proves to be the greatest of obstacles in the assessment of any Elizabethan genius. Whenever one approaches an Elizabethan dramatist, a ghost comes down, as it were, and stands in the way; it is the ghost of William Shakespeare. Beside his gigantic stature all other Elizabethans look like pigmies. To make the case worse, the critics, too, always apply the Shakespearean touchstone, always look for the Shakespearean pattern, Shakespearean touches. J. B. Priestley " has rightly complained, on behalf of the modern dramatists (he could have complained on behalf of all dramatists), that Shakespeare is the greatest blackleg in the business". 47 Marlowe, of course, was "not a Shakespeare". But one might as well say that Shakespeare was not a Marlowe, Maeterlinck was not a Shaw, and Ibsen was no Yeats. What is remarkable is that each is great in his own way, in his own sphere, and within his own limits; Shakespeare should not be used as a tool to beat Marlowe with. Again, Marlowe does reach the loftiest summit of tragic art-if there is ever a summit-in the last scene of DOCTOR FAUSTUS; as a representation of mental agony and despair", says Courthope, it is "only equalled, in the whole range of the world's poetry, by the speech of Satan to the sun in Paradise Lost." 48 47 'The Case against Shakespeare' by J. B. Priestley in Theatre: 1954-5 (Max Reinhardt, 1955), p. 111. 48 A History of English Poetry, Vol. II, p. 413. COLERIDGE ON THE NATURE OF POETRY P. S. SASTRI, M.A., M.LITг., PH.D. University of Saugor (M.P.) The individual in a specific state of experience is known as the poet. The nature of poet provides the clearest account of the nature of poetry. Taking up this line of approach Coleridge observes that the poet is a man of passion and of sensibility. Rejecting the 'state of excitement' expressed crudely and directly, he insists also on the role of excitement which is to stimulate the metre and the figurative language. Thus he says that 'strong passions command figurative language'; that 'figures of speech are originally the offspring of passion', and that a strong passion employs a language more measured than' that in common speaking. Hence too 'passion is the true parent of every word in existence in every language'. This passion links the poet to that state of childhood in which are found simpler and vehement feelings. "The poet is one who carries the simplicity of childhood into the powers of manhood". Passion, sensibility, metre, figurative language, and simplicity are accordingly some characteristics distinguishing a poem from other compositions and works. 2 Passion or an intense state of feeling is the basic factor on which the others are grounded. This passion works in close co-operation with the sensibility. The term sensibility might stand for emotionalism or ability to receive sensations vividly. The sensations are inseparable from the emotional excitement. This excitement is the same as joy, and it is other than emotion. Since passion and emotion are most important along with ideas, Coleridge considers plot to be only a canvas. He told Joseph bottle early in April, 1797: “I am fearful that Southey will begin to rely too much on story and event in his poems, to the neglect of those lofty imaginnings, that are peculiar to, and definitive of the poet.". This, however, does not mean that Coleridge was not aware of the other factors in the poem. In a letter to Wordsworth on 23.1.1798 he analysed a tragedy into "language, character, passion, sentiment and conduct". He is particularly unmindful of the story and of the plot-construction. This might lead to an identification of poetry with the lyric. He remarked, "a poem of any length neither can be, or ought to be, all poetry". But the term poetry, he observes, is applicable to painting and music as well, the various arts being differentiated by the differences in their media.” The medium is the distinguishing factor which can also specify the subspecies in any art. He considered it to be "far better to distinguish poetry into different classes" or genres.* This classification depends on the nature of the medium. While the medium varies from one art-form to another, that which unifies the different forms and media is the passion. Passion, however, is no chaotic state. Coleridge observes: "By excitement of the associative power passion itself imitates order and the order resulting produces a pleasurable passion (whence metre)"." Passion is not only a state of excitement, but it brings about an excitement, involving those factors or faculties that are associated with it. In this consequential excitement there arises an order, a specific of combination, a pattern. This pattern is what is essential to a poem. Without it, the poem will cease to be a poem. The objects touched by poetry acquire an interest "by means of the passions, and yet (poetry) tempers the passions by the calming power which all distinct images exert on the human soul". Just as the volitional act suspends the volitional attitude of belief, the passion or excitement that gives rise to the poem not only excites our emotions but tempers them. In other words, excitement with which poetry is concerned is a strange blend of two divergent trends. It excites and also refines. In this polarity, we find the specific nature of poetry. A quick and deep sensibility is a component part of genius along with the imagination and will. As Coleridge told Daniel Stuart on May 16, 1801, "cheerful thoughts come with genial sensations". The poetic activity thus includes the physical and non-physical activities; it is the whole individual that is active, not some mystic essence. As a consequence the poem too embodies the varied aspects that make up the human being. In this activity the individual has an experience, in which his feelings are so deeply stirred that he does not have a consciousness of his exclusive personality. This state has been described by many, 9a at least since Plato, as an inspired one. Early in April, 1797, Coleridge informed Cottle: "I would write haply not unhearing of that divine and rightly-whispering voice, which speaks to mighty minds of predestinated garlands, starry and unwithering". Late in life in his lectures he remarked: "what Hooker so eloquently claims for law I say of poetry-'Her seat is the bosom of God, her voice the harmony of the world; all things in heaven and earth do her homage'. It is the language of heaven, and in the exquisite delight we derive from poetry we have, as it were, a type, a foretaste, and a prophecy of the joys of heaven"." Inspiration is the principle that not only explains the spiritual quality of the poetic content, but it also reveals that the joy or delight communicated by poetry is a spiritual experience. In this experience the body ceases to be physical and is transformed into the spiritual. The poem resulting from the inspired mood does not, however, tell us something original; for, inspiration is that moment of experience where we intuit the meaning and value of life, the true nature of reality. This meaning is already present in life, though we are unaware of it because of the 'film of familiarity and selfish solicitude.' Inspiration offers an insight into that which is veiled in normal life. In a notebook entry we read "To perceive and feel the Beautiful, the Pathetic, and the Sublime in Nature, in Thought, or in Action-this combined with the power of conveying such perceptions and feelings to the minds and hearts of others under the most pleasurable forms of eye and ear-this is poetic genius." The poet does not therefore reveal anything new. It is therefore said: "Those only who feel no originality, no consciousness of having deceived their thoughts and opinions from direct inspiration, are anxious to be thought original. The certainty, the feeling that he is right, is enough for the man of genius" (AP 160). In true poetry what we have is the authentic voice of experience, a voice that rings with the truth of the intuited, not with the claim of originality. This feature is revealed by the feeling experienced and communicated by the poet. Hence it is that the specific character of the poem "originates in the poetic genius itsef"1o. This genious experiences the world not as it appears to the senses and the understanding. That is, 'The man of genius lives most in the ideal world'."1 The ideal world is more real than the normal world of daily life because it is the basis or foundation of all experience. In apprehending it, the poetic genius has an intense imaginative activity. It is such a "poetic genius, which sustains and modifies the emotions, thoughts, and vivid representations of the poem" 12 It is therefore not feeling that characterises the specific nature of poetry. To feel, to intuit, the real, one needs imagination. The imagination is not something that comes from outsile, nor is it regulated by any principle other than itself. The profoundest activity of the self is called imagination. Genius then is no more than "the action of reason and imagination".13 But the reason is not other than imagination. The ideas of reason are those intuited by the self-devloping activity of imaginatian. And the direction of this power cannot be known before we reach the end. Reason is powerless to know the goal set before itself by imagination. Hence Coleridge informed Thelwall on April 23, 1801: "At least no poet has a right to be certain, that any book of a poem will remain what it is, until he has written the whole." That is, the great poet is not fully conscious of what he is doing even during the composition. "There is in genius itself an unconscious activity; nay, this is the genius in the man of genius".14 It is unconscious in the sense that one does not know it, though he feels it. In other words, the poetic activity is not an act of self-consciousness. In this state the conscious inward self so impresses itself on the socalled unconscious external as to appear in it. Thereby it realises a synthesis, tending towards an identity. As the genius begins to compose the poem, there is a faint return of self-consciousness. This enables him to know at least vaguely the specific character he is going to embody in his work. As he informed Southey on Dec 17, 1794: "Before you write a poem, you should say to yourself-what do I intend to be the character of this poem, which feature is to be predominant in it? So you make it unique". Some idea of the purpose is necessary for any act of composition to begin. This idea may or may not be realised because in the act of poetic composition the genius is no longer self-conscious. He is in the hands of the imaginative power, the shaping spirit. Even the will cannot regulate it. Hence it is observed: "The rules of imagination are themselves the powers of growth and production. Could a rule be given from without, poetry would cease to be poetry and sink into a mechanical art". 12 Lectures, 12. 13 Table talk, May 21, 1830. |