The Anxiety of Influence

Bloom's The Anxiety of Influence, an insightful study of Romantic poets and the relation between tradition and the individual artist, has sold over 17,000 copies in paperback since 1984 and remains a central work of criticism for students of literature. For the second edition, Bloom offers a new introduction which explains the genesis of his thinking and the subsequent influence of the book on literary criticism of the past twenty years.