From his assault on New Criticism to his salvos against the "school of resentment," literary scholar Harold Bloom has fused an eloquent defense of the western canon with insightful analysis and a rebel's penchant for controversy. This imaginative program, the first-ever documentary on Bloom's far-reaching contributions to literary criticism, ushers viewers through the complex world of his writings, ideas, influences, and impact. Presenting extensive commentary from Bloom himself, the film also features detailed interviews with the renowned Sir Frank Kermode, a long-time colleague and sometime rival of Bloom's, and The New School's Dr. Nicholas Birns, literary critic and former student of both Bloom and Kermode. Academics who have studied Bloom's career-including Dr. Xavier Perez Torio of Pompeu Fabra University and Dr. Raffaele Pinto of the University of Barcelona-are also included.

Encoded with permission for digital streaming by Infobase on Nov. 06, 2009. Learn360 is distributed by Infobase for Films for the Humanities & Sciences, Cambridge Educational, Meridian Education, and Shopware.

Harold Bloom: Literary Critic (1:18) -- Aesthetic Merit in Literature (1:02) -- Bloom: Literary Populist (1:12) -- Bloom on Literary Canon (1:59) -- Bloom on Irony (2:11) -- Competing with the Dead (2:26) -- Romanticism and Imagination (2:15) -- Kabbalah and Criticism (3:29) -- Literary Canon (2:02) -- Shakespeare (3:01) -- Chaucer and the Creation of Character (1:37) -- Falstaff's Vocation: Meditative Characters (3:25) -- Milton Connection (2:53) -- Cervantes (3:15) -- Dante and the Genius of Theology (3:33) -- Wordsworth (1:10) -- Walt Whitman (2:50) -- Bloom on the Twentieth Century (3:22) -- Freud: Psychology as Poetry (2:27) -- Borges (3:19) -- School of Resentment (4:05) -- Reading against Death (2:26).