Harold Bloom on HP

[Jim Ferer]

No: HPFGUIDX 11251

--- In HPforGrownups at y..., "Andrea H Bonfanti" <andrea at n...> wrote:
> This week, Veja, the most prestigious Brazilian weekly magazine, 
interviews literary critic Harold Bloom. Here is what he says about HP 
(the translation is mine, so bear with me):
> 
> "Veja: Are books like the Harry Potter series a good start, a way to 
sparkle children's interest in reading?
> 
> Bloom: Do you really believe children will read better books after 
reading Harry Potter? I don't think so. And one of the worst writers 
in America, Stephen King (he's terrible, I can't even read a couple of 
paragraphs by him) has confirmed my worst fears in a review he wrote 
for The New York Times. According to him, the 12-year-olds who are now 
reading Potter will be ready to read his books at the age of 16. Do I 
need to say more? The USA are a country in which television, movies, 
video games, computers and Stephen King have ruined reading.

Mr. Bloom might have a point that the Harry Potter series may not fix 
the literary problems of an entire nation, but what's his answer? I 
doubt reading his material will change things.

> Veja: Why should one not read J. K. Rowling's books?
> 
> Bloom: I have only read one of her titles. The language is horrible. 
Nobody, for instance, "walks" in that book. The characters "stretch 
their legs", which is an obvious cliche. The whole book is full of 
these well-worn, second-hand phrases. I've written a negative review 
of Harry Potter for the Wall Street Journal. It was instant 
controversy. Over 400 letters were sent, calling me the worst names 
imaginable. Defense for such kind of bad books comes from everywhere - 
parents, children, media - and it is very unsettling and not at all 
healthy."

I wish people would stop sending flames to people like Mr. Bloom. He's 
entitled to his opinion, and some people just love to get vilified 
like that.

To me, JKR uses simple, straightforward language that doesn't get in 
the way.  I admire other authors' writing (as craft) more than hers, 
but her ideas,themes and characters are incomparable.

I think the following excerpt from a profile of Mr. Bloom on the 
Stnford Presidential Lectures site will give some insight into where 
he's coming from and convince some people Mr. Bloom is a literary 
snob: (Excuse me. An *envious* literary snob)

"Bloom's principal target in this first phase of his career was the
 conservative formalism of T. S. Eliot, who had dismissed the 
Romantics as undisciplined poets of nature. Eliot's position became an 
article of faith in the New Criticism that dominated the American 
academy in the 1950s and early 1960s. Bloom rejected this view, 
displacing the essence of Romantic art from reconciliation with nature 
to a visionary imagination profoundly antithetical to nature. In 
Bloom's reading, the Romantic poem does not represent the artist's 
harmonious union with the world but instead enacts his heroic refusal 
of time and matter."

This is exactly what we need to capture the minds and imaginations of 
9 to 12 year olds, isn't it?