Let's Get Lit!

      Today we are going to talk about a man who has been a towering influence upon the literary world as well as academia. Someone who has been called and I quote “a dinosaur”, “Donald Trump of Literary Studies”, “the most notorious literary critic in America”, “ the imperious and convivial scholar and literary critic ” and at the same time “a singular breed of scholar-teacher-critic-prose-poet-pamphleteer”. Harold Bloom.             Harold Bloom, the 'Sterling Professor of Humanities' at Yale University, who passed away last week, has been a decisive figure and somewhat of a lone-warrior in the field of literary studies. His legacy is considered by many to be troublesome with his unapologetic call to depoliticize literary studies and promote orthodox aesthetic values. For example, when Harry Potter became popular in the early 2000s, it was he who famously dismissed it as a “string of cliches”. Could 35 mill...

Two days ago, it was announced by the Swedish Academy that the Nobel Prize for Litearture for the year 2019 is awarded to Peter Handke, an Austrian writer. He has always been the centre of controversy due to his shocking political stands. His famous works include Offending the Audience , The Goalie's Anxiety at the Penalty Kick , and A Sorrow Beyond Dreams . The Keralite viewers might be familiar with the second work as it is famously referenced in one of N.S. Madhavan’s famous short stories titled Higuita . In this video, we will not be focusing on his works and achievements but rather the controversy that has clouded the award. The Swedish academy’s citation to Handke says that he was awarded "for an influential work that with linguistic ingenuity has explored the periphery and the specificity of human experience.” The award was widely criticized by international bodies such as PEN America, writers like Salman Rushdie, Politicians across Europ...