89 years old and still teaching at Yale? Must have had a sucky retirement plan.
At first I thought he was the author of
“The Closing of the American Mind”. which was a huge seller back in 1987. But no. That was Allan Bloom.
A tower among men. His was one of the first books that helped me question my unfailing leftist perspective.
I read his book “The Lucifer Principal” the week before 9/11. His chapter on Bin-Laden and Islamic radicals predicted 9\11 and when everyone on TV wondered who done it, it was clear in my mind. I heard about the book on coast-to-coast am, where he was often interviewed. A smart man. I don’t know about his politics.
I took his graduate course in Wordsworth and Keats in 1977, when I was in Yale Grad School. He was a true polymath, who put only a small fraction of what he knew into his books. He had an amazing grasp of the politics and social history of England in the 18th and 19th century.
Strangely enough, his latest book (on the “American Canon”) is due to be released tomorrow.
Sad news. His criticism of the King James Bible, Shakespeare and the Western Canon are a must-read.
Harold Bloom was our greatest classical literary critic. He was a champion of the classics.
A towering intellect and national resource who will be deeply missed. Baruch Dayan Ha Emet.
when I was the book buyer for our Library system, we bought a LOT of his books. Sad loss.
RIP.