Another work of uncompromised literary analysis, thought, and feeling, from the mind of Bloom: towering, real, invaluable.
The latest from the venerable Bloom (Hamlet: Poem Unlimited, 2003, etc.) may not always be easy going, but it’s invariably rewarding and rich.
There are “only three criteria,” says Bloom, that determine the books he’ll continue “reading and teaching”: “aesthetic splendor, intellectual power, wisdom.” But this isn’t wisdom you can put in your pocket and take home. Not only will this kind not make you feel better—“I have not found that wisdom literature is a comfort”—but you may not even be able to figure out what it is: “The Book of Job offers wisdom, but it is not anything we can comprehend.” Still, it’s there, in its own power, significance, and insistence (wisdom writing “must be rich”). This literature “teaches us to accept natural limits,” Bloom says at one moment, then reverses, saying that “Job could not console Herman Melville and his Captain Ahab, but provoked them to furious response.” Perfect consistency is too small a concept for this kind of wisdom, as Bloom argues that the drama form was too small for Hamlet. In any case, with the unflagging curiosity and the associative powers of one who seems to have read all books written, Bloom takes us through studies in pairings, of Job paired with Ecclesiastes, Plato with Homer (the battle between philosophy and poetry), Cervantes, and Shakespeare. Declaring that “Thoughts are events,” he gives us Montaigne and Bacon, Johnson and Goethe, Emerson and Nietzsche, and at last Freud and Proust, in a pairing as fascinating as any here. In closing, he touches on the Gospel of Thomas and on Augustine’s “invention” of reading, adding that “Reading alone will not save us or make us wise, but without it we will lapse into the death-in-life of the dumbing-down in which America now leads the world, as in all other matters.”
Another work of uncompromised literary analysis, thought, and feeling, from the mind of Bloom: towering, real, invaluable.Pub Date: Oct. 7, 2004
ISBN: 1-57322-284-4
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Riverhead
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2004
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
