|
Literature: "the" product
of the imagination
You "educate" your imagination by
READING!
And, READING, in turn, expands
your ABILITY TO WRITE - well!
:D
It extends your vocabulary making you MORE FLUENT!
THE MORE READING you do, the MORE you know, THE MORE
you have to say. This makes you MORE INTERESTING. :D
WHY is literature RELEVANT?
Literature FREES US FROM REALITY while it
extends our
human experience MAKING OUR
HUMAN EXPERIENCE MORE RICH!
|
The many facets of
the mind
-
the conscious:
- what the person is
doing + thinking NOW
-
the
subconscious:
- the on-going RECORD of the person's
- "conscious" behavior
(that contributes
- of personality
definition + personal con-
- cerns arising from
the interaction the
- person has with the
environment
-
memory:
- RECORD of the
person's interaction
- with the environment
- intellectually
- + emotionally
- It's A MUSCLE that is
strengthened
- by reading + learning.
- Incidentally, those
having 3 or more
- languages have the
strongest me-
- mories + consequently
the greatest
- facility of retaining
what they learned.
- In India, Grade One
students work
- in 3 languages:
English, Hindi +
- one of the 220
languages.
- intellect
(developed + undeveloped):
- governed by level of
literacy + learning
- (both impacts the
memory) to recognize
- what is true + NOT
true (geared towards
- independence +
survival based on the
- person's
troubleshooting ability)
- imagination:
- i. deals with fiction
- ii. a "speculative"
space for experimenting
- ii. with theories +
hypotheses
- iii. the place where
dreams originate in
- iii. order to provide
("carthartic') relief to
- iii. the main concerns +
interests of the
- iii. subconscious
"the study
of literature is supposed
"to train and improve
the imagin-
"ation."
(page 82)
" ... we use our imagination all the
"time: it comes into
our conversa-
"tion
and practical life: it even pro-
"duces dreams when we
sleep."
(page 82)
|
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
The following quotes come from University of
Toronto English professor, Dr. Nortrop Frye's world-famous 1963 seminal
book,
"THE EDUCATED IMAGINATION": it summerizes beautifully
the relationship between literature and the imagination, the source
from which literature springs forth out of the darkness of the night
into the light of the day.
|
THE
QUINTESSENTIAL
QUOTE
states
that literature
is
the product of the author's imagination
"There is NO direct address in
literature: it isN'T what you
"say but
how it's said
that's important
there.
The
literary
"writer
isN'T giving information, either
about a subject
"or
about his state
of mind:
he's trying
to let something
"take
on its own form, whether it's a poem or play
or
"novel
or
whatever. ... The
writer of literature can only
"write
out what
takes shape
in
his mind. ... all writers
"have
the same
problem
of transferring their language
"from
direct
speech to
the imagination." (page
24)
|
Your
Language
"The native language takes prece-
"dence over every other subject of
"study: nothing else can compare
"with it in usefulness. ... . ...
(it)
"turns into something called lite
"rature. ... . Literature ... is one
of
"the arts, along with painting and
"music ... , and,
... what you use
"in understanding it ... is your
"imagination." (page 2)
Humour
"A person who knows nothing
"about literture may be an ig-
"noramous, but many people
"doN'T mind being that."
(page 3)
Language
of the mind
"The language ... of the mind is
the
"language of conscious or aware-
"ness. ... a language of nouns and
"adjectives. ... . This is the specu-
"lative or contemplative position
"of the mind ... ." (page 4)
Emotions:
unreasonable
"The emotions are unreasonable:
" for them it's what they like and
" doN'T like that comes first."
(page 5)
State
of the mind
"Your habitual state of mind is the
"feeling of separation which goes
"with being conscious ... ."
(page 5)
2
worlds: the natural + the human
" ... you ... realize ... there's a
difference
"between the world you're living in and
"the
world you want to live in . The world
"you want to live in is a human world,
"NOT an objetive one: it's NOT an en-
"vironment but a home; it's NOT the
"world you
see but the world you build
"out of what you see.
... . You're NOT
"only separating ... yourself from
na-
"ture ... , but constructing a human
"world and
separating it from the
"rest of the world." (page 5)
"have
to" for "want to"
" ... you go to work because you
... have
"to, ... because you want something at
"the end of the work. That means ...
"the important categories of your life
"... are what you have to do and what
"you want to do - in other words,
"necessity and freedom." (page 6)
The imagination makes
speculation possible
"The language ... . ... . ... the
speculative
"level ... it's doing something
about the
"world instead of looking at it ...
. It's
"the process of ... transforming the
en-
"vironment in the interests of ...
human
"beings." (page 7)
The
imagination where your vision
of a future takes shape
" ... a vision ... in your mind of
what you
"want to construct. ... . The
actions of
"man are prompted by desire ... .
... .
"...
there's ... a desire to ... form
... cities
"... gardens ... farms that we call
civi-
"lization." (page 7)
A
"safe" place for conceptual
freedom of expression
"In the world of the imagination,
anything
"goes that's imaginatively possible,
but
"nothing ... happens." (page 8)
Literature:
unchanging
"Literature doesN'T evolve or
improve or
"progress." (page 9)
Literature:
its context, the human world
" ... literature belongs to the
world man
"constructs, NOT to the world he
sees;
"to his home, NOT his environment."
(page 12)
Literature
driven by emotions
(NOT the intellect)
"Our emotional reaction to the
world
"varies from 'I like this" to 'I
doN'T
"like this'." (page 12)
Literature:
the separation of man
from his environment
" ... man is the centre of
everything,
"surrounded on all sides by what
"he isN'T." (page 13)
The
imagination: limitless
" ... in the imagination anything
goes
"that can be imagined, ... the limit
of
"the imagination is a totally human
"world. ... . ... in the human world
"the imagination has no limits ... ."
(page 13)
The literary language: associative
" ... the language of literature
... asso-
"ciative: it uses figures of speech,
"like the simile and the metaphor,
"to suggest an identity between the
"human mind and the world outside
"it, that identity being what the
ima-
"gination is chiefly concerned with."
(page 17)
The imagination is about "your" world
" ... your imagination ... in terms
of
"the world you know ... ." (page 18)
Your
imaginative life:
"you" put it together
" ... you ... develop a ...
imaginative
"life of your own." (page 18)
Literature
was behind it
" ... it's ... embedded in religion,
"magic, and social cermonies."
(page 19)
Literary
forms
"Poems used for certain occasions,
"war-songs, work-songs, funeral
"laments, lullabies, become tra-
"ditional literary forms."
(page
19)
Literary
forms have a pedigree
" ... every form in literature has a
"pedigree, .. we can trace its de-
"scent back to the earliest times."
(page 19)
The
literary impulse
"A writer's desire to write can only
"come from previous experience
"of literature, ... he'll start by
imi-
"tating whatever he read ... ."
(page 19)
The author's literary sense
" ... his own distinctive sense of
form
"will develop out of his knowledge of
"literary technique. He doesN'T
create
"out of nothing; ... whatever he has
to
"say he can only say in a
recognizably
"literary way." (page 20)
Story-telling:
a timeless literary form
" ... the technical problems of
shaping
"a story to make it interesting to
read,
"to provide for suspense, to find
logi-
"cal points where the story should
"begin and end, doN'T change much
"... . (page 20)
Literary
writing:
unfolds "naturally" in the imagination
"The literary writer isN'T giving
in-
"formation, either about a subject
"or about his state of mind: he's
"trying to let something take on
"its own form, whether it's a
"poem or play or novel or what-
"ever. That's why you caN'T pro-
"duce literature voluntarily, in
"the way you'd write a letter or
"report. ... . The writer of litera-
"ture can only write out what
"takes place in his mind."
(page 24)
Literary
forms
" ... tragedy or comedy or satire
"or romance: certain typical
"ways in which stories get told."
(page 26)
The
literary experience: relational
"You keep associating your
"experiences together: you're
"always being reminded of
"some other story you read
"or movie you saw or char-
"acter that impressed you."
(page 26)
Literature respects the "natural" cycle of things
"For constructing any work of art
you
"need some principle of repetition or
"recurrence: that's what gives you"
"rhythm in music and pattern in pain-
"ting. ... literature ... . ... the most ob-
"vious repeating ...
feature is the cycle.
"The sun travels across the sky into
"the dark and comes back again; the
"seasons go from springs or fountains
"to the sea and back again in rain.
"Human life goes from childhood to
"death ... ." (page
26)
Literature:
about of our identity
"The story of the loss and regaining
"of identity is ... the framework of
all
"literature. ... . "
"
... literature NOT only leads us
"toward the regaining of identity,
"but it also separates ... the world
"we doN'T like and want to get
"away from. ... . ... to detach us
"... in the imagination, from the
"world we'd prefer NOT to be
"involved with." (pages
30-31)
Modern
writers
" ... modern writers ... . ...
spend a
"good deal of their time on the
"misery, frustration or absurdity
"of human existence." (page
31)
Understanding
the author's work
"We have to look at the figures
"of speech a writer uses, his
"images and symbols. ... .
"Above all, we have to look
"at the total design of a writer's
"work, the title he gives to it,
"and his main theme, which
"means his point in writing it ... .
(pages
30-31)
The
people in literature
" ... once anyone gets into
literature,
"... . Whatever he was in real life
"could hardly matter less."
(page 34)
The
literary realm: NEITHER real NOR unreal
" ... what we meet in literature is
"NEITHER real NOR unreal. We
"have two words, imaginary,
"meaning unreal, and imaginative,
"meaning what the writer produces
... ."
(page 34)
Literature: expresses the human experience
" ... the poet, Aristotle says,
NEVER
"makes real statements at all, cer-
"tainly NO particular or specific
"ones. The poet's job is NOT to
"tell
you what happened, but what
"happens: NOT what did take place,
"but the kind of thing that always
"take place. He gives you the
typical,
"recurring, or what Aristotle calls
"the universal event. ... . Our im-
"pressions of human life are ...
"for the most of us loose or dis-
"orgnized. But we constantly find
"things in literature that suddenly
"co-ordinate and bring into focus
"a great many such impressions,
"and this is part of what Aristotle
"means by the typical or universal
"human element." (page
35)
The
Achilles myth
"Achilles was vulnerable except
"for his heel, and he was the son
"of a sea-nimph. Neither of these"
"things can be true of anybody,
"so how does that make Achilles
"a typical or universal figure? ... .
"Homer's Achilles represents the
"... technique, where the character
"is a hero, much larger than life.
"Achilles is more than what any
"man could be, and he does what
"most men would do if they were
"strong enough. He's ... a great
"smouldering force of human
"desire and frustration and dis-
"content, something we all have
"in us too, part of mankind as a
"while. ... . Nobody cares now
"about the historical Achilles,
"if there ever was one, but the
"mythical Achilles reflects a
"part of our own lives."
(pages
35-36)
Literary
images as symbols
"What happens when a poet ... uses
"an image ... like a flock of sheep
or
"a field of flowers? ... he's going
to
"make a poetic use of them: they're
"going to become poetic sheep and
"poetic flowers, absorbed and di-
"gested by literature, set out in li-
"terary language and inside literary
"conventions. ... . There's always
"some literary reason for using
"them, and that means something
"in human life that they correspond
"to or represent or resemble. This
"correspondence of the natural
"and the human is one of the
"things that the word "symbol"
"means, so we can say that
"whenever a writer uses an
"image, or object from the
"world around him, he's made
"it a symbol."
"... one of the things that
literature
"does is to illustrate them
(symbols),
"putting their abstract ideas into
"concrete images and situations.
"When it does this deliberately,
"we have ... allegory, where the
"writer is saying ... I doN'T really
"mean sheep; I mean something
"political or religious ... . ... .
...
"if they're allegorical they're
"literary." (pages
36-37)
Allegory,
a major feature of literature
"There's a great deal of allegory
"in literature ... . ... . ...
allegory,
"where literature is illustrating
"moral or political or religious
"truths, means that both the
"writer and his public have to
"be pretty firmly convinced of
"the reality and importance of
"those truths, and modern
"writers and publics, on the
"whole, areN'T." (pages
37-38)
Allusion: another literary feature
"A more common way of indicating
"that an image is literary is by
allu-
"sion to something else in literature.
"Literature tends to be very
allusive,
"and the central things ..., the
Greek
"and Roman classics, the Bible,
"Shakespeare and Milton, are echoed
"over and over again."
"This allusiveness in literature
"is significant, because ... in li-
"terature you ... enter into a com-
"plete world of which every work
"of literature forms part. ... . ...
"allusiveness runs all through
"our literary experience. If we
"doN'T know the Bible and the
"central stories of Greek and
"Roman literature, ... our know-
"ledge of literature caN'T grow
"... ." (pages
38-40)
Regarding
"inspiration"
" ... the only inspiration worth
having
"is an inspiration that clarifies the
"form of what's being written, and
"that's more likely to come from
"something that ... has a literary
"form." (page 39)
Reshaping
literature
"... there's nothing new in literature
"that isN'T the old reshaped."
(page 40)
NO
"private" domain in literature
" ... well-known poem, Wordsworth's
"'I wandered lonely as a cloud' ... .
"... . ... we have an image ..., a
field of
"daffodils ... enclosed inside the
"human mind, which puts it into
"the world of the imagination,
"and the sense of human vision
"and emotion radiating from the
"daffodils ... is what gives them
"their poetic magic. The human
"mind is Wordsworth's individual
"mind at first, but as soon as he
"writes a poem it becomes our
"minds too." (page 41)
NO
self-expression in literature
"There is NO self-expression in
"Wordsworth's poem, because
"once the poem is there the
"individual Wordsworth has
"disappeared. ... there is really
"no such thing as self-expres-
"sion in literature." (page 41)
The
poet: a "wordsmith"
" ... the poet ... . ... a man with
"a special craft of putting words
"together ... ." (page 41)
Our
literary "knowledge":
accumulative + interrelational
"We relate the poems and plays
"and novels we read and see, ...
"to each other. Literature is a
"world that we ... build up and
"enter at the same time."
(page 42)
Poetic "interpretation": allegorical
" ... whenever you try to explain
"what any poem means you're
"bound to turn it into an alle-
"gory to some extent ... . ... as
"soon as you 'explain' his rose
"and worm you have to trans-
"and them into some aspect
"of human life and feeling ... .
"... . ... the poem is NOT ... .
"... allegorical ... it's NOT
"allusive either." (page 43)
Blake's
"The Sick Rose": a symbolic poem
"To understand Blake's poem,
"... you ... have to accept a world
"which is totally symbolic: a
"world in which roses and worms
"are so completely surrounded
"and possessed by the human
"mind that whatever goes on
"between them is identical with
"something going on in human
"life." (page 44)
The
"subject" of poetry":
the human experience
"The poet, ... everything he sees
"in nature he identifies with
"human life." (page 45)
Literature:
fictional
"In belief you're continually con-
"cerned with with quesitons of
"truth or reality ... . But
literature
"... never makes any statements
"of that kind ... ."
" ... what is the use of studying
"a world of imagination where
"anything is possible and any-
"thing can be assumed, where,
"there are NO rights or wrongs
"and all arguments are equally
"good? One of the more obvious
"uses ... is its encouragement
"of tolerance." (pages
45-46)
Literature:
"detachment" from reality
"What produces the tolerance is
"the power of detachment in the
"imagination, where things are ...
"out of the reach of belief and
"action. ... . ... experience is re-
"moved from us ... as the expe-
"rience of the Napoleonic war
"in Tolstoy's 'War and Peace'.
"... . There is an element of
"illusion even in 'War and
"Peace', but the illusion gives
"us a reality that isN'T in the
"actual experience of the war
"itself: the reality of proportion
"and perspective, of seeing
"what it's all about, that only
"detachment can give. Literature
"helps to give us that detachment,
"and so do history and philosophy
"and science and everything else
"worth studying." (page 46)
Literature:
it's "magic"
" ... literature has something ...
to
"give particularly its own: some-
"thing as absurd and impossible
"as the primitive magic it so
"clearly resembles." (pages
46-47)
Literature:
"outside" the realm of the ordinary
" ... takes him (Marcel Proust) out-
"side his ordinary life and also out-
"side the time he is living it in.
This
"is what enables him to write his
"book, because it makes it possible
"for him to look at men, NOT as li-
"ving from moment to disappearing
"moment, but as 'giants immersed
"in time". (page 47)
Literature:
the "product" of limitless imagination
"NO matter what direction we start
"off in, the signposts of literature
"always keep pointing the same way,
"to a world where nothing is outside
"the human imagination." (page 48)
Literature:
a "human" unvierse
" ... the imagination ... a universe
"entirely possessed and occupied
"by human life ... ." (page 48)
The poet versus the novelist:
the difference
" ... the poet ... his real effort is
"one of putting words togethers.
"What's important is ... what the
"words themselves say when the
"get fitted together. With the no-
"velist it's rather the incidents in
"the story he tells that get fitted
"together ... . (page 54)
The
literary form "guides" the creative process
" ... so much of a writer's best writng
"is ... involuntary. It's
involuntary
"because the forms of literature
"itself are taking control of it ...
."
(pages
54-55 )
On
the imagination
"The constructs of the imagination
"tell us things about human life
"that we doN'T get in any other
"
way." (page
77)
On
the "educated"imagination
" ... the world of imagination ... . ...
"a vision of possibilities, which
"expands the horizon of belief
"and makes it both more tolerant
"and more efficient. ... . ... the
end
"
of literary teaching is NOT simply
"the admiration of literature; it's
"something more like the transfer
"of imaginative energy from liter-
"ature to the
student." (page 80)
The
imagination NOT limited to literature
" ... we use our imagination all the
"time: it comes into our conversa-
"tion and practical life: it even
pro-
"duces dreams when we sleep."
(page 82)
A
"badly" or "well" trained imagination
"Literature speaks the language
"of the imagination, and the study
"of literature is supposed to train
"and improve the imagination. ... .
"... we have only the choice be-
"tween a badly trained imagination
"and a well trained one ... ."
(page 82)
The
language of the imagination
"Literature speaks the language
"of the imagination, and the
"study of literature is supposed
"to train and improve the imagi-
"nation." (page
82)
The
imagination
involves the intellect + emotions
"In practically everything we do
"it's the combination of emotion
"and intellect we call imagination
"that goes to work." (page 82)
The
imagination in favour of a society we "want"
"The fundamental job of the imagination
"in ordinary life ... is to produce,
out of
"the society we have to live in, a
vision
"of the socety we want to live in."
(page
86)
The
imagination: a "protective" wall
"The top half of literature is the world
"expressed by such words as sublime,
"inspiring, and the like, where what
we
"feel is NOT detachment but
absorption.
"... the world of heros and gods and
ti-
"tans and ... giants, a world of powers
"and passions and moments of ecstasy
"far greater than anything we meet out-
"side the imagination. Such forces
"would ... annihilate us if they entered
"ordinary life, but luckily the protecting
"wall of the imagination is here too."
(page
61)
The
origin of literature: mythology
" ... in the histry of civilization literature
"follows ... mythology. A
myth is a sim-
"ple and primitive effort ... to
identify
"the human with the non-human world,
"and its most typical result is a
story
"about a god. Later on, mythology
"begins to merge into literature ...
."
(page
65)
Literature:
human-centred
" ... literature, being one of the arts
"is concerned with the home and
"NOT the evironment of man: it
"lives in a simple, man-centred
"world and describes the nature
"around it in the kind of associ-
"ative language that relates it
"to human concerns." (page 77)
On
the "value" of literature
"... literature refines our sensibilities."
"Literature gives us an experience
"that stretches us vertically to the
"heights and depths of what the
"human mind can conceive ... ."
"No matter how much experience
"we may gather in life, we can
"NEVER in life get the dimension
"of experience that the imagination
"gives us." (pages 60-61)
"Literature is ... man's revelation
"to man ... ." (page
64)
Literary
criticism must be founded on
the "totality" of the work
" ... you doN'T react until you've
"taken in all of what he (the au-
"thor) has to say. ... . ... what you
"react to is the total structure
"of the story as a whole ... ."
(page
71)
The
range of literature: boundless
"Literature as a whole is ... the range
"of articulate human imagination ...
."
(page
64)
The
critic's role:
to keep "deepening" his literary experience
"The critic's function is to interpret
"every work of literature in the
light
"of all the literature he knows, to
"keep constantly struggling to
"understand what literature as
"a whole is about." (page 64)
The
"starting" point of literature: poetry
" ... literature ... at its centre ... is
"poetry ... . Poetry is the most di-
"rect and simple means of ex-
"pressing oneself in words ... ."
"Poetry is ... something very close
"to dance and song, something to
"walk down street keeping time to.
"... . ... poetry can be performed
"and listened to, like a concert."
(page
74)
"Rhythm"
in prose
"... the first thing one should
"demand of prose is rhythm.
"My ... teacher, Pelham Edgar,
"... told me that if the rhythm
"of a sentence was right, its
"sense could look after itself.
"... . We're often told that to
"write we must have some-
"thing to say, but that ...
"means having a certain
"potential of verbal energy."
(page 75)
On
rhetoric:
"the social ... use of words"
"In ordinary life, as in literature,
"the way you say things can be
"just as important as what's said."
"Society attaches an immense
"importance to saying the right
"thing at the right time. In this
"conception of the 'right thing',
"there are two factors involved,
"one moral and one aesthetic.
"They are inseparable, and
"equally important."
(pages
82-83)
Advertising:
product of the imagination
"... the element of illusion in the
"imagination, and advertising is
"one example ... of the deliberate
"creation of an illusion in ... real
"life. Our reaction to advertising
"is really a form of literary criti-
"cism. We doN'T take it seriously,
"and we areN'T supposed to ...
.
"... . ... a world of illusion. ...
it's ...
"the voice of the imagination
"doing
its proper job. ... ."... it
"means something to us which
"is different from what is
says.
"The end of the process
is NOT
"to reject all advertising,
but to
"develop our own vision
of soci-
"ety to the point at which
we can
"choose what we want
out of what's
"offered to us and
let the rest go.
"What we choose
is what fits that
"vision of society." (page
85)
"The essential thing is the power
"of choice." (page 91)
Irony
" ... irony ... means saying one thing
"and meaning another, as a device
"which writer uses to detach our
"imaginations from a world of ab-
"surdity or frustration by letting
"us see around it." (page 85)
Social
mythology
" ... a social mythology, with its own
"folklore and its own literary
conven-
"tions ... . ... . Every society
produces
"such a mythology: it's a necessary
"part of its coherence ... ."
(pages
86-87)
Imagination
as self-protection
" If a society changes very rapidly,
"... we have to recognize the large
"element of illusion in all social
"mythology as a simple matter of
"self-protection. The first thing
our
"imaginations have to do for us, as
"soon as we can handle words
"well enough to read and write
"and talk, is to fight to protect
"us from falling into the illusions
"that society threatens us with.
"The illusion ... . What it creates
"
is the imaginary, which is far
"
different from the imaginative."
(page
87)
Bureaucratese
" ... federal prose, the gabble of
"abstractions and vague words
"which avoids any simple or
"direct statements. ... a part
"of social mythology. ... . ...
"to suggest that the social ma-
"chine ... is running smoothly
"... . Direct and simple language
"always has some force behind
"it,
... the writers of gobbledy
" |