bookpresentation bloom's the western canon

The Western Canon

By Harold Bloom

Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences

Harold Bloom

• 1930 – present• American literary critic and Professor of Humanities at Yale University

• Wrote 20+ books on literary criticism

Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences

Claim

• Aesthetic value is autonomous from morality and politics

• Aesthetic originality as ‘entry ticket’ to canon

• Analysis of 26 EU-US writers, from Shakespeare to Beckett

Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences

Dante and Shakespeare

• Cognitive strength

• Linguistic energy

• Power of invention

Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences

Chronological periods

• Theocratic age: from ancient Near East to Middle Ages

• Aristocratic age: from Dante to Goethe

• Democratic age: 19th century• Chaotic age: 20th century

Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences

School of Resentment

• Use of literature to promote social agendas

• Bloom argues against this: instead aesthetic pleasure and self-insight

Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences

Politics

• Should have no place in literary criticism

• Reducement to ideology: poem becomes social document

• Preserving poetry as fully and purely as possible

Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences

The western canon

• Standard of measurement• Foundation for cultural thinking and individual thinking

• Rarely new works added

Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences

Context

• 1994• 1990s Postmodernism • Questioning basic concepts of knowledge, science, education, literature and tradition

Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences

Reception

• “Probably the most celebrated cultural critic in the U.S.”

• “America’s best known man of letters”

• But also in the middle of literary controversy

Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences

Connection with modern art

• 20th century: new art, new music, new literature

Bloom: cherish western traditions and cultural foundation

Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences

Thank you for your attention!Any questions?

Why is the existence of the western canon important and what criticism may be given?