The eminent American literary critic and professor Harold Bloom died on October 14. The ardent defender of the Western Canon warned that making literature subordinate to social justice – or any external cause — destroys intellectual and aesthetic standards. Writing in The Atlantic, Stanley Fish summarizes Bloom’s career, reminding us what we’ll lose by politicizing literary culture.

France is in the Crosshairs, but the Target is Western Civilization
Theodore Dalrymple in Law & Liberty crystallizes the recent riots in France to a simple equation: “Whole generations have been taught and come to accept that Western civilization consists of slavery, exploitation, and massacre.” Tearing it all down – not merely reforming it – is therefore not just understandable but desirable. Dalrymple disposes of the delusional trope that these are “student” protests, noting the preponderance of Muslim migrants committing the mayhem.
For a luminous glimpse into the singular civilizational achievements the rioters would tear down, read this C2C article by Patrick Keeney.


