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1. Who are the prominent critics Bloom cites as the most influential critics of Shakespeare?

Bloom cites romantic critics Hazlitt, W. H. Auden and A.C. Bradley, and Shakespeare's contemporaries, Ben Jonson and Christopher Marlowe, in addition to Dr. Samuel Johnson.

2. How does Bloom describe the meaning of his title, "The Invention of the Human"?

Bloom means that Shakespeare's characters have an internal life, and self-awareness, which did not exist before Shakespeare's plays, but which has become emblematic of human development in Western culture since then.

3. What was Nietzsche's influence on Bloom's view of Shakespeare?

Bloom says that Nietzsche made him see Shakespeare as creating memory using the characters'--and the audience's--pain.

4. What does Bloom say Shakespeare's compare to in terms of world religion?

According to Bloom, Shakespeare's plays are as influential as the Bible in shaping the thinking and the reality of the Western world.

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