Harold Bloom and SF
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1RandyStafford
Has anybody read any of Harold Bloom's lit crit books on sf? Is his criticism worth reading?
2rshart3
I haven't read his criticism of SF (I didn't know he had done any) but I've found his writing pompous, overbearing, and too obsessed with the Canon. A year ago I decided to try working through his book Genius: a mosaic of one hundred exemplary creative minds, but found it heavy going. It's arranged in a strange Kabbalistic order, and not only did I find it overbearing, I also sometimes had trouble understanding just what he was trying to say about the person. I've been stalled for many months now, but I still hope to read a bit more, selectively, as a way to learn more about some of the subjects. It's hard to imagine him being very simpatico with SF.
3anglemark
"Le Guin is the overwhelming instance of a superbly imaginative creator and major stylist"
" I have written extensively about everything so far mentioned, and desire to recommend strongly a fantasy novel much too little known, though it was first published a quarter century ago, John Crowley's Little, Big (1981). I have read and reread Little, Big at least a dozen times, and always am startled and refreshed. It seems to me the best book of its kind since Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass."
" I have written extensively about everything so far mentioned, and desire to recommend strongly a fantasy novel much too little known, though it was first published a quarter century ago, John Crowley's Little, Big (1981). I have read and reread Little, Big at least a dozen times, and always am startled and refreshed. It seems to me the best book of its kind since Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass."
4Cecrow
>3 anglemark:, that was the quote that got me reading Little, Big. Stylish, definitely.
6stellarexplorer
>2 rshart3: But on the other hand, if you happen to want to read about the Canon, he’s your guy!
7rshart3
>6 stellarexplorer:
I don't have any problem with the canon at all -- it's the canon for a reason, and important. But his awestruck, worshipful attitude, persistently expressed, gets suffocating after a while. One can be told that Shakespeare is god so many times, in so many different ways, that it gets old.
I don't have any problem with the canon at all -- it's the canon for a reason, and important. But his awestruck, worshipful attitude, persistently expressed, gets suffocating after a while. One can be told that Shakespeare is god so many times, in so many different ways, that it gets old.
8stellarexplorer
>7 rshart3: Maybe I should have added a smile emoji. I get what you’re saying. I just take him for what I like and ignore the rest. He was a character.
9justifiedsinner
>7 rshart3: Anyone tired of hearing Shakespeare as being godlike should watch the TV series Upstart Crow. A useful antidote.
10elenchus
>3 anglemark:
I didn't know of those quotes, and frankly am surprised Bloom published those. And I agree wholeheartedly with both recs, especially the Crowley. That said, I came to those authors without reading Bloom's recommendations, and so don't think he's the best avenue for learning about SF / F works that are unknown to me.
I didn't know of those quotes, and frankly am surprised Bloom published those. And I agree wholeheartedly with both recs, especially the Crowley. That said, I came to those authors without reading Bloom's recommendations, and so don't think he's the best avenue for learning about SF / F works that are unknown to me.
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