Harold Bloom and the Crisis in Literature
Harold Bloom and the Crisis in Literature

Summary/Abstract: This paper presents one of the greatest American literary critics and theoreticians of the 20th century, Harold Bloom, and his thoughts on literature as a civilizational attainment under the attack of modern literary movements. As a disciple of Gnosticism, Bloom was convinced that post-structuralist anti-humanist tendencies are the culprit of degenerative processes in literature. Bloom calls such degenerative movements the “School of Resentment” and the “New Cynicism” and believes that the concepts of literary canon and authorship are in a struggle for their existence. Within the “School of Resentment,” Bloom names those literary movements that he considers to be responsible for the current crisis of literature: Marxist literary criticism, African-American studies, New Historicism, Feminist criticism and Poststructuralism. He singles out Jacques Lacan, Jacques Derrida and Michel Foucault as the main culprits of degenerative changes in Western literary works. As a consequence of their denial of the existence of literary canons and authors, Bloom decides to write his monumental work, The Western Canon, in which he rejects their radical claims. In such circumstances, Bloom stands out as a gnostic champion who opposes post-structuralist tendencies, and it is precisely his thoughts on the crisis in literature, as well as the struggle for the literary canon and the concept of authorship, that are presented in this paper.

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