J.D. Salinger

Bloom's Modern Critical Views

by Harold Bloom (Editor)

A collection of essays about the works of the American author

Genres: Nonfiction, Literary Criticism

147 pages, Hardcover

First published May 1, 1987

About the author

Harold Bloom was an American literary critic and the Sterling Professor of Humanities at Yale University. In 2017, Bloom was called "probably the most famous literary critic in the English-speaking world." After publishing his first book in 1959, Bloom wrote more than 50 books, including over 40 books of literary criticism, several books discussing religion, and one novel. He edited hundreds of anthologies concerning numerous literary and philosophical figures for the Chelsea House publishing firm. Bloom's books have been translated into more than 40 languages. He was elected to the American Philosophical Society in 1995.
Bloom was a defender of the traditional Western canon at a time when literature departments were focusing on what he derided as the "school of resentment" (multiculturalists, feminists, Marxists, and others). He was educated at Yale University, the University of Cambridge, and Cornell University.

Reviews

[Brandon · Rating 3 out of 5]

I guess I've been reading this off and on since I've started at this new job, according to the start date for reading this book....

Anyway, pretty good collection of critical essays. I hold Harold Bloom in high esteem, yet it's taken me so long to get around to reading one of his edited collections. I happened to be reading Salinger's Nine Stories in October 2018, and so decided to read Bloom's Salinger collection.

Some ups and downs. I've written briefly on each essay in the "comments" as I tracked by progress page-wise, and it has been so long since I've started reading this that I don't really remember much of it very well at all. I'd say Seed's essay is the "best," with all the rest only interesting as a curiosity. Personally, I don't consider Salinger very "deep" from what I've read (Catcher, F&Z, Nine Stories), so it seems almost silly to plunge into his works like this. I guess I did "learn" some things, and indeed much of my own Goodreads review for Nine Stories was influenced by some of the stuff I read in this volume, so I have to give it credit for that.

Not that I'm shitting on this book, or anything. It's a decent source for criticism concerning Salinger's work without having to resort to university JSTOR stuff. I'm sure you could easily google "essays about Salinger," but personally I prefer the "authenticity" of a collected book.

[Lauren · Rating 3 out of 5]

decent collection of essays