"We read deeply for varied reasons, most of them familiar: that we cannot know enough people profoundly enough that we need to know ourselves better that we require knowledge, not just of self and others, but of the way things are."

Wisdom

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Thematic Reflection

This quotation examines the core nature of Wisdom as articulated by Harold Bloom. Within historical and literary traditions, reflections on Wisdom provide actionable mental models, challenging individuals to evaluate personal ethics, self-discipline, and daily actions.

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About Harold Bloom

Harold Bloom was an American literary critic and the Sterling Professor of humanities at Yale University. In 2017, Bloom was called "probably the most famous literary critic in the English-speaking world". After publishing his first book in 1959, Bloom wrote more than 50 books, including over 40 books of literary criticism, several books discussing religion, and one novel. He edited hundreds of anthologies concerning numerous literary and philosophical figures for the Chelsea House publishing firm. Bloom's books have been translated into more than 40 languages. He was elected to the American Philosophical Society in 1995.

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More by Harold Bloom

"The second, and I think this is the much more overt and I think it is the main cause, I have been increasingly demonstrating or trying to demonstrate that every possible stance a critic, a scholar, a teacher can take towards a poem is itself inevitably and necessarily poetic."

— Harold Bloom
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"I would say that there is no future for literary studies as such in the United States."

— Harold Bloom
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"But in the end, in the end one is alone. We are all of us alone. I mean I'm told these days we have to consider ourselves as being in society... but in the end one knows one is alone, that one lives at the heart of a solitude."

— Harold Bloom
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"Criticism in the universities, I'll have to admit, has entered a phase where I am totally out of sympathy with 95% of what goes on. It's Stalinism without Stalin."

— Harold Bloom
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More about Wisdom

"I won in a primary, so I understand primary fights."

— Donna Edwards
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"Wisdom principle 57 tells us that the journey of life is lesson 2."

— Cherie Bennett
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"I could have a roomful of awards and it wouldn't mean beans."

— Bobby Darin
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"Acting is not about dressing up. Acting is about stripping bare. The whole essence of learning lines is to forget them so you can make them sound like you thought of them that instant."

— Glenda Jackson
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