The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages (review)
The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages (review)
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西方经典：各个时代的书籍和学派（评论）
DOI：
10.1353/com.1996.0027
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发表时间：
2012
期刊：
影响因子：
--
通讯作者：
M. Witt
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文献类型：
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作者：
M. Witt
哈罗德•布鲁姆曾因其在《影响力的焦虑》（The Anxiety ofInfluence）中的理论，甚至最近在《论英语》（The Book ofJ）中的推测，一度被认为是英语研究领域的一个可怕的孩子。但现在，从他的书名（《西方经典》）的肯定性质，以及它针对贸易而非学术读者的营销来看，他似乎把自己置于已故的艾伦·布鲁姆（Allan Bloom）和e·d·赫希（E. D. Hirsch）的行列中，他们在1987年分别出版了《美国心智的关闭》和《文化素养》，采用了类似的策略。虽然哈罗德·布鲁姆没有提到这两位前辈，但他显然是在回应同样的教育危机和“文化战争”，这些危机已经撼动了学术文学界好几年了。事实上，大多数学者已经对这个话题感到相当厌倦。布鲁姆本人声称对“模仿文化战争”不感兴趣(1)，并采取了一种策略，即自始至终用轻蔑的言论来指代对手，而不是直接回应他们的论点。通过向更广泛的受众撒网，布鲁姆似乎希望通过获得更多的新鲜和更多的部队来赢得战斗。的确，某些基本问题从来没有得到真正的回答，但布卢姆毫不犹豫地接受了这些问题，并给出了自己的答案。考虑到我们在短暂的一生中只能花一定的时间来阅读，我们应该读什么？为什么？同样，在文学教学中，我们应该教哪些书——或者把哪些书作为有价值的东西传给下一代？为什么？我们是否有普遍的审美标准来评判文学的伟大？正如罗伯特·斯科尔斯（Robert Scholes）的优秀调查“正典性和文本性”（现代语言和文学学术导论，约瑟夫·吉巴尔迪（Joseph Gibaldi）编辑，第2版，[纽约：MLA， 1992]，第138-58页）所建议的那样，最近许多关于正典的文章都选择不直接回答这些问题，而是提出了更复杂的方法和关于正典性和正典形成概念的问题。通过将“正典”和“文学”等词的意义形成历史化，通过指出它们与社会力量和意识形态的联盟，通过反对“文本”流动的符号学结构的等级地位，这些作家要么会极大地扩展正典的领域，要么会完全抛弃正典。另一方面，布鲁姆没有花任何时间在定义和词源上；他在第一页写道，“规范”意味着“在我们的文化中具有权威性”，同时具有“美学价值”。虽然他不会声称他给出的名单是详尽的（一个更长的名单出现在附录中），但他接着讨论了26位作者（这里的作者，与罗兰·巴特及其追随者相反，远未死亡，但比我们读者更有活力），并告诉我们为什么我们应该阅读他们的作品。布卢姆将一些主要的现代批评流派，如女权主义、马克思主义和新历史主义，放在“怨恨学派”的标题下，开始了他的研究。他还将自己置于他所谓的右翼批评的对立面，这些人声称西方经典
Harold Bloom was once considered something ofan enfant terrible in English studies for his theories in The Anxiety ofInfluence and even for his recent speculations in The Book ofJ. But now, both by the affirmative nature ofhis book title (The Western Canon) and by its marketing for trade rather than for a scholarly audience, he seems to place himself in the company of the late Allan Bloom and of E. D. Hirsch, who adopted similar strategies when they published, respectively, The Closing ofthe American Mind and Cultural Literacy in 1987. Although Harold Bloom does not mention these two predecessors, he is clearly responding to the same perceived crisis in education and to the "culture wars" that have been shaking the academic literary establishment for several years now. Most academics have in fact grown rather tired of the subject. Bloom himself claims to be uninterested in "mimic cultural wars" (1) and adopts a strategy of referring to his opponents with dismissive remarks throughout rather than addressing their arguments directly. It would seem that by casting his net to a wider audience, Bloom hopes to win battles by garnering fresh and more numerous troops. It is true that certain fundamental questions have never really been answered, and that Bloom does not hesitate to take them on and to give his own answers to them. Given the fact that we can only devote a certain amount ofour brief lifetimes to reading, what should we read and why? Similarly, in the profession of teaching literature, what books shall we teach—or pass on as valuable to the next generation"—and why? Are there universal aesthetic standards by which we can judge literary greatness? As suggested in Robert Scholes's excellent survey "Canonicity and Textuality" (Introduction to Scholarship in Modern Languages andLiteratures, ed. Joseph Gibaldi, 2nd ed. [New York: MLA, 1992], pp. 138-58), much recent writing on canons chooses not to answer these questions directly, proposing instead ever more sophisticated approaches to and questions about the notion of canonicity and canon formation. By historicizing the formation of the meaning ofwords such as "canon" and "literature," by pointing out their alliance with social forces and ideologies, and by opposing to their hierarchical status the fluid, semiotic construction of"texts," such writers would either greatly extend the field ofthe canon or do away with it altogether. Bloom, on the other hand, does not spend any time on definitions and etymologies; "canonical," he states on the first page, means both "authoritative in our culture" and having "aesthetic value." Although he would not claim that the list he gives is exhaustive (a much longer one appears in the appendix), he then proceeds to discuss 26 authors (the author here, in opposition to Roland Barthes and followers, is far from dead, but more alive than we as readers are) and to tell us why we should read their works. Bloom prefaces his enquiry by lumping together some major schools of modern criticism, such as feminism, Marxism, and New Historicism, under the rubric of "The School of Resentment." He also positions himself in opposition to what he calls the right wing of criticism, those who claim that the western canon