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The Divine Harold Bloom (as he uses the term for Oscar Wilde) here defends the Western Canon, and while so doing became the recipient of much undeserved criticism, from the likes of so-called New Historicists, gender theorists, Marxist interpreters, and devotees of the School of Resentment. Battle worn and unyielding in his belief in literature that matters, Bloom here is indefatigable. In this, a pillar of western literary criticism, Bloom lucidly lays out his argument for the Canon. I wont defend the Canon here in this review, Bloom does that way better than I ever could, but I will say I appreciate his heroism. I will relate to you that during my undergraduate and graduate pursuits in the field of English Literature at an esteemed University, I can honestly say that the Canon does indeed need a champion. A reader of classical literature since I was a child, I experienced shock and dismay when much of my coursework was taken up with studying literature that was focused on due to "cultural significance" without regard to aesthetic beauty or literary quality. Without naming names, when one goes into a course of study that one hopes will incorporate Shakespeare, Milton, Dante and Cervantes, or the gods of the field, I ended up enmeshed in courses that focused on cultural/socio-political fetishes, with topical, and therefor irrelevant, importance, to call it that. Twenty years later, I'm still reeling from classes focused on comic books and political pamphlets. So, as always, I stuck to what I deem important-literature that has universal significance-Joyce, Becket, Proust, Kafka, Faulkner, Lawrence and Crane for the moderns; Shakespeare, Milton, Blake, Shelley, Dickens, Austen, Goethe, Mann, Flaubert, Tolstoy, Whitman, Melville, Hawthorne and James. Bloom, here as elsewhere, is a great guide for those of us who, due to the disintegration of the Academy, are forced into autodidactism. For those of us increasingly rare beings who search for where "wisdom might be found" in those authors where the muse speaks most evidently, this book is a great and treasured resource. Of the many accomplishments of this gem, Bloom allows us to become acquainted with these great writers and why they matter. One of the great regrets of my life is not having had the opportunity of surveying a course taught by Mr. Bloom at Yale or NYU, or better yet, sitting down and having a beer with the man and discussing poetry. I solace myself by reading his works incessantly and watching lectures and interviews on youtube (forgive me Mr. Bloom, I am as technologically adverse as you are, but I have to do what I have to do). This book, along with the Invention of the Human and The Daemon Knows, along with his other works, are my bibles in life as I unwaveringly search for wisdom in books, plays and poetry that have enriched my life and inner being immeasurably. Harold Bloom has had an incalculable impact on me as a living room scholar and on me as a person. Harold Bloom is, and will always be, a treasure great to behold.