in chiave shakespeariana.
9. IL FAUST, SECONDA PARTE DI GOETHE: POEMA CONTROCANONICO
Lettura di Goethe in chiave shakespeariana.
10. MEMORIA CANONICA NEL PRIMO WORDSWORTH E IN PERSUASIONE DI JANE AUSTEN
Lettura di Wordsworth e Austen in chiave shakespeariana.
11. WALT WHITMAN QUALE CENTRO DEL CANONE AMERICANO
Lettura di Whitman in chiave shakespeariana.
12. EMILY DICKINSON: VUOTI, TRASPORTI, IL BUIO
Lettura di Emily Dickinson in chiave whitmaniana che riporta a una lettura shakespeariana.
13. IL ROMANZO CANONICO: CASA DESOLATA DI DICKENS, MIDDLEMARCH DI GEORGE ELIOT
Lettura di Dickens e George Eliot in chiave shakespeariana.
14. TOLSTOJ E L’EROISMO
Forzata se non forzatissima lettura di Tolstoj in chiave shakespeariana.
15. IBSEN: TROLL E PEER GYNT
Lettura di Ibsen in chiave shakespeariana.
16. FREUD: UNA LETTURA SHAKESPEARIANA
Delirante lettura freudiana di Freud che Bloom chiama lettura shakesperiana perché, sostiene, Shakespeare avrebbe già implicitamente detto tutto quanto poi Freud avrebbe esplicitato in maniera più diretta. Il complesso di Edipo si sarebbe dovuto chiamare complesso di Amleto ma Freud non lo denominò in tal maniera per via di un complesso di inferiorità nei confronti di Shakespeare, complesso di inferiorità che sarebbe appunto il risultato del complesso di Amleto di cui Freud soffriva.
17. PROUST: LA VERA CREDENZA DELLA GELOSIA SESSUALE
Unico capitolo (quasi) senza Shakespeare a razziare lo spazio. Non a caso, uno dei migliori, se non il migliore.
18. L’AGONE DI JOYCE CON SHAKESPEARE
Lettura di Joyce in chiave shakespeariana.
19. L’ORLANDO DI VIRGINIA WOOLF: FEMMINISMO COME AMORE DELLA LETTURA
Lettura della Woolf in chiave shakespeariana.
20. KAFKA: PAZIENZA CANONICA E “INDISTRUTTIBILITÀ”
Lettura di Kafka in chiave shakespeariana.
21. BORGES, NERUDA E PESSOA: IL WHITMAN ISPANICO-PORTOGHESE
Lettura di Borges e Pessoa in chiave shakespeariana e di Neruda in chiave whitmaniana.
22. BECKETT… JOYCE… PROUST… SHAKESPEARE
Lettura di Beckett in chiave joyce-proustiana che rimanda a una lettura shakespeariana.
23. CONCLUSIONE ELEGIACA
Elegia per gli autori canonici (non solo quelli a cui è dedicato un capitolo, ma anche altri esclusi per questioni di spazio, da Petrarca a Pynchon passando per Boccaccio, Rabelais, Ariosto, Racine, Swift, Rousseau, Blake, Puškin, Leopardi, Hugo, Balzac, Flaubert, Melville, Baudelaire, Henry James, Dostoevskij, Nietzsche, Čechov, Yeates e Faulkner). Dante, Cervantes e Milton ricevono un’elegia alla seconda. Shakespeare riceve un’elegia all’ennesima potenza.
———————
Il libro è un po’ più complesso di così, Bloom è tra i critici più sagaci del mondo e ogni pagina abbonda di idee o ipotesi affascinanti. Ma la sua ossessione per Shakespeare è qualcosa che travalica i confini della sana propensione e sfiora, o forse supera abbondantemente, l’idolatria. Alcune visioni shakespeariane (soprattutto in Goethe, in Tolstoj e in un po’ tutti gli autori novecenteschi tranne Proust) sono a dir poco strampalate, e condizionano un libro potenzialmente grandioso impantanandolo spesso nelle paludi di una visione piuttosto miope, a volte semplicemente assurda. Col rischio di avere sul lettore l’effetto opposto al desiderato e fargli odiare Shakespeare.
1. UN’ELEGIA PER IL CANONE
Più una ferocissima critica verso le tendenze allora (come oggi) in voga nelle accademie umanistiche americane. Condivisibili, anche se un po’ ossessive.
2. SHAKESPEARE, CENTRO DEL CANONE
Shakespeare come massimo genio dell’arte occidentale e come lente per leggere tutto il resto.
3. LA SINGOLARITÀ DI DANTE: ULISSE E BEATRICE
Lettura di Dante in chiave shakespeariana.
4. CHAUCER: LA COMARE DI BATH, L’INDULGENZIERE, E PERSONAGGIO SHAKESPEARIANO
Lettura di Chaucer in chiave shakespeariana.
5. CERVANTES: LA RECITA DEL MONDO
Lettura di Cervantes in chiave shakespeariana.
6. MONTAIGNE E MOLIÈRE: LA CANONICA ELUSIVITÀ DEL VERO
Lettura di Montaigne e Molière in chiave shakespeariana.
7. IL SATANA DI MILTON, E SHAKESPEARE
Lettura di Milton in chiave shakespeariana.
8. IL DOTTOR SAMUEL JOHNSON, IL CRITICO CANONICO
Lettura di Samuel Johnson in chiave shakespeariana.
9. IL FAUST, SECONDA PARTE DI GOETHE: POEMA CONTROCANONICO
Lettura di Goethe in chiave shakespeariana.
10. MEMORIA CANONICA NEL PRIMO WORDSWORTH E IN PERSUASIONE DI JANE AUSTEN
Lettura di Wordsworth e Austen in chiave shakespeariana.
11. WALT WHITMAN QUALE CENTRO DEL CANONE AMERICANO
Lettura di Whitman in chiave shakespeariana.
12. EMILY DICKINSON: VUOTI, TRASPORTI, IL BUIO
Lettura di Emily Dickinson in chiave whitmaniana che riporta a una lettura shakespeariana.
13. IL ROMANZO CANONICO: CASA DESOLATA DI DICKENS, MIDDLEMARCH DI GEORGE ELIOT
Lettura di Dickens e George Eliot in chiave shakespeariana.
14. TOLSTOJ E L’EROISMO
Forzata se non forzatissima lettura di Tolstoj in chiave shakespeariana.
15. IBSEN: TROLL E PEER GYNT
Lettura di Ibsen in chiave shakespeariana.
16. FREUD: UNA LETTURA SHAKESPEARIANA
Delirante lettura freudiana di Freud che Bloom chiama lettura shakesperiana perché, sostiene, Shakespeare avrebbe già implicitamente detto tutto quanto poi Freud avrebbe esplicitato in maniera più diretta. Il complesso di Edipo si sarebbe dovuto chiamare complesso di Amleto ma Freud non lo denominò in tal maniera per via di un complesso di inferiorità nei confronti di Shakespeare, complesso di inferiorità che sarebbe appunto il risultato del complesso di Amleto di cui Freud soffriva.
17. PROUST: LA VERA CREDENZA DELLA GELOSIA SESSUALE
Unico capitolo (quasi) senza Shakespeare a razziare lo spazio. Non a caso, uno dei migliori, se non il migliore.
18. L’AGONE DI JOYCE CON SHAKESPEARE
Lettura di Joyce in chiave shakespeariana.
19. L’ORLANDO DI VIRGINIA WOOLF: FEMMINISMO COME AMORE DELLA LETTURA
Lettura della Woolf in chiave shakespeariana.
20. KAFKA: PAZIENZA CANONICA E “INDISTRUTTIBILITÀ”
Lettura di Kafka in chiave shakespeariana.
21. BORGES, NERUDA E PESSOA: IL WHITMAN ISPANICO-PORTOGHESE
Lettura di Borges e Pessoa in chiave shakespeariana e di Neruda in chiave whitmaniana.
22. BECKETT… JOYCE… PROUST… SHAKESPEARE
Lettura di Beckett in chiave joyce-proustiana che rimanda a una lettura shakespeariana.
23. CONCLUSIONE ELEGIACA
Elegia per gli autori canonici (non solo quelli a cui è dedicato un capitolo, ma anche altri esclusi per questioni di spazio, da Petrarca a Pynchon passando per Boccaccio, Rabelais, Ariosto, Racine, Swift, Rousseau, Blake, Puškin, Leopardi, Hugo, Balzac, Flaubert, Melville, Baudelaire, Henry James, Dostoevskij, Nietzsche, Čechov, Yeates e Faulkner). Dante, Cervantes e Milton ricevono un’elegia alla seconda. Shakespeare riceve un’elegia all’ennesima potenza.
———————
Il libro è un po’ più complesso di così, Bloom è tra i critici più sagaci del mondo e ogni pagina abbonda di idee o ipotesi affascinanti. Ma la sua ossessione per Shakespeare è qualcosa che travalica i confini della sana propensione e sfiora, o forse supera abbondantemente, l’idolatria. Alcune visioni shakespeariane (soprattutto in Goethe, in Tolstoj e in un po’ tutti gli autori novecenteschi tranne Proust) sono a dir poco strampalate, e condizionano un libro potenzialmente grandioso impantanandolo spesso nelle paludi di una visione piuttosto miope, a volte semplicemente assurda. Col rischio di avere sul lettore l’effetto opposto al desiderato e fargli odiare Shakespeare.
February 1, 2020
A life, focused like a laser on a single pursuit, can accomplish amazing things. Mozart with music, for instance, or Bobby Fischer in chess; Steve Jobs, Alexander the Great, Winston Churchill …. the examples are many and noteworthy.
Such was also the case, I’m convinced, with Professor Harold Bloom, a faculty member of the Yale English Department for 64 years, who taught his final class four days before he passed away last October at the age of 89. His passion for fine literature was lifelong and single-minded, and he was thought by many to be the greatest literary critic in America. He also wrote more than 40 books during his long career, of which “The Western Canon – The Books and School of the Ages”, was one of the most notable.
Clocking in at around 500 pages, “The Western Canon” was a fascinating, mind-expanding read. Bloom, unsurprisingly, was a voracious reader, and was also armed with a photographic memory of the first order. His expertise in the Western canon (which most of us know as the “Great Books”) is on full display in this book, and I often had to run intellectually to try and keep up. An experience, incidentally, which was well worth it.
By the way, about Bloom’s incredible memory? Graeme Wood, a writer at The Atlantic who not long ago interviewed Bloom, shared this account --- “He had read everything worth reading, or claimed to have. When he could still walk, he would allow bystanders on Yale quads to quote random lines of Milton to him, and he would pick up the line and keep reciting until he reached the other end of the quad”.
In “The Western Canon” Bloom eloquently and insightfully covers the 26 authors who, in his view, have produced works of literary superiority over the last centuries. These are names you will recognize: Shakespeare (definitely the pinnacle for Bloom), Dante, Chaucer, Cervantes, Milton, Goethe, Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson, Tolstoy, Proust, Joyce and more. As a bonus, four lengthy appendices are also included, each containing a detailed suggested reading list.
This was a deep swim in a vast ocean of literature, for sure; but even from his quite lofty perch, Bloom connects the dots and shares treasures and tidbits that can make any of us more passionate and knowledgeable about the great books.
Such was also the case, I’m convinced, with Professor Harold Bloom, a faculty member of the Yale English Department for 64 years, who taught his final class four days before he passed away last October at the age of 89. His passion for fine literature was lifelong and single-minded, and he was thought by many to be the greatest literary critic in America. He also wrote more than 40 books during his long career, of which “The Western Canon – The Books and School of the Ages”, was one of the most notable.
Clocking in at around 500 pages, “The Western Canon” was a fascinating, mind-expanding read. Bloom, unsurprisingly, was a voracious reader, and was also armed with a photographic memory of the first order. His expertise in the Western canon (which most of us know as the “Great Books”) is on full display in this book, and I often had to run intellectually to try and keep up. An experience, incidentally, which was well worth it.
By the way, about Bloom’s incredible memory? Graeme Wood, a writer at The Atlantic who not long ago interviewed Bloom, shared this account --- “He had read everything worth reading, or claimed to have. When he could still walk, he would allow bystanders on Yale quads to quote random lines of Milton to him, and he would pick up the line and keep reciting until he reached the other end of the quad”.
In “The Western Canon” Bloom eloquently and insightfully covers the 26 authors who, in his view, have produced works of literary superiority over the last centuries. These are names you will recognize: Shakespeare (definitely the pinnacle for Bloom), Dante, Chaucer, Cervantes, Milton, Goethe, Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson, Tolstoy, Proust, Joyce and more. As a bonus, four lengthy appendices are also included, each containing a detailed suggested reading list.
This was a deep swim in a vast ocean of literature, for sure; but even from his quite lofty perch, Bloom connects the dots and shares treasures and tidbits that can make any of us more passionate and knowledgeable about the great books.
February 2, 2016
To some Harold Bloom might just be a pompous critic, but if I can have an ounce of literary knowledge that this man has in his brain, I would consider myself lucky. I admire Harold Bloom, which makes me a bit bias when reading any of his criticisms. Unfortunately, I cannot help to admire a man that has an extensive knowledge of literature. Literature is my passion and it is his unending passion to read and to celebrate the art and styles of literature, which I cannot overlook.
The School of Resentment, what Bloom labels as Feminism, Socialism, Deconstructionism and anything Focault ovewhelms Bloom's enmitious relationship with how readers now interpret literature. I read Bloom because I agree with him, we no longer appreciate and take stock in the aesthetics of literature. Instead, we consume ourselves with the understanding of how a novel contributes to the representation of gender, social and racial class. I do not see literature in this manner, because any work that presents itself this way never transcends into an elevated study of the overall human understanding. Works that fit into that mold at best is a simulacrum.
Noteworthy pieces of criticism is how Bloom describes Ibsen's Trollishness and Hedda Gabler as a female mirror to Shakespeare's Iago. Lastly, this quote left quite a lasting impression to end my journey into the Western Canon:
Traditions tell us that the free and solitary self writes in order to overcome mortality. I think that the self, in its quest to be free and solitary, ultimately reads with one aim only; to confront greatness.
I thoroughly believe in the canon and it is an overwheling greatness that one can never surmise how to describe it.
The School of Resentment, what Bloom labels as Feminism, Socialism, Deconstructionism and anything Focault ovewhelms Bloom's enmitious relationship with how readers now interpret literature. I read Bloom because I agree with him, we no longer appreciate and take stock in the aesthetics of literature. Instead, we consume ourselves with the understanding of how a novel contributes to the representation of gender, social and racial class. I do not see literature in this manner, because any work that presents itself this way never transcends into an elevated study of the overall human understanding. Works that fit into that mold at best is a simulacrum.
Noteworthy pieces of criticism is how Bloom describes Ibsen's Trollishness and Hedda Gabler as a female mirror to Shakespeare's Iago. Lastly, this quote left quite a lasting impression to end my journey into the Western Canon:
Traditions tell us that the free and solitary self writes in order to overcome mortality. I think that the self, in its quest to be free and solitary, ultimately reads with one aim only; to confront greatness.
I thoroughly believe in the canon and it is an overwheling greatness that one can never surmise how to describe it.
May 2, 2023
At this point I think I've probably read enough of this to give a review. It's been on my shelf for a while, and I've used it as a valuable reference perspective on many authors. For all his extreme idiosyncrasy I find Bloom to be often brilliant in his criticism, and at his best he is downright extraordinary. But when he's not brilliant? Man, is he a wacko. I'm not surprised at all that he turned from writing scholarly work to slightly more "popular" level books like this, because his bombast is far too extreme for the mainstream. One has to be prepared to face a lot of what must be generously described as "utter nonsense" when reading him. His chapters on Dickens, Ibsen, Cervantes, and Dickinson are gold standards, while everything related to the Bible and Shakespeare is bonkers. His defense of the canon exists for all the wrong reasons (i.e. his overriding belief that moral instruction and spiritual formation is impossible through literature, or at least not a primary goal). If you can bear the overwhelming arrogance, it's definitely worth encountering this book. I just recommend skipping the introduction and conclusion, which present an impoverished and nihilistic understanding of literature, and dipping in and out as you please. The giant list in the back has influenced my reading goals probably more than I care to admit.
September 15, 2021
The late Harold Bloom, a titanic scholar and critic in the history of American letters, is famously known for his encyclopedic knowledge of the great classics, coupled with a body of ingenious studies defending of the recognition of such works and their influence. This book is a collection of essays about the central authors in the Western Canon (The Greatest Books of All Time), along with the Canon itself.
If anything, one could easily assume that TWC is a remarkable crash course in Literature, comparable to Northrop Frye’s Anatomy Of Criticism. Since Bloom’s knowledge stems from a lifetime of reading, one could do far worse than to (at least try to) follow his indications. In other words, TWC should be taken primarily as a road map to better orient oneself amidst the vast amount of literary works available to us at this day and age. The author’s method boils down to simply engaging with the tradition of imaginative writing, an act which goes far beyond any political, social, psychological, etc. approaches, as these would in turn hinder the merits of the works themselves. We are asked to read these works deeply, putting our whole selves into them, since there is no other way of unveiling their beauty and greatness (the Sublime in aesthetic terms).
The essays introduce us to some of the greatest writers of all time - Dante, Shakespeare, Chaucer, Cervantes, Montaigne, Goethe, Tolstoy, Proust, Joyce, and Kafka to name a few - Bloom’s astounding memory and wit never fail to impress, even at moments when you might find yourself disagreeing with him (which is not necessarily a bad thing). His obsession with Shakespeare can get annoying at times, although in the long run it revealed itself to be a very useful tool for unearthing a plethora of ideas and influences which have stood the test of time. As T.S. Eliot once said, “Dante and Shakespeare divide the world between them. There is no third.” By reading TWC we become not only more acquainted with the Canon per se, but also with its process of evolution through time and its importance within our culture as a whole.
After reading the essays, we are provided with the list of books that constitute the Canon, which spans many epochs, cultures, societies, countries et al., and is divided in four parts (Ages) organised after Giambattista Vico’s New Science: Theocratic, Aristocratic, Democratic and Chaotic. After the first three Ages, he admits that not all of the books contained in the Chaotic Age could prove to be canonical, but we cannot blame him nevertheless, for it is the longest and most culturally varied list of them all. One may find him/herself perusing these lists for a long time after reading this book, and that's part of the magic of it (A friendly advice: get yourself a good highlighter pen, it will be worth it).
All in all, it goes without saying that TWC is highly recommended for anyone who is eager to know more about Literature (like yours truly). There is no harm in learning more about this wonderful art which we all cherish - there may be no greater art after all.
Happy Reading!
If anything, one could easily assume that TWC is a remarkable crash course in Literature, comparable to Northrop Frye’s Anatomy Of Criticism. Since Bloom’s knowledge stems from a lifetime of reading, one could do far worse than to (at least try to) follow his indications. In other words, TWC should be taken primarily as a road map to better orient oneself amidst the vast amount of literary works available to us at this day and age. The author’s method boils down to simply engaging with the tradition of imaginative writing, an act which goes far beyond any political, social, psychological, etc. approaches, as these would in turn hinder the merits of the works themselves. We are asked to read these works deeply, putting our whole selves into them, since there is no other way of unveiling their beauty and greatness (the Sublime in aesthetic terms).
The essays introduce us to some of the greatest writers of all time - Dante, Shakespeare, Chaucer, Cervantes, Montaigne, Goethe, Tolstoy, Proust, Joyce, and Kafka to name a few - Bloom’s astounding memory and wit never fail to impress, even at moments when you might find yourself disagreeing with him (which is not necessarily a bad thing). His obsession with Shakespeare can get annoying at times, although in the long run it revealed itself to be a very useful tool for unearthing a plethora of ideas and influences which have stood the test of time. As T.S. Eliot once said, “Dante and Shakespeare divide the world between them. There is no third.” By reading TWC we become not only more acquainted with the Canon per se, but also with its process of evolution through time and its importance within our culture as a whole.
After reading the essays, we are provided with the list of books that constitute the Canon, which spans many epochs, cultures, societies, countries et al., and is divided in four parts (Ages) organised after Giambattista Vico’s New Science: Theocratic, Aristocratic, Democratic and Chaotic. After the first three Ages, he admits that not all of the books contained in the Chaotic Age could prove to be canonical, but we cannot blame him nevertheless, for it is the longest and most culturally varied list of them all. One may find him/herself perusing these lists for a long time after reading this book, and that's part of the magic of it (A friendly advice: get yourself a good highlighter pen, it will be worth it).
All in all, it goes without saying that TWC is highly recommended for anyone who is eager to know more about Literature (like yours truly). There is no harm in learning more about this wonderful art which we all cherish - there may be no greater art after all.
Happy Reading!
April 28, 2007
Reading literary criticism is like having a tour-guide to a book. And having someone passionate about the subject makes it that much more enjoyable. Prof. Bloom is an unabashed lover of literature with none of the disdain for "dead white male Europeans" that many academics have (he calls them the "school of resentment"). His passion for Western literature is so fierce that it is inspiring.
In the book, he walks us through the ages of literary history, pointing out great authors and great works. He talks about what should be in a canon of literature, and then picks the works that he thinks form the Western Canon. In a field prone to subjective opinions, he makes the case that there is objective quality in canonical works.
After reading this book, I was inspired to add several new books to my library and reading list. He's just that convincing.
In the book, he walks us through the ages of literary history, pointing out great authors and great works. He talks about what should be in a canon of literature, and then picks the works that he thinks form the Western Canon. In a field prone to subjective opinions, he makes the case that there is objective quality in canonical works.
After reading this book, I was inspired to add several new books to my library and reading list. He's just that convincing.
November 19, 2019
At least one a week while reading the review of friends on GR I am reminded of books that I have read at some distant point in the past and then add them to my GR database. The Western Canon is the most recent title to fall into this category.
Despite my reservations it was great fun to read. I greatly enjoyed the parody of it in Episode 104 "The Graduate" of the Northen Exposure television series.
Nonetheless, this work has not aged well. It was written in protest to what Bloom believed to be was a trend for university courses in North America to include works of low literary quality because the authors were Women or Afro-American. I do not believe that the practice was ever as great as Bloom believed to be. In any case, the academic commnunity has moved on to other things and this book has last whatever pertinence it had.
Despite my reservations it was great fun to read. I greatly enjoyed the parody of it in Episode 104 "The Graduate" of the Northen Exposure television series.
Nonetheless, this work has not aged well. It was written in protest to what Bloom believed to be was a trend for university courses in North America to include works of low literary quality because the authors were Women or Afro-American. I do not believe that the practice was ever as great as Bloom believed to be. In any case, the academic commnunity has moved on to other things and this book has last whatever pertinence it had.
February 16, 2016
DNF after a good 100 pages and the final chapter.
Wow, this is an ode to the preservation of cishet white male supremacy if ever I've seen one. It's almost hilarious how offended Bloom is by the allegation that the Western literary canon is made up of dead white European males. (Seriously, he's so outraged with that term. HOW DARE YOU, "FEMINISM, AFRICAN-AMERICAN CULTURISM, AND ALL THE OTHER POLITICALLY CORRECT ENTERPRISES OF OUR MOMENT" (p. 27). THAT'S JUST SO OFFENSIVE.) So he decides to fight "the politics of multiculturalism" and the alleged redundant political correctness of modern views on literature that have caused the "degeneracy of literary studies" by claiming that the reason why the white European males dominate the traditional literary canon is because they have a truth and a genius within them that women, people of colour, those of "various sexual persuasions", and other minorities just don't have. Not his fault that white European males are born with that extra something special.
...
Also, he really, really hates the Feminists (capitalisation his). I know. You're all shocked.
On a more "literary" note, I just don't agree with his basic statement that Shakespeare is the origin and personification of Western literature. I don't even agree that he's all that when it comes to the English or Anglo-American literary tradition alone. I'm not saying he isn't important or relevant to canon literature, but great literature didn't just begin or happen when he started writing. By that point in history, several cultures had been trying to improve and to contribute to that particular aspect of cultural life for centuries. But it's cute how he's trying to ignore the fact that from a European point of view, Anglo-American literature didn't even become hugely important until the early 20th century.
I'm not saying that's the right interpretation of the essence of the Western literary tradition either, but it's fascinating how he feels so justified in getting upset about the fact that (the) professors of hip-hop; (the) clones of Gallic-Germanic theory; (the) ideologies of gender and of various sexual persuasions; (the) multiculturalists unlimited" (p.483) (nothing offensive to be seen here, huh) are rewriting the literary canon when his whole work is based on a reclaiming of the Western literary tradition as essentially Anglo-American. Which it isn't. There are so many more languages, cultures and identities that should be represented in an institution that claims to lay down the essence of human (cultural) life, but I guess it's difficult to hear after a few thousand years that claim the opposite, that you're just not that special, important and unique after all.
Bloom's response, of course, is that Great Literature has every right to be elitist and should be elitist, and that Shakespeare writes such lifelike characters anyway that even the "non-white European males" identify with them and/or feel represented. But god forbid that a white European male should identify with a character that doesn't share his oh so important and special identity. He's just trying to say that we have to make smart choices now that there are so many great canonical works out there! Over a good three thousand! No one can read that in a lifetime! A lifetime is so much shorter than 20-30 years!!
So yeah, this is one of the most racist and sexist conceptions of Western literature (or what it's supposed to be) I've ever seen. Oh, and he also hates Harry Potter and popular culture in general. Idk, that seemed relevant to mention.
Wow, this is an ode to the preservation of cishet white male supremacy if ever I've seen one. It's almost hilarious how offended Bloom is by the allegation that the Western literary canon is made up of dead white European males. (Seriously, he's so outraged with that term. HOW DARE YOU, "FEMINISM, AFRICAN-AMERICAN CULTURISM, AND ALL THE OTHER POLITICALLY CORRECT ENTERPRISES OF OUR MOMENT" (p. 27). THAT'S JUST SO OFFENSIVE.) So he decides to fight "the politics of multiculturalism" and the alleged redundant political correctness of modern views on literature that have caused the "degeneracy of literary studies" by claiming that the reason why the white European males dominate the traditional literary canon is because they have a truth and a genius within them that women, people of colour, those of "various sexual persuasions", and other minorities just don't have. Not his fault that white European males are born with that extra something special.
...
Also, he really, really hates the Feminists (capitalisation his). I know. You're all shocked.
On a more "literary" note, I just don't agree with his basic statement that Shakespeare is the origin and personification of Western literature. I don't even agree that he's all that when it comes to the English or Anglo-American literary tradition alone. I'm not saying he isn't important or relevant to canon literature, but great literature didn't just begin or happen when he started writing. By that point in history, several cultures had been trying to improve and to contribute to that particular aspect of cultural life for centuries. But it's cute how he's trying to ignore the fact that from a European point of view, Anglo-American literature didn't even become hugely important until the early 20th century.
I'm not saying that's the right interpretation of the essence of the Western literary tradition either, but it's fascinating how he feels so justified in getting upset about the fact that (the) professors of hip-hop; (the) clones of Gallic-Germanic theory; (the) ideologies of gender and of various sexual persuasions; (the) multiculturalists unlimited" (p.483) (nothing offensive to be seen here, huh) are rewriting the literary canon when his whole work is based on a reclaiming of the Western literary tradition as essentially Anglo-American. Which it isn't. There are so many more languages, cultures and identities that should be represented in an institution that claims to lay down the essence of human (cultural) life, but I guess it's difficult to hear after a few thousand years that claim the opposite, that you're just not that special, important and unique after all.
Bloom's response, of course, is that Great Literature has every right to be elitist and should be elitist, and that Shakespeare writes such lifelike characters anyway that even the "non-white European males" identify with them and/or feel represented. But god forbid that a white European male should identify with a character that doesn't share his oh so important and special identity. He's just trying to say that we have to make smart choices now that there are so many great canonical works out there! Over a good three thousand! No one can read that in a lifetime! A lifetime is so much shorter than 20-30 years!!
So yeah, this is one of the most racist and sexist conceptions of Western literature (or what it's supposed to be) I've ever seen. Oh, and he also hates Harry Potter and popular culture in general. Idk, that seemed relevant to mention.
March 10, 2011
What's fascinating to me is that even though there is all the unfortunate blather and fulmination against his critical antagonists in the academy, most of whom appear to have completely ignored him, and there is also a lamentable amount of the Because I Say So school of argument, Harold Bloom, when he actually gets down to talking about the authors he loves and why he loves them, makes a certain amount of sense. He has what would have been called, in the era he should have lived in, good taste in literature. That is, he understands how a writer's mastery of complex ideas and of techniques to express them can create both pleasure and insight, i.e., real beauty. And his theory of influence, through which the artists of what he calls canonical works can be seen as choosing one another, is actually defensible, I think.
What's wrong is saying we have to choose, a la George Bush and the terrorists, between the pre-eminence of aesthetic concerns or socio-political ones, once and for all, in all discussions of literature. I reject that choice. So did some the critics I most admire, Raymond Williams, Edward Said, Hayden White and Frederic Jameson. They all loved canonical literature just as much as Harold Bloom, I venture to say. And White and Jameson actually bothered to take French critical theory on on its own ground, and in my view, showed exactly why, necessary as it may have been in a particular historical moment, it was a dead end for literary study. Bloom just rants about dreary feminists and multiculturalists who force us to read b-a-a-d books. He may have a point about the vagueness of focus in "cultural studies" programs producing bad scholarship, but he buries it in personal prejudice.
Perhaps he ought to have examined how his anxiety about his own influence both confirms his theory and makes it impossible for him to appreciate that the chaotic time with which he's so out of joint still offers up much creative possibility, and a legacy for literature. I wonder if a graphic novelist who writes a lesbian bildungsroman that's also a critical appreciation of Proust (Alison Bechtel), or television series writer David Milch's characters who bleed Shakespeare in every line, or Patti Smith's rock performance tributes to Rimbaud and William Blake would sway him at all. I doubt it. Too bad, because canonical literature is morphing before our very eyes. Far from dying out, it's the many-headed hydra, and it's popping up everywhere.
What's wrong is saying we have to choose, a la George Bush and the terrorists, between the pre-eminence of aesthetic concerns or socio-political ones, once and for all, in all discussions of literature. I reject that choice. So did some the critics I most admire, Raymond Williams, Edward Said, Hayden White and Frederic Jameson. They all loved canonical literature just as much as Harold Bloom, I venture to say. And White and Jameson actually bothered to take French critical theory on on its own ground, and in my view, showed exactly why, necessary as it may have been in a particular historical moment, it was a dead end for literary study. Bloom just rants about dreary feminists and multiculturalists who force us to read b-a-a-d books. He may have a point about the vagueness of focus in "cultural studies" programs producing bad scholarship, but he buries it in personal prejudice.
Perhaps he ought to have examined how his anxiety about his own influence both confirms his theory and makes it impossible for him to appreciate that the chaotic time with which he's so out of joint still offers up much creative possibility, and a legacy for literature. I wonder if a graphic novelist who writes a lesbian bildungsroman that's also a critical appreciation of Proust (Alison Bechtel), or television series writer David Milch's characters who bleed Shakespeare in every line, or Patti Smith's rock performance tributes to Rimbaud and William Blake would sway him at all. I doubt it. Too bad, because canonical literature is morphing before our very eyes. Far from dying out, it's the many-headed hydra, and it's popping up everywhere.
January 19, 2008
This book is half brilliant, a quarter nonsense, and a quarter defensible but repetitive and angry venting at deconstructionists, New Historicists, neo-Marxists, queer theorists, feminists, etc. Okay, art should be judged on its esthetic and conceptual merits and not as it accords with someone’s political or social agenda. Fair enough, and enough said already, Harold. He idolizes Shakespeare, and makes an almost convincing case for us to do the same. He’s incredibly well-read and knowledgeable, highly intelligent, and often has keen insight (not the same as having wisdom, but it’s not clear he’s aware of the difference). He’s best with older literature. His chapter on Emily Dickenson is worth its weight in gold – I really wish he’d write a 500 page book on her poetry rather than yet another tome idolizing the Bard and lamenting the decline of Western culture. He’s at his worst in his chapter on Freud; he recognizes that Freud’s theories are baloney, but he thinks he was one of the greatest creative writers in history. Quoi!? I’ve read Freud and I just don’t see it – not even close (and I’ve never heard anyone else make a similar claim). But the book’s certainly worth a look for the good parts. Also for the “canonical” book lists in the back. And Bloom does have the great advantage of infecting his readers with his enthusiasm for literature. That goes a good way towards compensating for all the bile.
October 9, 2013
Bloom offers an array of highly idiosyncratic opinions, which are often entertaining and sometimes quite insightful. But it is utterly pretentious of him to assume, as he constantly does, that he is the voice of Western culture. Despite the vastness of his learning and the intensity of his passion, his view of literature as a sort of competitive sport, if taken seriously, would render the culture he loves trivial, a bit like football or even pro-wrestling. If it is competition he wants, he could do just as well to watch the television show "Survivor." Bloom interprets literature in terms of the world he knows, which means that writers of the past such as Sophocles or Dante become petty-minded academics, constantly scheming, conniving, and plotting ways to achieve tenure (i.e., a place in the canon). If we can't do much better than this, no wonder the study of literature is in big trouble.
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