Bloom's protégé Camille Paglia is another (more polarizing) example of someone who is unapologetically, performatively herself - often to dizzying excess. Look at her TV appearances in the '90s: she comes out like a pugilist, talking ten thousand miles a minute. You'll find something deep to think about, a handful of books and authors to add to your reading list, some to strike from it, and a hot-take to be shocked and offended by before Camille even stops to breathe. She's theatrical. She's performative. For good or ill, she's unmistakably herself.
Thanks to Prof. Paglia's I think , gift for overstatement I have kept the idea we write in the long tail of the Romantic in mind ...until I satisfied myself lately that it is just as well to write cautionary tales about the side effects of our attempts to shine with defiance while relatively alone while believing we belong to join fraternal clubs. There are rules, poets imagine we can obey unwritten rules in pursuit of a sound and sense that rings for 3 generations skirting language drift. Tennyson still reads, very well...
Bloom's protégé Camille Paglia is another (more polarizing) example of someone who is unapologetically, performatively herself - often to dizzying excess. Look at her TV appearances in the '90s: she comes out like a pugilist, talking ten thousand miles a minute. You'll find something deep to think about, a handful of books and authors to add to your reading list, some to strike from it, and a hot-take to be shocked and offended by before Camille even stops to breathe. She's theatrical. She's performative. For good or ill, she's unmistakably herself.
Thanks to Prof. Paglia's I think , gift for overstatement I have kept the idea we write in the long tail of the Romantic in mind ...until I satisfied myself lately that it is just as well to write cautionary tales about the side effects of our attempts to shine with defiance while relatively alone while believing we belong to join fraternal clubs. There are rules, poets imagine we can obey unwritten rules in pursuit of a sound and sense that rings for 3 generations skirting language drift. Tennyson still reads, very well...
Both Bloom and Paglia learned this from one of their heroes, Oscar Wilde.