Harold Bloom: The Anatomy of Influence - Literature as a Way of Life
Yale University Press, USA, 2012. . Binding: Softcover. Book Condition: Very Good. Size: 9" Tall. Quantity Available: 1. Category: Literature & Literary; Books on Books. ISBN: 0300181442. ISBN/EAN: 9780300181449. Inventory No: 45211.
Literary criticism, as I attempt to practice it, writes Harold Bloom in
The Anatomy of Influence, is in the first place literary, that is to
say, personal and passionate. For more than half a century, Bloom has
shared his profound knowledge of the written word with students and
readers. In this, his most comprehensive and accessible study of
influence, Bloom leads us through the labyrinthine paths which link the
writers and critics who have informed and inspired him for so many
years. The result is a critical self-portrait, a sustained meditation
on a life lived with and through the great works of the Western can: Why
has influence been my lifelong obsessive concern? Why have certain
writers found me and t others? What is the end of a literary life?
Featuring extended analyses of Bloom's most cherished poets-Shakespeare,
Whitman, and Crane-as well as inspired appreciations of Emerson,
Tennyson, Browning, Yeats, Ashbery, and others, The Anatomy of Influence
adapts Bloom's classic work The Anxiety of Influence to show us what
great literature is, how it comes to be, and why it matters. Each
chapter maps startling new literary connections that suddenly seem
inevitable once Bloom has shown us how to listen and to read. A fierce
and intimate appreciation of the art of literature on a scale that the
author will not again attempt, The Anatomy of Influence follows the
sublime works it studies, inspiring the reader with a sense of something
ever more about to be.