“We believed that to understand literature, you had to understand its p...” — M. H. Abrams Quote

We believed that to understand literature, you had to understand its place in history and culture.

The Romantics were whipping boys of the New Criticism, but they appealed to me anyway. I was recalcitrant. It was clear to me that they had thought innovatively.

The theories of the major philosophers of the 18th century secular enlightenment were biblical and theological in spite of themselves.

Hard work makes easy reading or, at least, easier reading.

John Updike is always fun. And one of my former students, Tom Pynchon. And Harold Bloom, another former student.

I always believed a singer should be able to sing any kind of song. If I wanted to sing a Cole Porter song, I should be able to do that. Or 'Sherry,' I should be able to do that. Or a Dylan song.

I have to say that I've always believed perfectionism is more of a disease than a quality. I do try to go with the flow but I can't let go.

My father was an entomologist who believed in continental drift. In the early '50s, that was regarded as nonsense. It was in the mid-'50s that it came back. Someone had thought of it 30 or 40 years earlier named Alfred Wegener, and he never got to see it come back.

This might be a conceit of government officials, but there's the idea that maybe you can make a difference. It's a conceit. Maybe it's unhealthy. We all believed we could make a difference.