Harold Whom? Harold Bloom!!

Just to note: a friend pointed out quite accurately that everyone is now writing an essay about Harold Bloom; please be assured this is not an essay but a blog rant.

 Anyone who likes Northrop Frye cannot be all bad.

  

Harold Bloom, scholar, teacher, critic, writer, thinker, was a literary giant of the ol' style literature and else-wise Patriarchy, a man who in a Paris Review article was said to repeatedly call a grad student "my dear" while deriding her analysis of a major Shakespearean villain. He was a defender of the Western canon, most likely a huge male chauvinist, a purveyor of controversy. He also was a brilliant, far thinking, unique, innovative and analytic mind and critic; and for all this, he can be forgiven almost anything.

In addition, Harold Bloom apparently really liked one of my own more arcane literary heroes, Northrop Frye (go look him up, if you are not familiar- dare to find out who's behind the daunting moniker "Northrup" followed by the very Brrrritish "Frye," a name in itself to inspire serious, old school English lit awe, with intimations of perhaps the Beowulf era and the mindless, happy gulping of mead for breakfast).  Bloom also took on the once hallowed (now antediluvian) "new critics" literary mafia and defended the Romantic movement. For these things he shall be forgiven his transgresses, even in our multicultural, post post feminist, post post post post everything social and cultural milieu.

Bloom was the archetypal son of immigrants who caught his star by seizing the educational green light at the end of Daisy's dock, with the distant flicker of success beckoning more modestly, as Master Teacher rather than Master of the Universe; he achieved it through hard work and an amazing talent. He had his critics, and needless to say, like many of us, he was not a perfect human. However he was a gift to anyone who likes well constructed words and ideas and was  influential, entertaining, and a first class literary and cultural trouble maker. How can we not cleave to that?

Not sure how many blog readers know Bloom, or even care to look more closely, but honestly, it's worth a try, whaddya got to lose?? Two well known works among his unbelievably prodigious output on literature, culture, history are "The Book of J" and "The Western Canon." I cite these two only because they quickly come to mind and thus preclude having to dive online and do research to jog the memory- my own laziness here sadly providing yet more evidence for Bloom's lament about the decline of modern thought processes! In truth he wrote tons of great, often illuminating essays on lit and culture, and his ideas on Shakespeare are among the best; his take Hamlet is worth checking out for anyone mildly acquainted with the late Dane.

Did Bloom's preferred canon have significant omissions, and was he too much "then" and not totally in step with the times? For sure! The world always moves on and he left out names and works that should not have been excluded, and included  others with which you may not agree. But he created a major point of reference, a framework from where to start, a codified collection of suggestions, and a history. 

More significantly the canon, unlike the four thousand year old Gilgamesh- the ancient epic's eponymous main character often regarded as the first tragic hero- is not written in stone on rock tablets in cuneiform; it is fluid. And whether fluid or concrete, it's never the last word but a starting point, an idea. 

Perhaps Bloom just reminds me of my own youthful dalliances with serious lit, and therefore my youth, but this in no way negates the importance of what he offered. He also made his knowledge accessible to all kinds of readers, not just scholars and intellectual snobs, and then was criticized for popularizing such rarefied subjects.  

Would I have liked him personally? Who knows. . . .Why should we care about him? Well, why not? He counts. Times  change, but as Proust reminds, some things perennially remain. . . . The guy definitely knew his stuff, and lots of it. If you are one who likes to read, and read things that make you think carefully about what you just read, then read him too if the spirit moves you, and decide for yourself.

This excerpt from the Times obit states Bloom's credo in his own words:“What are now called ‘Departments of English’ will be renamed departments of ‘Cultural Studies,’” he wrote in “The Western Canon,” “where Batman comics, Mormon theme parks, television, movies and rock will replace Chaucer, Shakespeare, Milton, Wordsworth and Wallace Stevens. “Major, once-elitist universities and colleges,” he continued, “will still offer a few courses in Shakespeare, Milton and their peers, but these will be taught by departments of three or four scholars, equivalent to teachers of ancient Greek and Latin.” 

  

Oy, a veritable Literary Armageddon! But wherever you stand on what should be included (or not) in the canon going forward or editing backward, clearly you don't have to love everything in Bloom's version of what's essential to get the sense of what he is saying about his choice of great works; and I won't apologize for not particularly adoring Wallace Stevens or numbering Wordsworth among my favorite Romantics, but does this really matter?

  

The reactions to Bloom's quotation that came back via email before writing this blog surprisingly and not surprisingly showed me that readers from various and divergent points on the cultural/political spectrum seem to agree on certain basic issues and ideas inherent in his work, rationale, and contribution.

Next time on the blog I will post comments from readers along with email responses to Bloom's vision.  Are we truly headed toward one, gigantic, prose, poetry, art (and everything else that counts) theme park of culture? Maybe we're already (more than?) halfway there? Or not. Let us know what you think, and tune in to next post to see what others say about the direction of the canon, writing, critical reading and all art forms in general, the notion of "culture," and our own culture: the way we live, think, believe, observe and experience.