Renowned literary critic Harold Bloom published a scathing review of literary sensation of our generation, Harry Potter. This diatribe (Wall Street Journal, 11/7/00) is extracted here. What’s your view? Is J K Rowling really a brilliant author or, as Bloom asserts, “if you cannot be persuaded to read anything better, Rowling will have to do”?
I don’t get what the fuss is all about. I always thought Harry Potter was mediocre at best. I do disagree with Bloom on one thing though. The movies aren’t better.
What a pompous prick! Harold Bloom should shut up. What has he ever written?
Leave Bloom alone, he’s just a muggle.
William Shakespeare was rejected by the academic elitists of his time.
William Shakespeare was remembered.
Can anyone recall the names of those academic elitists?
Will anyone remember Harold Bloom?
Although Harry Potter is yet to establish itself as a timeless classic, I suspect that Amz is right concerning Prof Bloom. In fact, very few people know who he is today.
I also think that readers would be more open to his arguments if they were less contemptuous and condescending.
Harry Potter doesn’t seem to be a classic, and probably will never be on the same level as Shakespeare, or Dickens or other literary greats.
The story does follow established cliches as the critic suggests –orphan/Oliver Twist esque.
I do agree with his statement with a certain apprehension because it is true that it is not critics that determine the classics but the books standing the test of time.
I’m a long time Harry Potter basher, ie I’m not really into the books and don’t see what all the fuss is about.
But by the same token, I think that it is a little unfair for this guy (whoever he is) to be criticising JK Rowling as if she was trying to write a timeless classic. I think the fact that this book has brought joy to so many lives is a triumph for the author regardless of what critics say.
J K Rowling wrote a book that perfectly appealed to wide audience. She invoked many classical sources, from Dickens (as mentioned) to Homer and did so in the setting of a good ol English boarding school. It was a good idea and well executed… hardly a literary marvel, with her language at times becoming repetitive and boring and at others attempts to be evocative on a level close to something of Tolkein.. but fails.
This however is not the point. Her book sells.. I worked in a bookstore, and my GOD it sells!! And that is because it does what it does in a way that no one had really done before.. not that it introduced anything new, more that it got the mix just right. So maybe a literary critic can have his little tantrum because he didn’t like the first book (which actually sucks! Prisoner of Azkaban ftw) but he is not the audience it is aimed for, its for the kids! And they love it… and surely that is what matters.
Thats my 5c, now I’m off to critique the literary style of ‘the muggle headed wombat’ and maybe THEN everyone will know my name!
Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.
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