Poetic Influence and Romantic Tradition, British and American: 1789 to the Present

FAIN: FF-10362-74

Harold Bloom
Yale University (New Haven, CT 06510-1703)

To study a progression of British and American poets, including Blake, Wordsworth, Keats, Poe, Whitman, Stevens, Crane, while centering on the critical and historical problems that are presented by intra-poetic relations, particularly influence and resistance to influence. The emphasis will be on the process by which each poet struggles with the excessive strength of a precursor's influence, and on the parallel process of the individual reader's struggle with the poet's influence.