Harold Bloom Books

Since it was first published in 1965, David V. Erdman's edition has been widely hailed as easily the best available text of Blake's poetry and prose. Comparing it to other Blake texts, Michale J. Tolley in Southern Review observed that it has "very much fuller textual annotations; and incorporates a remarkable number of new readings, including an almost complete recovery of the suppressed or altered passages in Jerusalem and many new readings of hitherto dubious passages in the manuscript, including many in The Four Zoas." F.W. Bateson, writing in The New York Review, pointed out that "the crucial preliminary problem [in establishing Blake's text] is simply to make out what Blake wrote -- including, of course, what he wrote before he deleted the manuscript or erased the engraving (or the copper-plate script). Erdman has used the modern aids such as infra-red photography, micro-photography and a powerful magnifying glass to help his own sharp and experienced eyes, but his real achievement has simply been to look at the physical realities of Blake's text more closely and intelligently than any previous editor."

Celebrated American literary critic Harold Bloom turns his attention to the writers of his own national literary tradition, from Walt Whitman and Herman Melville to William Faulkner and Hart Crane. The distillation of a lifetime of criticism, it is one of Bloom's most profoundly personal books to date.

An anthology of poems which attempts to give readers the possession of six centuries of great British and American poetry.

The nation's most celebrated literary critic introduces children to the exciting world of literature through this collection of great stories by Hans Christian Andersen, William Blake, O. Henry, Tolstoy, Mark Twain, Oscar Wilde, and others. 100,000 first printing.

-- Brings together the best criticism on the most widely read poets, novelists, and playwrights -- Presents complex critical portraits of the most influential writers in the English-speaking world -- from the English medievalists to contemporary writers Johann Wolfgang von Goethe was a monumental figure in 19th-century Germany, and his Faust stands among the finest works of Western literature.

This volume devotes over 100 pages to William Blake, including The Book of Thel and the entire "Night the Ninth" from The Four Zoas, as well as excerpts from Milton and Jerusalem. It also includes poems and prose by Wordsworth, Coleridge, Keats, Shelley, and Byron.

A critical overview of the work features such contributors as Bernard W. Bell, Trudier Harris, Nancy Jesser, and Susan Corey.

Presents critical essays that discuss the language, characters, plot, and major themes of the novel dealing with one man's memory of the fire-bombing of Dresden.

- A complex critical portrait of one of the most influential writers in the world- Bibliographic information that directs readers to additional resources for further study- A useful chronology of the writer's life- An introductory essay by Harold Bloom.

"Wonderful. . . . Spectacular. . . . You feel the pulse of life, what poetry can bring to us if we let it." —The Philadelphia Inquirer "This audacious personal odyssey offers readers a cosmos of possibilities when contemplating what happens once we 'shuffle off this mortal coil.'" —The Christian Science Monitor "An elegiac meditation on a life lived through books." —O, The Oprah Magazine "The great critic revisits the literature that has meant most to him." —The New York Times Book Review Here is the daringly original literary critic's most personal book: a four-part spiritual autobiography in the form of brief, luminous readings of poetry, drama, and prose—much of which he has known by heart since childhood. As one of his own mentors, M. H. Abrams, has said, to read Bloom's commentaries is like "reading classic authors by flashes of lightning." Gone are the polemics; here Bloom argues elegiacally with nobody but himself. In "A Voice she Heard Before the World Was Made," he offers startling meditations on foundational concerns of Biblical study. "In the Elegy Season" finds him coming to terms movingly, from a new vantage, with writers on whom he has brooded for much of his life. And with brio and bravura in "The Imperfect Is Our Paradise," Bloom ranges dazzlingly through twentieth-century American poetry, from Wallace Stevens to Amy Clampitt. Possessed by Memory, in short, is essential Bloom.

HarperCollins is proud to present its new range of best-loved, essential classics. 'Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks! rage! blow!' Epic and tragic in its scope, King Lear explores a king's demise into madness and insanity when he is betrayed by two of his manipulative and scheming daughters. It is Cordelia, the third and only daughter who refuses to flatter her father to deceive, who is banished from the kingdom, leading to dramatic and tumultuous events.

"The indispensable critic on the indispensable writer." -Geoffrey O'Brien, New York Review of Books. A landmark achievement as expansive, erudite, and passionate as its renowned author, Shakespeare: The Invention of the Human is the culmination of a lifetime of reading, writing about, and teaching Shakespeare. Preeminent literary critic-and ultimate authority on the western literary tradition-Harold Bloom leads us through a comprehensive reading of every one of the dramatist's plays, brilliantly illuminating each work with unrivaled warmth, wit and insight. At the same time, Bloom presents one of the boldest theses of Shakespearean scholarships: that Shakespeare not only invented the English language, but also created human nature as we know it today.

Gathers critical essays representing literary discussions about Alice Walker and her work, including essays on some of her specific works, Walker's relationship to other authors, and her treatment of gender and race themes.

Dramatic and powerful in its scope, 'Othello' explores the perils of suspicion and jealousy and the ensuing breakdown of relationships and disaster that can arise from such emotions. Othello secretly marries Desdemona, but is led to believe that she has been unfaithful to him by his ensign, Iago, leading to tragic events.

The last book written by the most famous literary critic of his generation, on the sustaining power of poetry

"Penguin Readers" is a series of simplified novels, film novelizations and original titles that introduce students at all levels to the pleasures of reading in English.

A study of twenty-six canonical writers details the qualities that make them literary essentials, and includes Shakespeare, Chaucer, Milton, Beckett, Tolstoy, Freud, Moliere, and others.

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.

J is the title that scholars ascribe to the nameless writer they believe is responsible for the text, written between 950 & 900, on which Genesis, Exodus & Numbers is based. In The Book of J, Bloom & Rosenberg draw the J text out of the surrounding material & present it as the seminal classic it is. In addition to Rosenberg's original translations, Bloom argues in several essays that "J" was not a religious writer but a fierce ironist & a woman living in the court of King Solomon. He also argues that J is a writer on par with Homer, Shakespeare & Tolstoy. Bloom also offers historical context, a discussion of the theory of how the different texts came together to create the Bible & translation notes. Rosenberg's translations from the Hebrew bring J's stories to life & reveal her towering originality & grasp of humanity.

The book remains a central work of criticism for all students of literature.

Compared to the works of James Joyce and Virginia Woolf, The House on Mango Street is made up of lyrical passages, interconnected vignettes, and meditations and observations that resemble prose poems. This book analyzes the work through critical essays, and features a bibliography, and notes on the contributing writers.

America's most original and controversial literary critic writes trenchantly about forty-eight masterworks spanning the Western tradition—from Don Quixote to Wuthering Heights to Invisible Man—in his first book devoted exclusively to narrative fiction. In this valedictory volume, Yale professor Harold Bloom—who for more than half a century was regarded as America's most daringly original and controversial literary critic—gives us his only book devoted entirely to the art of the novel. With his hallmark percipience, remarkable scholarship, and extraordinary devotion to sublimity, Bloom offers meditations on forty-eight essential works spanning the Western canon, from Don Quixote to Book of Numbers; from Wuthering Heights to Absalom, Absalom!; from Les Misérables to Blood Meridian; from Vanity Fair to Invisible Man. Here are trenchant appreciations of fiction by, among many others, Austen, Balzac, Dickens, Tolstoy, James, Conrad, Lawrence, Le Guin, and Sebald. Whether you have already read these books, plan to, or simply care about the importance and power of fiction, Harold Bloom is your unparalleled guide to understanding literature with new intimacy.

The author of The Book of J analyzes the American religious imagination to produce this brilliant examination of a national soul. His consensus: America is a nation of Gnostics, believers in a pre-Christian tradition of individual divinity.

Presents a collection of critical essays on the novel that analyze its structure, characters, narrator, and themes.

This book presents a collection of essays exploring various aspects of the novel "The Metamorphosis" by Franz Kafka.

Presents the text of Shakespeare's play of unrequited love and contains extensive annotations that provide context, pronunciation, and alternative readings and phrasings.

John Ashberry won the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Award, and the National Book Critics Circle Award for Self-Portrait in a Convex Mirror. Ashberry reaffirms the poetic powers that have made him such an outstanding figure in contemporary literature. This new book continues his astonishing explorations of places where no one has ever been.

Diese Einführung in die 'Kunst des Lesens' ist nicht an theoretischen Einsichten orientiert, sondern an den konkreten Leseerfahrungen des Autors, eines US-amerikanischen Literaturwissenschaftlers. Das Buch lädt ein zu Streifzügen durch die abendländische und die US-amerikanische Literaturgeschichte, mit Schwerpunkt auf dem 19. und 20. Jahrhundert. Dabei werden immer nur ein, zwei Texte eines Autors aufgegriffen, knapp, lebendig und geistreich interpretiert und zugleich als sujektives Leseerlebnis nachvollziehbar gemacht. Der Autor will in ähnlicher Weise zum Lesen verführen, wie dies zuletzt Rolf Vollmann 1997 so glänzend gelang ('Die wunderbaren Falschmünzer': BA 6/97), Empfehlung als gute Ergänzung zu Vollmanns Werk in größeren Bibliotheken. (2).

Dal Libro di Giobbe all'Ecclesiaste, dalle opere di Platone a quelle di Cervantes, Shakespeare, Montaigne, Nietsche e Proust. Un libro per rispondere a una domanda cruciale: a che cosa serve la letteratura? (LaFeltrinelli.it)

Die zentrale These in diesem Werk von Harold Bloom besagt, dass Dichtung aus der Angst vor dem Einfluss großer Vorbilder entsteht. Diese Angst hemmt zwar die Produktivität, fungiert jedoch gleichzeitig als starke Antriebskraft für das literarische Schaffen. Junge Dichter versuchen, sich aus dem Schatten ihrer Klassiker zu befreien, indem sie deren Werke einer aggressiven "Fehllektüre" unterziehen, um eigene Texte zu entwickeln. Alle Lektüren sind letztlich "Fehllektüren", und die Bedeutung eines Textes entsteht in einem dynamischen Austausch zwischen verschiedenen Werken, was die Literaturgeschichte als ein Schlachtfeld darstellt.

In questo saggio Bloom intende dimostrare che la tradizione giudaico-cristiana in realtà non esiste, che ebraismo e cristianesimo sono di fatto incompatibili. Esaminando con il metodo della critica letteraria e storica la Torà ebraica, l'Antico e il Nuovo Testamento e i Vangeli gnostici contemporanei a quelli canonici, Bloom arriva alla conclusione che il Gesù "ebraico" di Marco, così umano, irascibile e incline all'ironia, potrebbe essere davvero figlio di quella divinità fin troppo umana che è lo Jahvè della Torà; mentre il Cristo degli altri libri del Nuovo Testamento proviene da una famiglia del tutto diversa; e lo Jahvè degli ebrei e il Dio Padre dei cristiani hanno ben poco in comune.

Frye addresses what he sees as the four main approaches to criticism: the historical, the ethical, the archetypal and the theoretical. His text is considered a classic of modern literary criticism.