The New York Times bestseller from Harold Bloom...A National Book Award Finalist, National Book Critics Circle Award Finalist, a New York Times Notable Book of the Year, and a Publishers Weekly best book of the year."The indispensable critic on the indispensable writer."--Geoffrey O'Brien, New York Review of BooksA landmark achievement as expansive, erudite, and passionate as its renowned author, Shakespeare: The Invention of the Human is the culmination of a lifetime of reading, writing about, and teaching Shakespeare. Preeminent literary critic Harold Bloom leads us through a comprehensive reading of every one of the dramatist's plays, brilliantly illuminating each work with unrivaled warmth, wit and insight. At the same time, Bloom presents one of the boldest theses of Shakespearean scholarships--that Shakespeare not only invented the English language, but also created human nature as we know it today.* A New York Times bestseller* A National Book Award Finalist* A National Book Critics Circle Award Finalist* A New York Times Notable Book* One of Publishers Weekly's Best Books of the Year* A Main Selection of the Book-of-the-Month Club* An ALA Booklist Editors Choice for 1998* The culmination of Bloom's celebrated career--a long-awaited, complete assessment of his most beloved subject* Includes in-depth readings of every Shakespeare play* An essential reference volume for every home and school library"A huge cloak-bag of ideas...It is a feast."--Wall Street Journal"An enraptured, incantatory epic...dazzling...You could hardly ask for a more capacious and beneficent work than Shakespeare: The Invention of the Human."--The New Yorker"A fiercely argued exegesis of Shakespeare's plays in the tradition of Samuel Johnson, Hazlitt, and A.C. Bradley, a study that is as passionate as it is erudite." --Michiko Kakutani, New York Times"Bloom has given us the crowning achievement of his career...If any piece of literary criticism can have a practical effect--on our stage and imaginations--this is the one."--Salon"Should this be the one book you read if you're going to read one book about Shakespeare? Yes."--The New York Observer"Bloom...is a master entertainer." --Newsweek"Very nearly perfect."--Kirkus