On its publication, the Harvard literary critic James Wood wrote: "How extraordinary, then, that Bellow's substantial new novel, "Ravelstein", written in his 85th year, should be so full of the old, cascading power. ... Ravelstein ... is large, flamboyant, and excessively clumsy. When he laughs, he throws his head back 'like Picasso's wounded horse in "Guernica".' He loves fine clothes, Lanvin jackets, Zegna ties, but tends to spill food on them. Hostesses know to put newspaper underneath Ravelstein's chair at a dinner party. At home, he wanders around in an exquisite silk dressing gown, chain-smoking. His apartment is stuffed with beautiful glass and silverware, with the finest Italian and French linens, and thousands of CDs. He reclines on a black leather couch, listening to Baroque music, is enormously learned, and given to oration on a thousand subjects. ... By all accounts, including Bellow's, this is Allan Bloom as his friends knew him."