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THE ANXIETY OF INFLUENCE

A THEORY OF POETRY

Professor Bloom (Yale; author of Blake's Apocalypse, 1963, and Yeats, 1970) interprets modern poetic history — the history of poetry in a Cartesian climate — in terms of Freud's "family romance," and advances creative anxiety as its motive principle. The poet's anxiety in the face of a strong predecessor is, in other words, an extreme version of the son's dubious regard for the father; and influence, far from a benign legacy of images and ideas, is a threat of death, smothering his desire and locking his rightful present up in the past. Bloom's emblem for it is the Covering Cherub of Blake and Ezekiel, while the prototype of the poet is Milton's Satan who rises to proclaim a good of his own — only after hitting the floor of the abyss. Each poet must create himself in a kind of damned antithesis to the parent poet and, turning from the language of revelation toward a more phenomenological analysis, Bloom identifies six phases in the process — beginning with a misreading of the forerunner, proceeding through the "revisionary ratios" of self-assertion, and ending in an embrace that is both surrender and appropriation. All this is put forth in support of an "antithetical practical criticism" which Bloom proposes as a corrective to the "tautological" and "reductive" methods now in use. The meaning of a poem, he suggests, is neither itself nor something outside poetry, but a precursor's poem. While he perhaps carries the idea a bit far, its advantages are self-evident in regard to such contemporaries as Ashbery and Ammons. Yet we are not entirely convinced by the author's insistence that his "interests are those of the practical critic"; there is a brooding, obsessive brilliance in the scholarship, in the convening of Blakean third parties (Sphinx, Muse, Tharmas), that indicates a combat of Bloom's own with the Cherub. Imposing, daemonic and — it seems so incidental — written with a mighty adversative flair.

Pub Date: Feb. 7, 1972

ISBN: 0195112210

Page Count: 212

Publisher: Oxford Univ.

Review Posted Online: Oct. 10, 2011

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1972

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NUTCRACKER

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

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TO THE ONE I LOVE THE BEST

EPISODES FROM THE LIFE OF LADY MENDL (ELSIE DE WOLFE)

An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.

Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1955

ISBN: 0670717797

Page Count: -

Publisher: Viking

Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1955

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