/lit/ - Literature

>An individual's views are necessarily shaped by that individual's culture, as well as by the individual's status relative to his/her culture. However, the individual is the ultimate source of his/her view's and that individual's work is the ultimate product of those views. The work, however, is necessarily a separate object from its author and the views expressed within the work are not necessarily purely the author's. In order to parse and properly isolate the intended message, thesis, or even vantage of a work, one must regard it aesthetically rather than politically. Once it has been aesthetically deconstructed (in the fashion of a philosophic argument), it can be evaluated on its political merit. To elide the necessary step of aesthetic examination leaves the work without its own voice; it reduces the work to its place within the examiner's theory (as I said before).

>If a work of literature is a completely different thing when viewed through one lens than it is when viewed through another, then what thing can the work of literature be said to be? And what can it be said to do? It may seem silly to even ask such questions but they are vitally important to the aesthetic judgment of a work of art. If a work is reduced only to its function within a theory, then the work cannot exist without the theory; the political view of the reader shapes the work, and the work cannot be said to have a priori merit to its reading. The work ceases to have value in and of itself. In a politically theoretical university, there is no aesthetic, no in-and-of-itself. There is only the reader's strident opinion. The work is then but a canvas onto which that opinion is projected. Literature is variable rather than functional. Thus, there can be no canon of "great" works, for there is left no reasonable method for the evaluation of aesthetic superiority. There can be only canons relative to certain dogma. There are books which are sufficiently Marxist, there are books which are sufficiently feminist, and so on, ad infinitum.

>The result is complete misreadings of works, blind spots to some of the most important works of modern and classic literature, and, most to my dismay, the attitude that you're 'above' works that don't conform to your narrow worldview. The implication that something is just not worth your time if you can't fit it into the "gender studies" box, or whatever. More people read Chinua Achebe's "Things Falling Apart" in college than anything by Joseph Conrad.

>this is one of the reasons why deconstruction and other postmodern schools of theory often get tagged as nihilistic. They turn reading into a science, and like all science for the last couple hundreds of years, they begin by assuming that the object under study operates according to an underlying system that, with enough study, can be gotten to the bottom of and eventually demystified. They deny the possibility of the "pure aesthetic effect”

>if I had to read poems and novels as strictly political artifacts, I don't think I would enjoy reading that much. I'm an atheist and I love science of all kinds, but I put my foot down when it comes to literature. I've sort of built a wall of stubbornness around myself when it comes to this, sort of like what religious people have to do in light of modern science. Maybe it can all be rationally explained, but the feeling I get when I walk outside after reading a really good poem or story is something that I'd rather not have integrated into the materialist, systematic universe that we're all so bent on getting to the bottom of these days.

I'm against anything that Howard Bloom is for.

>>3574150
So you're for the politicization of teaching literature?

>>3574114
This... I'm a Bloomian. Fuck post-modernism, i'm becoming a Bloominist.

He is absolutely right.

He's right. I'm not a fan of Bloom's critical work but I'm totally onside with his "School of Resentment" argument. Identity politics have no place in serious academia.

>>3574158
Or rather Bloomist.

I'm against it. I can remember the Toni Morrison, Native Son etc. crap I had to read. Could've been better spent elsewhere.

>>3574152
I'm a literature teacher, and I think that Bloom would consider what I do to be politicized teaching because I discuss gender and race in charged terms. I consider what he thinks people should do to be incoherent and anemic. I'm not any more politicized than Bloom is. If anything, I'm less so, since I'm not out there telling other teachers how to teach.

>>3574168
Wow, you're a fucking bad teacher, that is what you are.

>>3574152
Firstly, Yes. If the little cunt's haven't got the intellect to see that they're being brainwashed and subjected to cultural marxism, they deserve to be brainwashed.

If you hand a university student a plate of bullshit and they complacently swallow it, they don't deserve the degree. There is no right and wrong here. We have been bombarded with propaganda for generations, this is just the next wave led by the political correctness brigade. Either swallow their agenda, or have the intelligence to see it for what it is.

Secondly, yes. America needs a dose of forced equality for the benefit of the rest of the world. Personally I don't give a shit if America turns into one uniform egalitarian shithole – the rest of us will be safer for it.

>>3574168
Discussing politics as they pertain to literature is fine, but many professors seem to be approaching it backwards these days, i.e. using literature merely as a means to make a point about politics. This is just not on in a Literature class, and it can also be alienating to students whose personal politics are at odds with the professor's.

>>3574178
>If you hand a university student
ok but this problem doesn't start at the university level, it starts in high school, middle school even.

of course they will eat it up, what do you expect?

>>3574178
>all politics are good politics

>>3574178
Fortress America will never be defeated.

:Whitesnake solo:

>>3574165
>Toni Morrison
>Native Son
>crap

I think you should just give up reading.

>>3574171
Indoctrinating America's youth erryday.

>>3574180
I occasionally saw this happen at an undergraduate and I found it frustrating. I feel that what I do is different. For instance, last week I had a class on The Woman in White where we discussed the problems Collins encounters with making gender a primary explanatory category in the novel. I'm sure it was clear to my students that I am very skeptical of gender identity, but it was discussed entirely in the context of the novel.

>>3574201
Are you a nigger? I dare you to deny it.

>>3574210
Jokes on you, I'm white as fuck.

I'm inclined to agree with Bloom here. There are a lot of "lost" classics being reissued as of late for the sake of diversity; but they were lost for a reason, right?. One I read recently, Who Would Have Thought It? by Maria Amparo Ruiz de Burton, while interesting as a historical artifact, was absolutely worthless as a piece of literature.

Identity politics are ruining everything.

>>3574205
What shall we pick:
>Shakespeare
>The Odyssey
>The Bible

Get that historical context, that awesome prose, the impact and influence and society, ritualistic behavior in text and structure, tackling the largest questions in life with deep metaphysical meaning

nope.... muh gender issues

How does it feel to be the one leading the downfall of your country, while asia is becoming more and more like we used to be everyday.

>>3574218
>The Odyssey
>The Bible
>that awesome prose
wut

>>3574218
>while asia is becoming more and more like we used to be everyday.

wut? asia is heading down the same path as the west. we just had a head start of a few centuries.

>>3574218
In 30 years whites will be the seagull-shit-skinned immigrants of Asia. It makes me want to cry.

>>3574220
>>3574222
wutmind

having to read zora neale hurston for class was literally death.

>>3574218
As if gender isn't an essential piece of the historical context, the impact and influence on society, and one of the largest questions people face about their personal identity, which is one of the greatest and most important themes in Western letters.

You guys crack me up.

>>3574233
>As if gender isn't an essential piece of the historical context, the impact and influence on society, and one of the largest questions people face about their personal identity, which is one of the greatest and most important themes in Western letters.

Well it might be, but hardly from the fucking books you pick.

>mfw i can't tell the differnece the between history and english classes because both of them are nothing but jew holocaust suffering and black slavery being shoved down everyones throats

I think literature studies' divorce from philology and linguistics sealed the nail in its coffin and relegated it to sociology tier bullshit.

>>3574237
You don't know anything about me. I primarily teach Shakespeare and Milton. Is that "great works of Western civ" enough for you?

>>3574235
>mfw we had to read The Diary of a Young Girl in 8th grade
>mfw Zionist scum forcing their Jewery down my throat from a young age
>mfw only thinking person in a world of sheep blinded by Jewish propaganda

>>3574243
>Milton
>teaching fanfiction

if you're going to teach women's work, teach heian period lit.

>>3574201

Funnily enough I thought they should give up trying to write.

>>3574246
Fiction is just fanficition of real life.

>>3574244
mfw you have no face

>>3574252
I've been Jewed on too much to even use reaction images.

>>3574253
Jewish conspiracy theories are a Jewish conspiracy. They are trying to alienate you from the world so you don't interact with it, or fix it, or change it for the better. And especially so that you don't breed. Integrate and pass on your genes.

One day, someone will assign Gravity's Rainbow, or even the dreaded Finnegans Wake. Then you'll all be sorry/

Bloom never smiles, this is what lit does to you.

>>3574293
Only when he reads bro, only when he reads...

>>3574299
But we never see him read.

>>3574302
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cHGu11GL9qw#t=5m25s

>>3574308

>>3574158
>>3574163
I like these. I am now a Bloomist.

>>3574375
The word is Bloomite. Do you even lit?

>>3574402

I don't know what Bloom is talking about. A lot of universities I know of still have Great Books programs and have English courses teaching things like Shakespeare, Jane Austen, 17th Century lit, Romantic period, Victorian era, etc.

Hear Ye, Hear, Ye!

The great man, known as Harold Bloom will pass away within the year.

His day of reckoning will be the rise of The Bloomite Movement and it will foretell the returning of the Greats of Literature. May we rejoice in this moment.

Bloomists gather round!

>>3574587
p-present

Universities cannot go on solely teaching books from the canon, they have to include books from outside the canon as well. I hope that goes without saying. Although, I go to an university in England so I'm not sure about American universities.

English has always and will always be very eclectic, an understanding of history, culture etc is pretty darn useful.

>>3574600
except spending weeks on a horrible novel with no real value under the umbrella of "culture" does not belong in an academic setting. if you want that, make a book club.

Bloom is looking really skinny in that shirt, man. :(

Part of the issue is that any lost classic work that is written by a woman or ethnic minority will be assumed to have been rediscovered solely because it is work from an 'underrepresented' group.

I agree with Bloom that works should rise or fall on aesthetic merit and not on political outlook. Yet, if I found a great 18th Century work by some black writer it would difficult to prove its validness as an overlooked masterpiece without people on both sides of the argument jumping on its inclusion as solely being because of the group the author is from.

So I think a skeptical approach is good. Be cautious of new inclusions, but be open at least.

>>3574114
I feel bad for you Americans

>>3574233
it's really not
if girls and those guys who want to get laid by pretending to be feminist want to discuss gender or whatever in texts that have nothing to do with gender, they should form their own classes instead of hijacking the standard ones

>>3576570

>it's really not
well aren't you edgy

>>3576574
it's just not very interesting today. there are many more compelling compelling questions that we could be asking.

>>3574114
>Are degrees in English just degrees in degree in Cultural Studies?
I'd argue that if they weren't, they'd be worse.

>>3576584
how so? argue it, sir

>>3576592
To better iterate:
>I'd argue that if they were not cultural studies classes, they're worse than that

All "English" classes teach are texts - in English. It's hardly teaching much else besides the historical use of the language. Language is a part of culture. So, English is a Cultural Studies class - not much more specific than any other cultural studies class would be - since they're lumping all english speaking - and generally Euro-centered cultured (even if they don't specifically speak English).

I've known colleges - in the USA, of course - that will teach translated texts in English - which if you ask me, hardly makes sense. You'd think you'd stick to native-English pieces.

Also, English is a fairly new language. It's a 'limited' -time wise- culturally.

>>3574114
I'm a layman. Where can I learn more about this?

School of Resentment is shit.

Bloom isn't the greatest critic (very hit or miss) but how many academics are standing up or dissenting from the norm?

You'll always hear post-modernists circle jerk about how they don't want consensus, but throw in the first thinker who says (yo consensus is achievable, let's do some work) they all start heckling him. It's ironic because this is exactly the kind of dissensus that post-modernists claim they want.

I'm all for teaching stuff outside of the canon, but only because it's a damn good book. Multiculturalism is a dead movement. It doesn't help anyone and minorities feel no attachment to it.

What pains me the most is that English departments don't teach Empson. EVER. He was the greatest critic of the 20th century, who managed to come up with interesting close readings that were sensitive to ambiguity and authorial intent without falling into the retardation that is Paul de Man/Derrida and T.S Eliot boringness.

tl;dr read Empson

>>3576922
The thing about blooms criticism, is that it's very personal, he goes from his views from aestheticism and beauty, which is based on an enormous amount of knowledge.

This is his standard of criticism. View it from your own two eyes.

>>3576934
The thing that is actually about Bloom's criticism is that he's usually paraphrasing someone else's superior opinion. And he refuses to cite his shit.

Sometimes he says something brilliant, but often he's just like "lol influence, weak interpretation, not as good as Shakespeare or Whitman."

I don't know, maybe I just think for a guy who claims that Hamlet is the greatest, most deepest thing ever, he should have something to say beyond "Nietzsche was right, Hamlet thinks too well not too much!"

Don't get me wrong, I like Bloom even when he's ranting aimlessly.

>>3576976
You seem to know more than me. I like Bloom, at least his honest about his opinion, and doesn't strive to change the world through detecting power structures in his reading.

>>3576986
Yeah, that's what he's good for. At least when he's ranting he's not bullshitting.

Read some Empson, too.

>>3577002
>Empson
OP here, thanks for this guy. As you could have guessed from your first post, I've never heard of him.

>>3577021

Empson is actually a faggot. Many will tell you otherwise. But you've got to believe me. He sucks

>>3577033
backup your argument, son

>>3577037

I was just joking. 7 types of ambiguities is said to be great by a professor I respect although I could not understand what the fuck he was talking about.

>>3574178
And this, friends, is what foreigners actually think.

>>3574178

>>3577040
He wrote 7 Types of Ambiguity when he was like 23 having no english experience because he was studying Math at Cambridge and randomly walked into the English dept and said, "Yo, prof, I got an idea about ambiguity"

Then he just published one of the greatest works of 20th century criticism and went full boss-mode.

Too bad he got banned from Cambridge because they got him fucking a chick and he had condoms in his room.

> boss mode indeed