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March 20 ROOTING OUT BLOOM 2: The Western Canon
As fond as I am of Mr. Bloom, his "Prelude and Preface" (why wasn't one of those words good enough? Or find a single one that is?) is full of PhD-style writing. Monumentally abstract labels abound: new historicist, cultural materialist, neo-Marxist, School of Resentment. Remember, this is just the -- for the sake of simplicity -- I'm going to refer to it as -- the preface. There's six other sections. In the section on Chaucer, he chose to write about the Wife of Bath and The Pardoner, two characters somewhat distant from the top of the Boetian totem pole. And I can see why he mentions Chaucer and Shakespeare together so often. They created characters of flesh and blood, and nerves and heart. And screw-ups. Hamlet was a prince of Denmark, but he didn't act like any of the Windsor boys. Romeo and Juliet were nobility by blood but acted like a couple of kids from The O.C. And Henry V was George Gipp. Don't scoff. I know you want to. But that's why these writers stand the test of time. They understand that any philosophical/literary abstraction has its roots in "human" beings. In people. It's "soylent green" -- and we all know what soylent green is... He mentions Freud more often than I'm comfortable with. Freud linked a lot of psychological conditions to the condition of one's sex life. Do Bloom-style scholars feel saucy and maybe a little wicked by mentioning him? Does it give them a tingle? BTW, p. 426 -- James Joyce is an adjective! EPIC!
March 19 PRE-ORDERS: THE WAITING IS THE HARDEST PART
******MILD SPOILERS RE: LORA LEIGH'S SEALs********
Remember when the Nazis were making everyone see Jews as rats? When they convinced them that they weren't human, so it was okay to hurt them? Remember that? Well, these characters are hybrid humans -- created with animal DNA. It's hard sometimes to tell where the human ends and the animal begins. Well, it's hard until someone pisses them off. Then you find out the hard way that animal DNA doesn't allow for mercy. Loyalty? Yes. Love? Check. Instincts? For sure. Mercy? Ha! You wish. It's not nice to F*#@ with Mother Nature.
So in this story, Macey finds someone to love. But as is typical, the course of true love doesn't run smoothly. The sex, yeah, for sure. No second guessing there. But love is a scarier proposition. Apparently.
SHERRILYN KENYON ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
After waiting for 10 books to get this guy's story, I find myself suddenly of two minds. Over the course of the Dark-Hunter novels, Acheron is mysterious, gorgeous, libidinous, generous, and several other -ous adjectives. But now that his story is going to come out this summer, I'm thinking, maybe it's better to keep him as mysterious man/god/sex-god. That's why he's interesting, right? It's just like with Jonas of the Breeds books. He's interesting because he's a puppetmaster, behind-the-scenes manipulator. Acheron is someone everyone wants to get close to, but extremely few manage it and still live. In fact, if you want to be invited to his house, you have to DIE. How freaking goth is that!!! 2008 IS THE YEAR OF ACHERON
ROOTING OUT BLOOM'S WRITING ROOTS
Harold Bloom is a "Very Important Critic". He has a deep, personal relationship with classics that, I'm sure, is the envy of any college professor. He is the equivalent of a code writer at MS or Apple. Neck-deep in the nosebleed section -- sailing in the superstratosphere -- of literary criticism. He has probably forgotten more than any ten of us will ever know about classic literature. He writes and thinks in English so baroque, it's a wonder he can still abide this mundane plane. I like Harold because I like the way he writes. His writing style is intellectually stimulating. If you've ever hungered for knowledge, ever thirsted for enlightenment, ever yearned for wisdom, ever CRAVED ideas to fill you and satisfy you, this guy delivers -- BIG TIME! You are smarter after reading one of Bloom's books. Not because you ingest and regurgitate his opinions, but because you're a better thinker after reading one of his works, especially the three I'm talking about here. What's so satisfying about his writing is that, mostly in WSWBF, he explains his ideas simply, million-dollar vocabulary notwithstanding. His prose is so rich with so many apparatuses that are hallmarks of superior writing.
And how does he do it? He reads the books. He writes about them. Too simple? Yeah, but ain't nothin' wrong with that. ~~*~~*~~
This book is deceptive. What it weighs in physical terms is nowt compared to its weight in ideas and associations. It's so dense with information, as any review of the full Shakespeare would have to be, that you should read it a chapter at a time. There's no honor in trying to read the whole book in a few days. Reading books in a hurry is for little people. Any chapter here is like sitting down to a multi-course dinner. First the salad, then the soup, then the fish, then the entree, then the dessert, then the biscuits, cheese, and port, then brandy and cigars. You want -- need -- a chance to "recollect in tranquility" all that the chapter has to offer before starting another. The book is great. His Most Majestic Stodginess, however, I take issue with sometimes. My favorite play is MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING. I have a thing about double-standards. Well, after reading Ch.13 about the play, I felt guilty for liking that one above all the others. I felt childish and shallow and ditzy for liking a play about matchmaking gone awry and an overgrown tomboy who doesn't know how to be girly enough to entice her crush. I resented Bloom, for a while. The more I thought about it though, I realized, "Hey, he's a guy. Of course, he's going to have a lower opinion of it." Guys, even bookish owls like Bloom, prefer the plays where someone's getting a boot up the backside. In his chapter on Titus Andronicus, he writes about how he's fascinated by the play that even two of the West End's best struggle to get just right. How bloodthirsty it is; and how he thinks it's kinda cool that the play was designed to negate Christopher Marlowe. Contentiousness. Brutality. Senecan stoicism. If you possess a fleshy nozzle and testosterone, this is your play. Click here to see Bloom discussing Shakespeare and Genius at the Library of Congress.
March 03 THE PHILOSOPHER'S SONG, VERSE 2
John Stuart Mill of his own free will, on half a pint of shanty was particularly ill Plato, they say, could stick it away; half a crate of whiskey every day Aristotle, Aristotle, was a bugger for the bottle And Hobbes was fond of his dram And Rene Descartes was a drunken fart. "I drink, therefore I am." Yes, Socrates himself is particularly missed... A lovely little thinker, but a bugger when he's pissed!
Philosophy Pages: Major Western philosophers
March 02 IN A NUTSHELL 3: Posting a bunch of wank...
________________________________________________________________________________________ Previous Round-up Posts: March 01 THE PHILOSOPHER'S SONG, VERSE 1
"The Bruces Song " Immanuel Kant was a real piss-ant who was very rarely stable. Heideggar, Heideggar was a boozy beggar who could think you under the table. David Hume could out-consume Schoppenhauer and Hegel. And Wittgenstein was a beery swine who was just as sloshed as Schlegel. There's nothing Nietzsche couldn't teach 'ya 'bout the raising o'the wrist. Socrates, himself, was permanently pissed.
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