The Closing of the American Mind

By: Allan Bloom

Narrated by: Christopher Hurt

Length: 14 hrs and 39 mins

Publisher's summary

In one of the most important books of our time, Allan Bloom, a professor of social thought at the University of Chicago and a noted translator of Plato and Rousseau, argues that the social and political crisis of 20th-century America is really an intellectual crisis. Bloom cites everything from the universities' lack of purpose to the students' lack of learning, from the jargon of liberation to the supplanting of reason by so-called creativity. Furthermore, he shows how American democracy has unwittingly played host to vulgarized Continental ideas of nihilism and despair, of relativism disguised as tolerance, while demonstrating that the collective mind of the American university is closed to the very principles of spiritual heritage that gave rise to the university in the first place.

(P)1992 by Blackstone Audiobooks; ©1987 by Alan Bloom

Critic reviews

"With clarity, gravity, and grace, Bloom makes a convincing case for the improbable proposition that reading old books about the permanent questions could help to reestablish reason and restore the soul." (Mary Ann Glendon, Harvard University)

Poignant today

Written in 1980’s, Mr. Bloom’s insights now seem prophetic .

This didn’t happen overnight, and we are reaping what has been sown.

The Audio Quality Is Completely Unacceptable

I've been an Audible subscriber for years. This audio book is by far the worst audio quality I have ever heard. There are many background sound artifacts, as some reviewers here rightly have said. The overall sound engineering is also pathetic. Distortion clipping can be heard on numerous occasions when Christopher Hurt naturally inflects Allan Bloom's text. While this was recorded in 1992, I do not remember any recording from that year sounding like it is being played from a wax cylinder. This narration would be my first such experience.

Despite the notorious listening of this format, I think the book itself is one of the most prescient and insightful critiques of American higher education. Bloom's descriptions of the competing and developing philosophies affecting Europe and America are masterful. He uses this historical understanding to trace their appearances on university campuses and the illiberal regression that resulted in the humanities and social sciences.

This book is incredibly important, I think. It's just shameful and disappointing that this is the only audio version of the book. Audible clearly should make a newer version of this work that has higher quality.

Machine gun narration nearly ruins fine book.

Allan Bloom's book The Closing of the American Mind was one of the formative works of my youth. Bloom's critique impaired my youthful, unfounded, know-it-all confidence and set me on a path of lifelong study. I expected to enjoy reviewing the book and deepening my understanding of it by listening to it as an audiobook. And if the Audible app for iPhone offered a narration speed in between 0.75x and 1.0x, perhaps 0.9x, one could slow Hurt down to a speed at which one might be able to understand, follow, and think about the difficult thoughts he rattles off. However, as matters stand, I do not know how long I will be able to endure Hurt's rapid, mumbly performance.

Prescient & thought provoking

Bloom’s erudite style may make him difficult to digest for many readers/listeners who are less widely read and he will doubtless come-off as a plaintive curmudgeonly crank to those of the modern leftist disposition; but I find his perspectives on the state of the American mind and its attendant problems, his diagnoses of the intellectual and spiritual malaises of the West and the challenges and failures of the university (e.g. the death of liberal education, the fragmentation of its soul, the loss of unifying purpose and vision etc.) that have become ascendant and only ever-accelerating since the 60s offers valuable insights into the past and serves as an important lens from which to grasp the current conditions of today’s society.

A Must Read!

A must read!
Enlightening, in-depth, comprehensive dissective analysis of the American educational system. Bloom's firsthand account is extremely well-written and this audio version is expertly read. My only complaint is that it ended too soon.

Wonderful Book - Typical Boring Narration

Ive read the book several times and find it filled with many important insights for those living in our Constitutional republic. I also have an old recording on cassettes which were narrated by Allan Bloom himself. I was hoping that this would be the same recording, but available in a modern audio format without all the hiss of those old cassette tapes. Unfortunately, someone else narrated the book. He has the typical syrupy but monotonous kind of voice so often found in audio books. There's none of the inflection or passion of the author when he read the book. I find it hard to keep my eyes open when listening to this version. Does the narrator even understand what he's reading, its significance ? This version lulls me to sleep. I better not drive with it on. I doubt I will finish listening to this version. It was quite a disappointment. Even though I don't think I can listen to more than 10 minutes of it, I can't bear to give the book a horrible rating. The content deserves 5 stars. - -

Must read book; distracting audio recording

This audiobook recording is plagued by what sounds like an unintended second track that bleeds in and out at the level of background noise. Given the often heady nature of Bloom's writing, the background noise is quite distracting.

The book itself is an entertaining form of true education; both in politics, history, philosophy, and a masterful use of the English language. I found the preface and introduction sections to be pedantic and at first doubted the value of listening to the following 14 hours of audio. But the book itself is quite good, particularly if you are interested in a very intelligent person's description of the de-evolution of the university-societal complex since the 1960's. If you are well aware of the horrific state of America today (January 1, 2021) and want to understand (on a level higher than Levin/Savage/diSouza/Shapiro) how we got here, I highly recommend Bloom's book -- but not this edition of the audiobook.

Dr. Bloom used many words, but did not say much.

Dr. Bloom made his one helpful point at the beginning, that in the effort to teach American children to be open-minded, what was actually accomplished was that children were made to be closed-minded to the possibility that there was anything good, true, or beautiful. Simply, there are absolutely no absolutes, and everything is relative. While this is not a new point in the great conversation, Dr. Bloom does make this point well. After this point, the vast majority of the book is Dr. Bloom arguing that philosophy should be seen as the chef discipline of the academy. His support for this point, is that it was philosophy that brought about the enlightenment. While Dr. Bloom makes many points in his argument for the superiority of philosophy, he is simply wrong. It was the result of the reformation and the puritans that America came to be, and how it because exceptional. In actuality, what Dr. Bloom retells is the history of how wester civilization suppressed the truth about the God of the Bible, and he participates in this history. While Dr. Bloom is surely an intelligent and studied man, these this do not guaranty a grasp of the true. For a better resource, try The Mission of God by Joe Boot and The Consequence of Ideas by R. C. Sproul.

More Relevant than Ever

Bloom’s critique of the University provides an excellent backdrop to understanding our current mess. Unless modern reformers are willing to explore the roots of what’s troubling today’s colleges, they cannot begin to move things in a better direction.

Great narrative of the American Universities

This book has a great narrative on the decline in volte of the American University. It's amazing to hear his descriptions of victimhood, especially considering this was written 30 years ago.

But I feel this could be two separate books: one on the culture of the American University, and the other as a description of philosophy. Unless you are a great student of the common philosophers, you will be lost in the latter half of this book.