"And if as a nation we stop thinking well one day we will cease to be a democracy" Hmmmmmmmmmmmm

I haven't read most of the books he references but I love the emphasis on "You are fundamentally learning how to speak to yourself. You're learning how to listen to yourself... you are in the act of discovering yourself"

In that way, books have completely changed my life. I don't know what he thought of contemporary literary fiction but that's where I swim, and they have completely changed my inner self.

“There is nothing more profoundly healing than the act of solitary reading, provided that what is being read is, indeed, permanent, deep, lasting work, work. Work that calls for all of your faculties in response, work that calls you out of your own deep, as it were. Work that transforms you.”  YES!

When this interview first aired, I thought Bloom's views on Harry Potter and the Internet were pompous. Rewatching it, he was a prophet who predicted the moral and intellectual collapse of America.

A man who stands up for STANDARDS 👏👏👏

I think it is truly said by Harold Bloom that reading makes you to discover your self, you find your soul refreshed and reinvigorate by reading, it a true friend to lost souls.

An English professor colleague of mine quit reading over 15 years ago. Why? Laziness. The passivity of self in front of his television has won the days.

LOVE this conversation!  And love these "rewinds" - they are wonderful!  Thank you so much for posting.   More of these please!

Reading is everything.  I grew up on a ranch in NW Montana and had a hunger to read from preschool.  I found comprehension of whatever I read very easy which allowed me to slow down when I found what I was reading to be of particular quality.  When I was 14; my Father found me reading the Bible again one day and walked over to his library and handed me The Complete Works of Shakespeare copy written in 1634.  Fortunately I had an Old English translated into a Modern English dictionary and began a study which took me the next year to complete.  This study changed me irrevocably into a student of human behavior and a reader with a very high bar as to good literature.  I also found I could read any legal document, code, ordinance or law and tell anyone exactly what it said and also report anything crooked or unusual in the wording.  I made it important in my children's lives to be readers and explained to them that in books we discover the world; who we are and develop taste.  Oddly enough to this day; Mario Puzo's Godfather which I read at 16 is still my favorite book.

I miss the Charlie Rose shows with these great interviews.

Just watched this on the Internet. And learned a lot!

The obsevations of Mr. Bloom is quite accurate and sound.

Genius is the only book I read of his. Thank you Mr. Bloom for introducing me to miguel cervante and don quixote.
Later in life a saw the man who killed Don Quixote and the man who played Quixote is who I pictured Quixote to look like and act like.

Harold Bloom ❤❤❤

8:30 "No, [Harry Potter] is not reading."

Legend

Utoob brought me here after searching for a Monty Python scene, (the school prayer in The Meaning of Life).

Thank you Charles for the wonderful interview from those of us without access to such persons as Harold Bloom otherwise.  

^^^my grammar 😅

He’s right about Harry Potter, though was wrong that no one would remember it. He was also quite prescient regarding the internet.

14:45 our time is limited. Open minds to richness

Idk how old this interview is but the fact he used the word slop is hilarious