WEBVTT

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Prof: So I'll tell you a
little bit about Harold Bloom's

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career later in the lecture.

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Those of you who know How to
Read a Poem,

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the books on religion,
Shakespeare and the

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Invention of the Human,
and perhaps only know those

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books, may feel a little
surprised at finding him on a

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literary theory syllabus,
but the great outpouring of

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work beginning with The
Anxiety of Influence,

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A Map of Misreading,
Poetry and Repression,

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and a great many other books in
the seventies put Bloom in the

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very midst of the theoretical
controversies then swirling.

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He was associated with the
so-called Yale School.

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In fact, he was willing to put
his name as editor and also a

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contributor on a volume that was
called Deconstruction and

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Criticism.
I think though that,

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even in reading what you have
before you, you can see how

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relatively little Bloom has to
do with deconstruction.

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Certainly in his more recent
career he's distanced himself

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from theory.

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He hasn't really changed his
views of anything,

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although he doesn't any longer
read poems through the machinery

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of the six revisionary ratios.

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Perhaps I should stop there and
say the six revisionary ratios

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won't be on the test.

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>

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Now I think that nothing could
be more exciting than to

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understand clinamen,
tessera, sort of kenosis,

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askesis, demonization,
apophrades--whoa!--and to

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wander in the realms of these
ideas,

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and actually to use them as the
machinery for practical

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criticism: to take a poem and to
see what you can actually do

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with these ideas really is,
and I'm serious,

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an exciting process.

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You may very much resent not
having these six ratios on the

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exam, and you may wish to hear
more about them.

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You'll hear something about a
few of them in passing today,

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but if you do wish to hear more
about them,

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perhaps your sections will
>

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provide some guidance.

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In any case,
the contributions of Bloom to

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theory in my opinion,
and I hope to bring this out in

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the long run,
have primarily to do with the

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fact that I think he can
legitimately and authentically

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be called an important literary
historiographer.

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That is to say,
together with people like

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Tynjanov and Jakobson earlier in
the course and Hans Robert Jauss

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later in the course,
Bloom does seriously deserve to

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be considered a literary
historian--

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that is to say,
a person with a theory about

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literary history on a par with
those other figures.

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This hasn't always often been
remarked.

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As a matter of fact,
the general critical attitude

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toward Bloom is that he's
hopelessly ahistoricist,

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cares nothing about history,
and cares nothing about the way

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in which the real world impinges
on literature.

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In a certain measure,
as we'll also see,

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there is some truth in this,
but he has a powerful argument

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about the relationship among
texts as they succeed each other

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in history.

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It's an argument which I think
really we ignore in our peril.

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It's an important one and it is
a psychoanalytic one,

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which is one of the things that
places him at this point in the

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course.

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You'll remember the sort of
tripartition of the subject

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matter of our course which--
it's all headed up in the

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syllabus and all clearly to be
understood.

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First we have logo genesis,
the production of literature by

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language.

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Then we have psychogenesis,
the production of literature by

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the human psyche.

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Then we have sociogenesis,
the production of literature by

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social, economic,
and political and historical

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factors.

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Okay, fine, well and good,
but you may have noticed how

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much trouble we have had getting
into psychogenesis.

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We keep saying we've arrived
>

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at psychogenesis,
but we actually continue to be

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working obviously with
linguistic models.

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Here is Lacan telling us the
unconscious resembles a

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language, that it's structured
like a language;

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Brooks telling us that it's the
verbal structure arising out of

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the relationship between
metaphor and metonymy that

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constitutes the narrative text.

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We keep sitting around
twiddling our thumbs,

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waiting for somebody to say
something about the

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psychogenesis of the text.

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Well, Bloom brings us closer,
and he himself,

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when he speaks of the poet in
the poet,

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is concerned to describe what
he calls an "agon,"

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a psychological agon or
struggle between the belated

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poet and the precursor taking
place at that level in the

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psyche;
but even Bloom,

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of course, is talking about the
relation of text to text.

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He is talking about relations
which are arguably verbal.

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Verbal influence,
by the way, he always professes

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contempt for.

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He calls it moldy fig
philology, but I think that as

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you study the examples of
literary influence in Bloom's

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text,
Anxiety of Influence,

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A Map of Misreading and so
on,

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you will see that there is a
kind of dependence on verbal

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echo and verbal continuity,
and that his theory,

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the strong version of his
theory,

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struggles against but,
I think, nevertheless does link

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itself to.

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I want to move into a general
exploration of the topic of

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influence by talking,
in fact, about how unstable the

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relationship between an idea of
influence which is,

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let's say, psychological or
world-based and an idea of

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influence which is word-based
can be.

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It's not as simple and
straightforward a distinction as

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one might imagine.

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So we linger in these
linguistic models and there's a

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long tradition in which the
confusion between the psychic

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and the linguistic is manifest,
and it has to do with the very

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traditional subject of
imitation.

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Plato and Aristotle agree that
art, poetry, is an imitation.

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It is, both of them say,
an imitation of nature.

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Plato thinks it's done badly,
Aristotle thinks it's done

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well, but both agree that poetry
is an imitation of nature.

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Then as time passes,
this idea of mimesis,

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the imitation of nature,
gradually becomes transformed

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so that by the time you get to
the Silver Age of Roman

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literature,
a high-water mark of elegance

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in the Latin language,
you have rhetorical theorists

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like Quintilian and Cicero and
others talking not about mimesis

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but about--
in Latin, of

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course--imitatio,
seemingly the same idea.

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They are still talking about
imitation, but the strange thing

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that's happened is now they're
not talking about the imitation

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of nature anymore.

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They're talking about the
imitation of literary models:

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in other words,
the imitation of language,

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the way in which we can
establish canons by thinking

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about the relationship of
particular poets and other

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writers with a tradition of
literary expression from which

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they emerge.

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So this then,
imitatio,

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becomes a language-based theory
of influence arising seemingly

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spontaneously out of a
nature-based theory of

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influence.

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Now take a look at the first
passage on your sheet from

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Alexander's Pope's "Essay
on Criticism."

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He's talking about Virgil here.

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Homer, the argument is,
has to have imitated nature.

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After all, there were no
literary models to imitate,

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so if Homer imitated anything
it must have been nature.

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Well, fine.

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Homer imitated nature,
but then along comes Virgil--

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in this same period,
by the way, when rhetorical

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theories were redefining
imitation as the imitation of

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verbal models--
along comes Virgil and he says,

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"I'm going to write my own
national epic and you know what,

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I'll just sit down and write
it."

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But then he starts looking at
Homer;

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this is all what Pope is
thinking as he prepares to write

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the couplet that's on your
sheet.

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Then he starts to write,
but then he rereads Homer.

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At first he feels terrible
because he realized that Homer

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has said it all.

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There are two poems,
The Iliad and The

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Odyssey.

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There's nothing left to say.

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Homer has covered the entire
waterfront, and so Virgil is

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sort of stuck.

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What is he going to do?

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Well, what he can do,
if he can't imitate nature

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anymore because Homer has done
that, is he can imitate Homer.

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The result is that he comes to
a sort of realization that Pope

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epitomizes in this couplet:
But when t' examine ev'ry part

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he came [that is to say,
every part of Homer's

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compositions,
every part of his own

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composition as he undertook to
write his own epic]

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Nature and Homer were,
he found, the same.

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So here you have emerging the
idea that to imitate nature and

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to imitate art--
to imitate the things of the

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world,
the people of the world,

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and to imitate language--
is part and parcel of the same

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process.

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To do one you necessarily and
perforce do the other.

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That's what I mean by saying
that we're still struggling to

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get away from the logogenetic
>

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model to the psychogenetic
model.

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Even in the most traditional
expressions of how influence

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works,
like Pope's,

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we are still concerned to
distinguish,

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and find it very difficult to
distinguish,

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between nature and art.

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When Samuel Johnson,
fifty years after Pope,

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is still saying,
"Nothing can please many,

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or please long,
but just representations of

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general nature,"
he is in this idea of

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representations and in the idea
of general nature teetering

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between a sense that it's things
in the world that art imitates

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and it is existing literary
models that art imitates and

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from which art takes its cue.

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So there's a kind of collapse
then in the idea of imitation.

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There's a kind of a collapse,
a surprising collapse perhaps

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when you think about it,
between the notion of the

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imitation of nature and the
notion of the imitation of art.

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Now if we turn then to the two
texts that you've read for

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today, both of which are
theories of influence,

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you can see that T.S. Eliot,
too, is a little bit unclear as

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to the relationship of these two
sorts of imitation.

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For Eliot the individual talent
that inserts itself into,

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that engages with,
tradition has to cope with what

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Eliot calls "the mind of
Europe,"

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page 539,
left-hand column.

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I'll read a fairly extensive
passage because this is one of

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the most accessible summaries of
what Eliot has to say:

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[The poet]
must be quite aware of the

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obvious fact that art never
improves, but that the material

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of art is never quite the same.

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He must be aware that the mind
of Europe--

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the mind of his own country--a
mind which he learns in time to

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be much more important than his
own private mind…

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Let me just stop there and say
this seems as much unlike Bloom

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as it can possibly be because
Bloom,

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the Romantic,
is all about one's own private

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mind,
the struggle of the individual

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mind to define itself over
against all of those minds

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jostling for attention that
precede it to over them to the

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point where they are,
in effect, effaced,

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and the belated ego can finally
establish itself as prior to all

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preceding egos.

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This sort of struggle
seems--and I say

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"seems"
because I'm going to be

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lingering over this for a
while--

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seems to be absent from Eliot.

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Eliot seems to be all about
self-effacement,

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about the recognition that the
mind of Europe is more important

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than one's own mind,
and that if one is to

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contribute anything as an
individual talent to tradition,

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that contribution has to be a
matter of the most acutely

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sensitive awareness of
everything,

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not that one is struggling to
be but that one is not.

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It seems, in other words,
like a very different

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perspective.

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To continue the passage:
… [The mind of Europe

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is]
a mind which changes,

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and that this change is a
development which abandons

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nothing en route which does not
superannuate either Shakespeare

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or Homer,
or the rock drawing of the

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Magdalenian draftsman.

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That this development,
refinement perhaps,

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complication certainly,
is not, from the point of view

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of the artist any improvement.

14:42.080 --> 14:46.200
In other words,
the relationship between

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tradition and the individual
talent is a relationship of

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entering into a vast matrix of
literary,

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philosophical,
and other sorts of expression

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that changes and yet never
really transforms itself and

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certainly can't be understood as
a grand march or progress toward

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some great goal,
because nothing is ever lost

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and nothing radically innovative
can ever really be introduced.

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I hope you are thinking and
reflecting on a passage of this

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kind about a good deal that
we've passed through already:

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Gadamer's sense of tradition as
something which depends

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absolutely on the awareness of
continuity,

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on the willingness to meet the
past halfway,

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to enter into a merger of
horizons in which the past and

15:43.297 --> 15:47.847
the present can speak in an
authentic way to each other;

15:47.850 --> 15:53.290
and that in other ways this
idea, or possibly also the

15:53.294 --> 15:58.334
Russian formalist idea in its
Darwinian sense,

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that the dominant and the
recessive elements of any

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literary text are always present
at any time.

16:04.769 --> 16:08.449
It's just that they tend
perpetually in a kind of

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oscillation to be changing
places with each other.

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So the whole gamut of literary
possibility,

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of expressive possibility,
is, according to theories of

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history of this kind,
is always already there,

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and one's own entry into this
vast sea of expressive

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possibility is always a subtle
thing that certainly can't in

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any way be seen to showcase or
to manifest any sort of original

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genius as the Romantic tradition
might want to insist on it.

16:48.509 --> 16:53.849
So this is basically the
perspective of Eliot and one

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from which certainly you know
Bloom would obviously seem to be

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diverging.

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Now I want to argue that
actually there is a tremendous

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amount of continuity between
Eliot and Bloom,

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and that Bloom's
>

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Anxiety of
Influence--I've never

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discussed this with Harold,
by the way.

17:20.558 --> 17:23.188
Those of you who may be taking
his seminars,

17:23.191 --> 17:26.681
I leave it up to you whether
you want to take this up with

17:26.680 --> 17:27.170
him.

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As I say, I leave that up to
you, but I think a strong

17:31.795 --> 17:36.145
argument can be made,
and I have made it in print so

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Harold has seen it,
that Bloom misreads and is a

17:39.882 --> 17:42.192
strong misreader of
T.S. Eliot:

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which is to say--such is the
logic of strong misreading--that

17:46.799 --> 17:51.489
T.S. Eliot said everything
Bloom has to say already.

17:51.490 --> 17:53.020
I do believe this,
>

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despite this extraordinary
appearance of total difference

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in perspective,
the traditional versus the

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Romantic and so on.

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I don't want to go into detail
in this argument for fear of

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being considered obsessive,
but I'd like to make a few

18:09.090 --> 18:13.500
points about it in passing,
because I think it's such a

18:13.503 --> 18:16.553
perfect exemplification of how
The Anxiety of Influence

18:16.554 --> 18:17.254
works.

18:17.250 --> 18:21.010
Bloom has always denied the
influence of "Tradition in

18:21.006 --> 18:22.946
the Individual Talent."

18:22.950 --> 18:27.050
He acknowledges influences,
but they are Emerson,

18:27.047 --> 18:31.227
Nietzsche, the great Romantic
poets, and so on.

18:31.230 --> 18:34.500
He has, as I say,
vehemently denied the influence

18:34.500 --> 18:36.860
of Eliot,
yet as one reads Eliot--and I'm

18:36.856 --> 18:38.936
going to spend some time with
Eliot now--

18:38.940 --> 18:41.820
it seems to me that at least in
skeletal form,

18:41.818 --> 18:46.418
in suggestion,
Bloom is all there already,

18:46.420 --> 18:49.620
which is, after all,
all Bloom ever says about the

18:49.615 --> 18:53.065
relationship between a precursor
and a belated writer:

18:53.070 --> 18:55.550
so it can't be surprising,
can it?

18:55.549 --> 18:56.199
All right.

18:56.200 --> 19:01.880
Now first of all,
it's very important to Bloom to

19:01.875 --> 19:07.895
show the way in which the new
reconstitutes the old:

19:07.904 --> 19:12.524
that is to say,
the appropriation of the

19:12.517 --> 19:16.237
precursor text,
which is not a notional text

19:16.242 --> 19:19.002
although it--
and that's one of the things

19:18.998 --> 19:22.618
that's sort of counterintuitive
about Bloom's writing in this

19:22.615 --> 19:23.215
period.

19:23.220 --> 19:26.640
He insists that there is a
particular precursor text.

19:26.640 --> 19:29.100
The precursor text for
"Tintern Abbey"

19:29.099 --> 19:30.409
is "Lycidas."

19:30.410 --> 19:31.710
Don't tell me about other
>

19:31.710 --> 19:32.910
precursor texts.

19:32.910 --> 19:36.720
It's "Lycidas,"
and he shows how this is the

19:36.723 --> 19:39.663
case,
but the relationship between

19:39.659 --> 19:44.209
the belated text and the
precursor text is such that we

19:44.210 --> 19:48.930
can never read the precursor
text the same way again.

19:48.930 --> 19:53.710
The strong misreading of the
precursor text is so powerful,

19:53.711 --> 19:57.091
in other words,
that it becomes our strong

19:57.093 --> 19:58.333
misreading.

19:58.328 --> 20:00.758
We just can't think about
"Lycidas"

20:00.757 --> 20:03.957
in the same way on this view
after we've read "Tintern

20:03.957 --> 20:04.837
Abbey."

20:04.838 --> 20:09.918
If this seems counterintuitive,
just think about certain

20:09.917 --> 20:13.147
examples that might come to
mind.

20:13.150 --> 20:18.000
The most obvious example is the
famous text by Borges called

20:18.000 --> 20:20.960
"Pierre Menard,
Author of Don

20:20.961 --> 20:22.771
Quixote."

20:22.769 --> 20:25.099
I imagine a number of you know
that text,

20:25.098 --> 20:29.238
but what it consists in
basically is--

20:29.240 --> 20:34.120
it's a kind of an anecdote
about a Frenchman writing,

20:34.118 --> 20:38.308
as I recall,
in the end of the nineteenth

20:38.310 --> 20:43.900
century in Spanish a text,
and his text is as it turns out

20:43.895 --> 20:46.185
verbatim,
word for word,

20:46.186 --> 20:51.416
Cervantes' Don Quixote,
only it's not Cervantes' Don

20:51.423 --> 20:53.683
Quixote;
it's Pierre Menard's Don

20:53.680 --> 20:54.350
Quixote.

20:54.349 --> 20:56.039
Think how different it is.

20:56.038 --> 20:59.288
This is a Frenchman at the end
of the nineteenth century

20:59.288 --> 21:00.528
writing in Spanish.

21:00.528 --> 21:03.378
That's pretty impressive,
much more impressive than

21:03.382 --> 21:06.122
Cervantes merely writing in his
own language,

21:06.118 --> 21:10.178
and it's a completely different
historical perspective.

21:10.180 --> 21:13.620
Whereas Cervantes thinks he's
being a little bit ironic about

21:13.624 --> 21:16.884
his own historical moment--
the death of chivalry and all

21:16.875 --> 21:19.195
that--
think about how ironic you can

21:19.199 --> 21:23.209
be about that historical moment
writing several centuries later

21:23.207 --> 21:25.597
with everything that you know
now.

21:25.598 --> 21:29.858
What a tour de force to be able
to write Don Quixote at

21:29.855 --> 21:33.555
the end of the nineteenth
century in another language,

21:33.555 --> 21:35.365
a whole new ball game!

21:35.368 --> 21:39.848
How can you ever read
Cervantes' Don Quixote in

21:39.851 --> 21:41.121
the same way?

21:43.019 --> 21:45.969
Now that's not the point of the
story.

21:45.970 --> 21:49.720
The point of the story is
actually to belittle Pierre

21:49.721 --> 21:54.341
Menard, but you can see this as
a theory of strong misreading.

21:54.338 --> 21:57.668
Pierre Menard thinks he's doing
something new,

21:57.667 --> 21:58.257
right?

21:58.259 --> 22:01.309
The fact is,
he's not doing anything new at

22:01.305 --> 22:01.735
all.

22:01.740 --> 22:05.210
His belief that he's doing
something new is precisely his

22:05.209 --> 22:07.439
misreading of the precursor
text--

22:07.440 --> 22:16.090
and by the way,
you don't have to have read the

22:16.086 --> 22:21.116
precursor text--
but that misreading,

22:21.121 --> 22:25.251
after all, is something in its
very power which,

22:25.250 --> 22:29.620
as it were, infiltrates our own
understanding of the precursor

22:29.616 --> 22:31.746
text,
making it impossible for us to

22:31.746 --> 22:33.196
read it the same way again.

22:33.200 --> 22:34.600
Think of Joyce's Ulysses.

22:34.598 --> 22:36.348
We all know that
Ulysses,

22:36.345 --> 22:39.605
like Virgil's Aeneid,
is based on The Odyssey

22:39.609 --> 22:42.819
and that it, as it were,
recycles The Odyssey;

22:42.818 --> 22:45.448
but it seems to be looking at
The Odyssey through the

22:45.446 --> 22:46.646
wrong end of a telescope.

22:46.650 --> 22:51.960
It's dragging all the sort of
heroic dimension of the poem

22:51.957 --> 22:57.447
down into a kind of nitty-gritty
account of everyday life in

22:57.450 --> 22:59.220
recent society.

22:59.220 --> 23:01.320
In other words,
it implicitly,

23:01.319 --> 23:05.589
precisely in following The
Odyssey debunks the heroic

23:05.594 --> 23:07.844
myth of The Odyssey.

23:07.838 --> 23:10.048
How can we read,
in other words,

23:10.048 --> 23:14.038
The Odyssey in the same
way again after we've read

23:14.036 --> 23:15.386
Ulysses?

23:15.390 --> 23:17.440
Now it has to be said,
and Bloom would say this,

23:17.440 --> 23:20.530
Ulysses is not a strong
misreading of The Odyssey

23:20.534 --> 23:23.234
because it's perfectly conscious
of what it's doing.

23:23.230 --> 23:27.250
It knows exactly what it's
doing with respect to the text

23:27.250 --> 23:31.560
of The Odyssey, so
it's a deliberate misreading

23:31.558 --> 23:33.568
which has other virtues.

23:33.568 --> 23:38.428
It's not quite the same thing,
but what it does have in common

23:38.429 --> 23:43.369
with Bloom's theory and what it
has in common also with Eliot's

23:43.366 --> 23:47.826
idea about the relationship
between the individual talent

23:47.827 --> 23:52.207
and tradition is that it
reconstitutes tradition.

23:52.210 --> 23:55.340
It doesn't just provide
something novel.

23:55.338 --> 24:00.288
It makes us see tradition
itself in a different way.

24:00.288 --> 24:03.788
Turn to page 538,
the right-hand column about

24:03.788 --> 24:07.258
halfway down:
The existing monuments [says

24:07.259 --> 24:09.699
Eliot]
form an ideal order among

24:09.695 --> 24:14.645
themselves which is modified by
the introduction of the new (the

24:14.645 --> 24:17.785
really new) work of art among
them.

24:17.788 --> 24:22.458
The existing order is complete
before the new work arrives;

24:22.460 --> 24:26.920
for order to persist after the
supervention of novelty,

24:26.924 --> 24:31.314
the whole existing order must
be, if ever so slightly,

24:31.307 --> 24:32.297
altered.

24:32.298 --> 24:36.438
We can't quite see it the same
way again,

24:36.440 --> 24:39.960
so it's a dynamic,
mutual relationship between

24:39.964 --> 24:44.674
tradition and the individual
talent: the strong precursor and

24:44.665 --> 24:47.535
the belated poet,
in each case,

24:47.538 --> 24:50.368
which is mutually transforming.

24:50.368 --> 24:54.478
The basis, the principle of
transformation,

24:54.480 --> 25:00.210
is the belated poet's strong
misreading of the precursor

25:00.205 --> 25:06.865
which simultaneously asserts the
egoistic priority of the belated

25:06.868 --> 25:12.308
poet: I'm doing something new;
I'm going where no one has ever

25:12.311 --> 25:13.111
gone before.

25:13.108 --> 25:16.878
I'm doing so so powerfully that
it's a question of whether there

25:16.875 --> 25:20.175
actually was anybody before,
on the one hand,

25:20.178 --> 25:23.888
and the strong precursor who
turns out,

25:23.890 --> 25:27.620
as one reflects more and more
and more about the relationship,

25:27.618 --> 25:30.568
to have said everything the
belated poet says already,

25:30.565 --> 25:31.005
right?

25:31.009 --> 25:36.419
So simultaneously,
Bloom's theory of literary

25:36.416 --> 25:40.286
history,
his literary historiography,

25:40.286 --> 25:45.046
places a premium on innovation
and on conservatism,

25:45.049 --> 25:47.459
or tradition, simultaneously.

25:47.460 --> 25:51.280
Unlike Gadamer,
leaning toward the conservative

25:51.282 --> 25:54.462
or traditional,
and Iser or the Russian

25:54.460 --> 25:57.930
formalists,
who lean toward the innovative,

25:57.934 --> 26:01.854
the Bloomian idea
simultaneously countenances the

26:01.845 --> 26:06.725
idea of tradition as something
absolutely continuous and also

26:06.732 --> 26:11.872
of tradition as something which
is constantly being remade or at

26:11.865 --> 26:13.735
least rethought.

26:13.740 --> 26:17.870
That, I have to tell you,
is very similar to

26:17.871 --> 26:20.371
T.S. Eliot's position.

26:20.368 --> 26:25.998
So now again the famous
aphorism of Eliot on page 539,

26:26.000 --> 26:30.040
the left-hand column at the
bottom:

26:30.038 --> 26:32.588
Someone said:
"The dead writers are

26:32.594 --> 26:36.594
remote from us because we know
so much than they did."

26:36.588 --> 26:40.268
Precisely, and they are that
which we know.

26:40.269 --> 26:41.389
Rather good, I think.

26:41.390 --> 26:45.360
The famous aphorism of
T.S. Eliot can also be

26:45.356 --> 26:49.866
understood as something that
Bloom, in his own way,

26:49.865 --> 26:52.205
might very well say.

26:52.210 --> 26:56.360
The past is what we know,
but we're not aware of knowing

26:56.362 --> 26:56.742
it.

26:56.740 --> 26:59.810
In other words,
I write the past when I write

26:59.809 --> 27:03.299
my belated poem,
but I don't think I'm doing it.

27:03.298 --> 27:07.218
I think instead that I'm doing
something new.

27:07.220 --> 27:11.020
In the first provisionary
ratio, clinamen,

27:11.017 --> 27:15.647
I am swerving from the past:
I swerve out and down,

27:15.648 --> 27:19.908
I find my own space like a
Lucretian atom.

27:19.910 --> 27:22.670
If it weren't for swerving--and
Lucretius says all the atoms

27:22.671 --> 27:25.491
would fall in the same place--
that wouldn't be good,

27:25.490 --> 27:29.090
so they all swerve so they can
all fall in their own place.

27:29.088 --> 27:33.338
Well, that is the belated
poet's sense of what he's doing

27:33.337 --> 27:35.687
in relation to the precursor.

27:35.690 --> 27:39.590
He's swerving out and down from
the precursor poet,

27:39.586 --> 27:41.376
but of course he's not.

27:41.381 --> 27:43.331
>

27:43.328 --> 27:46.168
Again--and we'll come back to
this--he's not.

27:46.170 --> 27:48.160
He's actually falling in the
same place,

27:48.160 --> 27:52.080
but the strength of that
swerve, the rhetorical gesture

27:52.076 --> 27:56.086
of the swerve,
is so powerful that we do feel

27:56.093 --> 27:57.303
transported.

27:57.298 --> 28:02.948
Once again we feel both at
once, the innovation and the

28:02.950 --> 28:07.970
necessary conservatism,
or preservational aspect,

28:07.971 --> 28:11.531
of the new poet's composition.

28:11.529 --> 28:12.249
All right.

28:12.250 --> 28:17.000
So I think, as I say,
that Eliot's aphorism,

28:16.997 --> 28:23.067
too, very much anticipates
Bloom's view of the agonistic

28:23.068 --> 28:25.828
struggle among poets.

28:25.828 --> 28:29.488
Then finally Eliot's famous
emphasis--

28:29.490 --> 28:32.220
and of course,
nothing could seem to be less

28:32.220 --> 28:35.480
gloomy than this--
Eliot's famous emphasis on the

28:35.481 --> 28:39.631
poet's impersonality,
on the wish to escape

28:39.625 --> 28:44.175
personality: he says,
in the right-hand column,

28:44.176 --> 28:46.776
page 541,
end of section two, "But,

28:46.779 --> 28:51.149
of course, only those who have
personality and emotions know

28:51.150 --> 28:55.520
what it means to want to escape
from these things"--

28:55.519 --> 28:57.839
in other words,
to enter a world of art,

28:57.838 --> 29:03.598
in effect, to abandon the sense
that what's important is my

29:03.599 --> 29:09.849
personal psychological agony;
to enter, by contrast,

29:09.854 --> 29:14.614
the mind of Europe;
to recognize the complete

29:14.605 --> 29:18.855
insignificance of any individual
mind, certainly my own;

29:18.858 --> 29:23.478
and to immerse oneself as a
poet, as an artist,

29:23.480 --> 29:27.380
and as a creator,
if one can still retain this

29:27.384 --> 29:30.664
term,
in that which is infinitely

29:30.663 --> 29:33.633
more vast than one is oneself.

29:33.630 --> 29:40.570
Well, that doesn't sound very
Bloomian, but look on page 1160,

29:40.565 --> 29:46.245
the right-hand column,
at Bloom's fifth revisionary

29:46.249 --> 29:48.409
ratio, askesis.

29:48.410 --> 30:02.990
>

30:02.990 --> 30:08.810
He's talking about what the
later poet, the belated poet,

30:08.807 --> 30:13.167
does in order to find space for
himself.

30:13.170 --> 30:16.560
What can I do in order to make
myself different from other

30:16.555 --> 30:17.085
people?

30:17.088 --> 30:20.578
Well, you'd think the answer
would be make yourself bigger

30:20.580 --> 30:21.500
than anybody.

30:21.500 --> 30:25.330
Wallace Stevens has a wonderful
poem called "Rabbit as King

30:25.327 --> 30:28.177
of the Ghosts,"
and the rabbit swells up to

30:28.182 --> 30:31.892
become so big that it just kind
of overwhelms everything.

30:31.890 --> 30:34.440
I always think of this as
Bloom's belated poet,

30:34.440 --> 30:40.320
but if you have askesis as one
of the authentic revisionary

30:40.316 --> 30:43.296
ratios,
something very different is

30:43.303 --> 30:45.353
happening to this same end.

30:45.348 --> 30:49.868
About halfway through the
definition, definition five--and

30:49.865 --> 30:54.375
by the way, the masculine
pronoun is something that Harold

30:54.382 --> 30:56.682
has never apologized for.

30:56.680 --> 31:00.810
What he means is that a poet is
gendered masculine but that,

31:00.808 --> 31:03.398
of course, any woman can be a
poet.

31:03.400 --> 31:06.900
We'll come back to distinctions
of that sort later.

31:06.900 --> 31:09.300
He does think of Emily
Dickinson, for example,

31:09.297 --> 31:10.307
as a strong poet.

31:10.308 --> 31:14.178
Obviously, that's a
controversial aspect of Bloom's

31:14.182 --> 31:18.832
work, but he uses the masculine
prologue unapologetically.

31:18.828 --> 31:22.228
Of course, his theory is very
much caught up in the idea of

31:22.233 --> 31:24.973
Oedipal conflict which,
as Freud is always being

31:24.971 --> 31:28.661
criticized for,
is, unless you project it into

31:28.664 --> 31:34.624
the realm of the symbolic as
Lacan and feminist Lacanians do,

31:34.619 --> 31:37.999
undoubtedly a masculist idea.

31:38.000 --> 31:41.270
If the essential generational
conflict of human beings is

31:41.270 --> 31:43.490
between father and son,
well, obviously

31:43.490 --> 31:45.010
>

31:45.009 --> 31:50.149
problems can be seen to arise
from that, and in Bloom's

31:50.154 --> 31:55.684
rhetoric, in his vocabulary,
the masculist Oedipal conflict

31:55.679 --> 31:57.679
is still central.

31:57.680 --> 32:01.210
In any case,
returning to this point about

32:01.213 --> 32:06.143
the effacement of the self,
in the very act of trying to

32:06.137 --> 32:09.727
find a place for oneself as an
innovator--

32:09.730 --> 32:13.990
an effacement which,
however, once again seems to me

32:13.993 --> 32:18.933
to catapult Bloom back into the
position of Eliot that he is

32:18.926 --> 32:21.516
trying to misread strongly.

32:21.519 --> 32:25.859
He says, "[The poet]
yields up part of his own human

32:25.855 --> 32:28.485
and imaginative endowment."

32:28.490 --> 32:30.640
In other words,
he curtails himself;

32:30.640 --> 32:34.160
he shrinks himself;
he makes himself less than he

32:34.164 --> 32:37.574
might have been,
of course, in order to be more

32:37.568 --> 32:39.048
than he has been.

32:39.048 --> 32:43.488
He yields up part of his own
human and imaginative endowment

32:43.486 --> 32:48.296
so as to separate himself from
others including the precursor.

32:48.298 --> 32:52.418
So in askesis--and also in
kenosis,

32:52.420 --> 32:55.290
by the way--there is a
self-shrinking or

32:55.286 --> 32:59.836
self-effacement on the part of
these particular moves of strong

32:59.842 --> 33:03.152
misreading with respect to the
precursor.

33:03.150 --> 33:06.530
It's not, in other words,
just a question of the rabbit

33:06.528 --> 33:08.028
as king of the ghosts.

33:08.028 --> 33:11.758
It's not a question of a
massive ego swelling to the

33:11.757 --> 33:14.167
point where it fills all space.

33:14.170 --> 33:17.930
It is more complicated than
that, and in being more

33:17.934 --> 33:21.254
complicated it is frankly more
Eliot-like.

33:21.250 --> 33:22.190
All right.

33:22.192 --> 33:27.852
So turning then more directly
to Bloom, his career begins--it

33:27.854 --> 33:33.334
has always involved a sense of
struggle in the relationship

33:33.326 --> 33:34.926
among poets.

33:34.930 --> 33:37.600
In his earliest
work--Shelley's

33:37.602 --> 33:41.102
Mythmaking,
Blake's Apocalypse,

33:41.103 --> 33:45.573
and The Visionary Company--
the idea of struggle was

33:45.570 --> 33:49.200
embodied plainly as what he
called Protestantism.

33:49.200 --> 33:52.130
In other words,
he saw the tradition he was

33:52.131 --> 33:56.041
talking about arising in
relation to the Reformation,

33:56.038 --> 33:58.848
that time when,
as I said in my thumbnail

33:58.845 --> 34:02.585
history of hermeneutics,
everybody suddenly realized he

34:02.589 --> 34:05.739
had his own Bible and his own
relationship with God:

34:05.737 --> 34:09.287
in other words,
that time when human

34:09.286 --> 34:12.916
individuality emerges,
which is also,

34:12.922 --> 34:15.832
of course, called by many
others the emergence of the

34:15.831 --> 34:16.671
bourgeoisie.

34:16.670 --> 34:20.210
In that moment,
the idea of Protestantism--

34:20.210 --> 34:23.070
purely in the sense,
as a character in Durrell says,

34:23.070 --> 34:27.360
"that I protest"--
emerges so that each poet

34:27.358 --> 34:31.798
takes, in some sense,
an adversary stance toward

34:31.804 --> 34:33.884
previous literary models.

34:33.880 --> 34:36.540
This is present in Bloom's work
from the beginning of his

34:36.541 --> 34:36.971
career.

34:36.969 --> 34:41.089
The word "Protestant"
gradually gives way to the word

34:41.090 --> 34:44.610
"revisionary,"
and then that's the word that

34:44.614 --> 34:48.074
he uses primarily in The
Visionary Company,

34:48.070 --> 34:52.260
for example,
and then finally becomes the

34:52.260 --> 34:54.350
notion of misreading.

34:54.349 --> 34:59.079
The protest of the belated
figure is the protest which

34:59.079 --> 35:04.699
takes the form of transfiguring
the precursor text in such a way

35:04.702 --> 35:08.722
that one can find oneself to be
original.

35:08.719 --> 35:10.629
It is an Oedipal struggle.

35:10.630 --> 35:14.150
Now this idea of Oedipal
struggle, which is largely

35:14.146 --> 35:18.006
unconscious, is not new to
Bloom, just quickly to review

35:18.014 --> 35:20.974
the next three passages on your
sheet.

35:20.969 --> 35:26.649
Longinus, the author whose
actual identity we cannot quite

35:26.646 --> 35:31.126
determine but whose On the
Sublime,

35:31.130 --> 35:33.410
an extraordinarily interesting
text,

35:33.409 --> 35:37.249
is available to us to
read--I've got two passages from

35:37.253 --> 35:37.693
him.

35:37.690 --> 35:41.280
The first is:
As if instinctively [this is in

35:41.275 --> 35:45.915
the moment of the sublime]
our soul is uplifted by the

35:45.918 --> 35:47.318
true sublime.

35:47.320 --> 35:47.740
[Fine.

35:47.737 --> 35:50.797
That's what you would expect
anybody to say.]

35:50.797 --> 35:54.827
It takes a proud flight and is
filled with joy and vaunting

35:54.831 --> 35:57.411
[and this is where the surprise
comes]

35:57.405 --> 36:01.435
as though it had itself
produced what it has heard.

36:01.440 --> 36:05.580
In other words,
there's a kind of possession by

36:05.579 --> 36:11.069
the other that takes place which
is simultaneously experienced

36:11.070 --> 36:15.930
psychologically as possession of
the other, right?

36:15.929 --> 36:18.129
It is speaking through me.

36:18.130 --> 36:21.050
It's making me very excited
like a little kid.

36:21.050 --> 36:23.260
They're watching TV,
somebody hits a home run,

36:23.262 --> 36:25.382
and the little kid goes like
this [gestures]

36:25.376 --> 36:27.636
and thinks he thought he hit
the home run.

36:27.639 --> 36:31.409
He's completely into the
fantasy of being that hero,

36:31.407 --> 36:31.997
right?

36:32.000 --> 36:37.120
It's the same thing with the
response to something that we

36:37.115 --> 36:40.885
haven't said,
such that in a certain moment

36:40.885 --> 36:43.485
we think we have said it.

36:43.489 --> 36:46.019
It's a mutual possession.

36:46.018 --> 36:49.268
It possesses us,
causing the psychological

36:49.273 --> 36:53.643
reaction that we think of
ourselves as possessing it.

36:53.639 --> 36:58.159
It seems to me that there is
real insight in what Longinus is

36:58.157 --> 37:02.297
saying and that it has an
important influence on Bloom's

37:02.300 --> 37:03.280
position.

37:03.280 --> 37:07.850
Another passage from
Longinus--and by the way,

37:07.849 --> 37:10.819
I think what Longinus says here
is absolutely true:

37:10.815 --> 37:13.005
Plato is constantly abusing
Homer,

37:13.010 --> 37:19.040
and yet nothing can be easier
than to show the ways in which

37:19.039 --> 37:25.169
the great Homeric actions and
even tropes help shape Platonic

37:25.172 --> 37:26.402
thought.

37:26.400 --> 37:29.510
It's a fascinating topic and
Longinus,

37:29.510 --> 37:32.810
it seems to me,
again is exactly right about

37:32.811 --> 37:36.881
it: "There would not have
been so fine a bloom of

37:36.880 --> 37:40.800
perfection on Plato's
philosophical doctrines unless

37:40.797 --> 37:45.247
he had with all his heart and
mind struggled with Homer for

37:45.250 --> 37:46.940
primacy."

37:46.940 --> 37:50.620
He even thinks in Bloomian
terms of that of wanting to be

37:50.623 --> 37:54.443
first even though in some part
of your mind you know you're

37:54.440 --> 37:57.140
second--
he even struggles for primacy,

37:57.139 --> 38:00.769
showing perhaps too much love
of contention and breaking a

38:00.769 --> 38:03.969
lance with him,
as it were, but deriving some

38:03.965 --> 38:06.495
profit from the contest
nonetheless;

38:06.500 --> 38:10.080
for as he says,
"This strife is good for

38:10.077 --> 38:11.377
mortals."

38:11.380 --> 38:14.780
Quickly, a more commonplace
example taking from

38:14.777 --> 38:17.447
Sainte-Beuve,
a famous essay of his called

38:17.451 --> 38:20.741
"What is a Classic?"--
which is all about influence.

38:20.739 --> 38:24.829
There's a tradition of essays
called "What is a

38:24.827 --> 38:26.107
Classic?"

38:26.110 --> 38:29.760
Eliot wrote a great one in
1944, and these are very much a

38:29.755 --> 38:33.395
contribution to the history of
the theory of influence.

38:33.400 --> 38:36.890
So Sainte-Beuve writes:
Goethe spoke the truth when he

38:36.887 --> 38:40.277
remarked that Byron,
great by the flow and source of

38:40.284 --> 38:42.544
poetry,
feared that Shakespeare was

38:42.543 --> 38:44.983
more powerful than himself [it's
true,

38:44.980 --> 38:48.490
Byron was always abusing
Shakespeare]

38:48.494 --> 38:53.574
in the creation and realization
of his characters.

38:53.570 --> 38:55.590
He would have liked to deny it.

38:55.590 --> 39:00.470
The elevation so free from
[this is Goethe talking]

39:00.465 --> 39:02.705
egoism irritated him.

39:02.710 --> 39:07.050
He felt when near it that he
could never display himself at

39:07.054 --> 39:07.584
ease.

39:07.579 --> 39:12.039
He never denied Pope because he
did not fear him.

39:12.039 --> 39:17.709
He knew that Pope was [and you
know how short Pope was]

39:17.710 --> 39:20.860
only a low wall by his side.

39:20.860 --> 39:23.960
So in other words,
he chose as his literary model

39:23.960 --> 39:26.480
somebody he knew he was better
than--

39:26.480 --> 39:29.330
not true, by the way,
but he thought he was better

39:29.331 --> 39:32.601
than Alexander Pope,
and he perpetually denied a

39:32.599 --> 39:35.959
very, very powerful influence on
his writing,

39:35.960 --> 39:40.140
quarreling constantly with
Shakespeare and bardolatry and

39:40.141 --> 39:44.401
excessive love of Hamlet
and all the rest of it.

39:44.400 --> 39:49.530
He's constantly sort of denying
any influence or power over

39:49.534 --> 39:52.814
himself on the part of
Shakespeare.

39:52.809 --> 39:57.159
He chooses, in other words,
for his precursor a weak

39:57.164 --> 40:00.754
precursor instead of a strong
precursor.

40:00.750 --> 40:06.880
All of this is a continuous
theme in the psychodynamic of

40:06.878 --> 40:10.928
Bloom's theory as he elaborates
it.

40:10.929 --> 40:13.669
So what complicates Bloom's
argument,

40:13.670 --> 40:17.510
apart from the vocabulary and
the philosophical range of

40:17.510 --> 40:20.410
thought,
is what I began with:

40:20.407 --> 40:25.367
the traditional idea of
influence as an art-nature

40:25.373 --> 40:28.413
problem,
trying to figure out,

40:28.411 --> 40:33.701
in fact, whether the crisis of
influence is the sense of one's

40:33.704 --> 40:37.964
orientation to nature,
one's ability to imitate nature

40:37.960 --> 40:40.220
and have nature available to
one,

40:40.219 --> 40:45.389
or whether it's word oriented,
which it seems to be more in

40:45.385 --> 40:49.925
Bloom: the sense of one's
relationship with text.

40:49.929 --> 40:55.739
But notice on page 1157 that
Bloom really doesn't want to say

40:55.742 --> 40:57.972
it's just about text.

40:57.969 --> 41:01.949
He doesn't really want to say
that it has exclusively to do

41:01.949 --> 41:05.239
with the strong precursor
understood, as it were,

41:05.242 --> 41:06.412
as an author.

41:06.409 --> 41:11.119
There is in some sense a text
of nature as well,

41:11.119 --> 41:14.529
so that Bloom says,
bottom of 1157,

41:14.525 --> 41:17.925
right-hand column:
… Freud's disciple,

41:17.929 --> 41:21.259
Otto Rank, show[s]
a greater awareness of the

41:21.259 --> 41:25.599
artist's fight against art,
and of the relation of this

41:25.597 --> 41:29.497
struggle to the artist's
antithetical battle against

41:29.503 --> 41:30.273
nature.

41:30.269 --> 41:34.219
In other words, nature is death.

41:34.219 --> 41:40.059
Nature is that into
which--should he not sustain

41:40.057 --> 41:47.757
himself in the triumph of his
assertion of priority nature--

41:47.760 --> 41:52.920
the author will fall back in
the form of death.

41:52.920 --> 41:55.500
Wait until they try to
transcribe that sentence.

41:55.500 --> 41:55.900
Okay.

41:55.900 --> 41:58.360
Well, but you
>

41:58.360 --> 42:02.070
got what I mean.

42:02.070 --> 42:06.460
This is an interesting problem,
and Bloom wants to insist that

42:06.458 --> 42:10.558
part of the struggle of the
belated poet is a struggle for

42:10.557 --> 42:11.707
immortality.

42:11.710 --> 42:16.820
Part of what it means to come
first and to know nothing ever

42:16.820 --> 42:21.930
having been there before you is
also to suppose that you are

42:21.932 --> 42:25.602
going to be last,
that you're going to be

42:25.603 --> 42:30.053
immortal, that you really do not
belong in an unfolding,

42:30.050 --> 42:34.190
inexorable sequence of the sort
that we call history;

42:34.190 --> 42:37.580
but that you are rather
something, a force,

42:37.577 --> 42:41.367
a genius, or a power that
transcends history.

42:41.369 --> 42:45.999
This entails as much the
"lie against time,"

42:46.003 --> 42:50.803
as Bloom calls it,
holding off death as it does,

42:50.797 --> 42:55.487
insisting on there having been
no beginning,

42:55.489 --> 42:59.609
no priority,
and no genesis in what you do;

42:59.610 --> 43:01.920
you were there first.

43:01.920 --> 43:02.680
All right.

43:02.677 --> 43:06.767
To illustrate this very
quickly, let's look at passages

43:06.766 --> 43:09.036
five and six on your sheet.

43:09.039 --> 43:17.339
Wordsworth, the particularly
important strong misreader and

43:17.344 --> 43:22.934
belated poet with respect to
Milton,

43:22.929 --> 43:27.299
in Bloom's view:
Wordsworth writes in a kind of

43:27.302 --> 43:30.632
programmatic or promissory
poem--

43:30.630 --> 43:35.360
written actually in 1800 and
not published until 1814 as part

43:35.358 --> 43:39.058
of the preface to a poem of his
called "The

43:39.063 --> 43:42.213
Excursion"--
he wrote a prospectus to

43:42.210 --> 43:45.130
"The Recluse,"
that's what at one time

43:45.128 --> 43:48.668
"The Excursion"
was supposed to be part of,

43:48.670 --> 43:51.640
and he says:
"I am not interested in

43:51.635 --> 43:55.585
writing Paradise Lost.
Paradise Lost for me is

43:55.592 --> 43:56.702
a thing of the past.

43:56.699 --> 43:58.829
It's just archaic.

43:58.829 --> 44:02.109
Who would care about the things
Milton cares about:

44:02.112 --> 44:05.692
'all strength,
all terror, single or in bands

44:05.686 --> 44:09.206
that ever was put forth in
personal form,

44:09.210 --> 44:12.940
Jehovah with his thunder and
the choir of shouting angels and

44:12.938 --> 44:17.338
the imperial thrones,
I pass them unalarmed.'

44:17.340 --> 44:20.260
Paradise Lost,
that's just playing with

44:20.264 --> 44:21.244
toy soldiers.

44:21.239 --> 44:27.669
That's nothing compared with
what I myself am going to do:

44:27.670 --> 44:31.770
'not chaos,
not the darkest pit of lowest

44:31.769 --> 44:36.719
Erebus nor aught of blinder
vacancy scooped out by help of

44:36.724 --> 44:41.944
dreams can breed such fear and
awe as fall upon us often when

44:41.938 --> 44:46.818
we look into our minds,
into the mind of man,

44:46.822 --> 44:51.552
my haunt and the main region of
my song.'

44:51.550 --> 44:52.940
I'm not talking about God.

44:52.940 --> 44:54.560
I'm not talking about heaven.

44:54.559 --> 44:56.709
I'm not talking about hell.

44:56.710 --> 44:59.040
I'm not talking about war in
heaven.

44:59.039 --> 45:03.269
I'm not talking about anything
mythological or archaically

45:03.271 --> 45:03.941
heroic.

45:03.940 --> 45:06.760
"I'm talking about this.

45:06.760 --> 45:08.660
I'm talking about the mind of
man.

45:08.659 --> 45:12.779
I'm talking primarily about my
mind, but my mind is your mind.

45:12.780 --> 45:16.440
Mind is universal,
and in talking about mind I'm

45:16.443 --> 45:19.723
not falling back into the pit of
nature.

45:19.719 --> 45:24.539
I'm keeping my focus not on the
sky gods,

45:24.539 --> 45:27.869
not on the "transcendent,
starry junk,"

45:27.871 --> 45:31.361
as Wallace Stevens called it,
of my precursors,

45:31.364 --> 45:34.504
all those people with their
outworn superstitions.

45:34.500 --> 45:37.400
I'm not interested in any of
that, but I'm not interested in

45:37.398 --> 45:38.428
any of this either.

45:38.429 --> 45:39.719
I'm not interested in nature.

45:39.719 --> 45:43.449
I'm not interested in that in
which I would be buried if I

45:43.445 --> 45:45.075
reduced myself to that.

45:45.079 --> 45:47.479
I am interested in
consciousness,

45:47.476 --> 45:48.446
the psyche.

45:48.449 --> 45:51.029
In other words,
my focus is,"

45:51.025 --> 45:53.525
Wordsworth says,
"altogether

45:53.525 --> 45:55.395
psychological."

45:55.400 --> 45:58.290
All right.

45:58.289 --> 45:59.889
No interest in Paradise Lost.

45:59.889 --> 46:01.949
That's just archaic.

46:01.949 --> 46:06.089
Well, look at passage five:
three statements by Satan which

46:06.092 --> 46:10.382
Bloom insists--it's not so much
Milton, because Bloom follows

46:10.376 --> 46:12.516
Blake and Shelley in this.

46:12.518 --> 46:15.008
It's not so much Milton who is
the strong precursor of

46:15.009 --> 46:15.619
Wordsworth.

46:15.619 --> 46:16.819
It's actually Satan,
right?

46:16.820 --> 46:17.930
>

46:17.929 --> 46:22.209
It's Milton's Satan who says,
"The mind is its own place

46:22.210 --> 46:26.920
and in itself can make a heaven
of hell, a hell of heaven."

46:26.920 --> 46:27.430
Okay.

46:27.429 --> 46:28.579
Gee whiz. >

46:28.579 --> 46:31.449
I guess Satan is writing the
prospectus to "The

46:31.449 --> 46:32.969
Recluse,"
isn't he,

46:32.969 --> 46:35.759
because that's what Wordsworth
is saying in the prospectus to

46:35.760 --> 46:36.970
"The Recluse."

46:36.969 --> 46:40.459
"I know no time,"
says Satan, "when I was

46:40.463 --> 46:41.673
not as now."

46:41.670 --> 46:45.440
That's what the belated poet
always says, "I came

46:45.443 --> 46:46.443
first."

46:46.440 --> 46:48.600
Elsewhere in the poem Satan
tells his troops,

46:48.599 --> 46:49.679
"You know what.

46:49.679 --> 46:52.309
God keeps saying he created you.

46:52.309 --> 46:53.949
Do you remember being created?

46:53.949 --> 46:55.459
I don't remember being created.

46:55.460 --> 46:56.610
I've always been there."

46:56.610 --> 46:57.950
Right?

46:57.949 --> 47:00.719
That is, in effect,
what he says again,

47:00.721 --> 47:04.081
what he repeats in this
passage, "Finally,

47:04.076 --> 47:05.896
myself am hell."

47:05.900 --> 47:07.720
Well, that's,
of course, rather an

47:07.724 --> 47:10.824
uncomfortable thing to say,
but at the same time it's the

47:10.820 --> 47:13.200
rabbit as king of the ghosts,
isn't it?

47:13.199 --> 47:16.959
It is whatever you can throw at
me, I'm it already.

47:16.960 --> 47:18.770
Right?

47:18.768 --> 47:24.388
Because "the main haunt
and sole region of my song is

47:24.387 --> 47:27.637
the mind,"
is my own mind.

47:27.639 --> 47:28.919
All right.

47:28.920 --> 47:31.890
So Satan has already said in
Paradise Lost everything

47:31.891 --> 47:34.761
Wordsworth can possibly say in
the prospectus to "The

47:34.762 --> 47:35.672
Recluse."

47:35.670 --> 47:39.610
He has strongly misread
Paradise Lost such that

47:39.608 --> 47:43.248
he thinks he's doing something
completely new,

47:43.250 --> 47:48.930
while revealing precisely that
the strong precursor poet has

47:48.934 --> 47:54.624
always already written what the
successor poet can write.

47:54.619 --> 47:57.409
The tension,
the dynamic in other words,

47:57.409 --> 48:02.759
between conservation and
innovation is intact in all such

48:02.759 --> 48:05.549
moments,
in all the moments,

48:05.545 --> 48:09.105
that involve the anxiety of
influence.

48:09.110 --> 48:11.500
I'm sorry I have so little time
for this.

48:11.500 --> 48:16.000
Give me a minute or two because
we have to honor Tony the Tow

48:16.001 --> 48:20.291
Truck, and it's
rather obvious that for Lacan,

48:20.289 --> 48:24.069
Tony the Tow Truck is a
text in which Tony settles for

48:24.074 --> 48:27.964
the objet petit a,
right: little Bumpy the Car,

48:27.963 --> 48:31.913
an imperfect being but a
helpful one and a friend--

48:31.909 --> 48:33.339
"that's what I call a
friend";

48:33.340 --> 48:38.140
whereas the objects of desire,
Neato, Speedy--whoa,

48:38.137 --> 48:39.767
those are cars.

48:39.768 --> 48:44.208
The objects of desire are
improper object choices on the

48:44.210 --> 48:45.260
face of it.

48:45.260 --> 48:47.990
That's what an American ego
psychologist would say,

48:47.989 --> 48:50.639
but they are,
in a more Bunuelesque way of

48:50.643 --> 48:53.893
putting it,
obscure objects of desire as

48:53.891 --> 48:58.741
they motor on down the road
which are simply unavailable to

48:58.742 --> 49:01.672
Tony as object relations at all.

49:01.670 --> 49:06.580
So Neato and Speedy are the big
other--right?--and Bumpy is the

49:06.579 --> 49:08.479
object petit a.

49:08.480 --> 49:08.890
All right.

49:08.889 --> 49:12.359
Now it's just perfectly obvious
that for Harold Bloom,

49:12.362 --> 49:16.102
Tony the Tow Truck is a
strong misreading of The

49:16.099 --> 49:17.999
Little Engine that Could.

49:18.000 --> 49:23.560
It's perfectly clear
because Bumpy is the hero of

49:23.556 --> 49:27.186
The Little Engine that Could.

49:27.190 --> 49:33.050
The misreading involves
making Tony the hero who needs

49:33.052 --> 49:35.112
the help of Bumpy.

49:35.110 --> 49:37.130
In other words,
Bumpy, in the folkloric sense

49:37.134 --> 49:39.184
of the story,
becomes the helper and not the

49:39.182 --> 49:40.822
hero,
but we can see,

49:40.820 --> 49:45.080
after all, that the essential
narrative model--

49:45.079 --> 49:51.079
the model of the small turning
out through perseverance and

49:51.077 --> 49:57.487
energy to necessarily reinforce
the strength of the strong--

49:57.489 --> 49:59.599
is about the strong and the
weak.

49:59.599 --> 50:02.639
Both The Little Engine that
Could and Tony the Tow

50:02.643 --> 50:05.073
Truck are about the strong
and the weak,

50:05.070 --> 50:10.220
that the strong must in some
sense or another be supplemented

50:10.224 --> 50:15.984
or supplanted by the weak if the
strong is fully to self-realize.

50:15.980 --> 50:19.310
We can't ever read Tony the
Tow Truck,

50:19.309 --> 50:22.969
the character,
Tony, quite the same way again

50:22.972 --> 50:27.702
after the appearance of Bumpy,
and yet Bumpy is nothing other

50:27.695 --> 50:31.735
than the hero of The Little
Engine that Could,

50:31.739 --> 50:37.759
a subject position that has
been appropriated by Tony in

50:37.764 --> 50:39.084
this text.

50:39.079 --> 50:43.599
So the relationship is again an
agonistic one involving the

50:43.599 --> 50:48.199
transposition of heroism from
one character-focus to another

50:48.197 --> 50:52.817
while at the same time--
as anybody can recognize who

50:52.818 --> 50:56.128
has read both stories to their
kids--

50:56.130 --> 51:00.440
simply rewriting the story in a
way that The Little Engine

51:00.438 --> 51:03.308
that Could completely
anticipates.

51:03.309 --> 51:04.449
All right.

51:04.449 --> 51:05.699
So much then for that.

51:05.699 --> 51:10.579
We'll be returning to more
Lacanian pastures on Tuesday

51:10.583 --> 51:15.653
when we study Deleuze and
Guattari and Slavoj Žižek.

51:15.650 --> 51:21.000