Poetic, Mental, and Other Images
Keywords:
literature, imagery, poetical images, mental images, perception, metaphorAbstract
A number of definitions of imagery emphasize that literary images are not necessarily of a visual nature, but can address any one of the senses. In addition, imagery in literature cannot be equated with mental images. Even the term “mental image” is not completely unambiguous; however, in general use there is a predominant belief that mental images are some sort of internal pictures that one observes with the mind. The beginnings of theoretical studies of mental images reach at least back to Aristotle’s treatise On the Soul. In order to explain thought, Aristotle introduced an intermediary link between perception and thinking: imagination. He defined it as the ability that leads people to say that they “see” a certain image or phantasm. – Aristotle’s assertion that the soul never thinks without an image became the source of numerous disputes and efforts to prove that, in reality, thinking does not take place in images. Following Aristotle’s model, philosophers have treated images as internal pictures and mainly connected their origin with perception. In recent decades, now that cognitive psychology has been focusing on images again, the thesis has been developed that mental images are ultimately linguistic descriptions rather than pictures. – Amplifying the meaning of “image” from visual perception to any sense originates in Hobbes’ sensualist theory. Eighteenth-century English authors that dealt with literary studies, followed by nineteenth-century German aesthetics, accepted the term “image” into their vocabulary and used it, among other things, to denote a renewed sensual perception. They treated images that originate in perception as the material that writers use to create their works. When the idea was finally recognized that internal pictures are not material for metaphors and comparisons (or at least not the only material), advocates of the term “literary image” began emphasizing its metaphoricity. The term “(poetic) image” is thus not a metonymy (internal pictures are not necessarily material for images in literature), but a metaphor denoting the use of words that (like pictures) demands multi-sensory perception and interpretation.References
Aristotel. O duši. Ljubljana: Slovenska matica, 1993.
– – –. Poetika. Ljubljana: CZ, 1982.
Bachelard, Gaston. La poétique de l’espace. Pariz: Presses universitaires de France, 1957.
Blumenberg, Hans. »Paradigmen zu einer Metaphorologie«. Theorie der Metapher. Ur. Anselm Haverkamp. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1983.
Cuddon, John Anthony. Dictionary of Literary Terms. London: Andre Deutsch, 1979.
Dauzat, Albert idr. Nouveau dictionnaire étymologique et historique. Pariz: Libraire Larousse, 1968.
Findlater, Andrew, ur. Chambers’s Etymological Dictionary. Edinburg: W. & R. Chambers, 1948.
Frazer, Ray. »The Origin of the Term ’Image’«. English Literary History 27 (1960).
Friedrich, Wolf Hartmut in Killy, Walther. Literatur. II/1. (Das Fischer Lexikon). Frankfurt: Fischer Taschenbuch Verlag, 1965.
Furbank, P. N. Reflections on the Word “Image”. London: Secker & Warburg, 1970.
Gadamer, Hans-Georg. Wahrheit und Methode. Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr, 1972 (3. izdaja).
Kalan, Valentin. »Aristotelov magistrale o življenju in duši«. O duši. Aristotel. Ljubljana: Slovenska matica, 1993.
Kluge, Friedrich: Etymologisches Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache. Berlin, New York: Walter de Gruyter, 1989.
Le Guern, Michel. Sémantique de la métaphore et de la métonymie. Pariz: Larousse, 1973.
Lewis, C. Day. The Poetic Image. London: Jonathan Cape, 1953.
Mitchell, W. J. T. »What Is an Image?« NLH 3 (1984).
Moreau, François. L’image littéraire. Pariz: SEDES, 1982.
Ocvirk, Anton. Pesniška podoba. Ljubljana: SAZU in DZS, 1982. (Literarni leksikon 16).
Onions, C. T., ur. The Oxford Dictionary of English Etimology. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1966.
Pavlič, Darja. Funkcije podobja v poeziji K. Koviča, D. Zajca in G. Strniše. Maribor: Slavistično društvo, 2003.
– – –. »Pesniško podobje v poeziji Otona Župančiča, Antona Vodnika in Srečka Kosovela«. Primerjalna književnost 20.1 (1997): 43–62.
Richards, I. A. Filozofija retorike. Novi Sad: Bratstvo-jedinstvo, 1988.
Sartre, Jean-Paul. L’imaginaire. Pariz: Gallimard, 1940.
Spurgeon, Caroline. Shakespeare’s Imagery and What It Tells Us. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1935, 1977 (8. ponatis).
Stanovnik, Majda. Angloameriške smeri v 20. stoletju. Ljubljana: SAZU in DZS, 1980. (Literarni leksikon 8).
Šklovski, Viktor. Theorie der Prosa. Frankfurt: Fischer Verlag, 1966.
Šutić, Miloslav, ur. Pesnička slika. Beograd: Nolit, 1978.
Todorov, Tzvetan. Théories du symbole. Pariz: Édition du Seuil, 1977.
Tye, Michel. The Imagery Debate. Cambridge, Massachusetts: The MIT Press, 1991.
Walde, A. in Hofmann, J. B. Lateinisches etymologisches Wörterbuch. Heidelberg: Carl Winter’s Universitätsbuchhandlung, 1938.