The Reality of Imagination
The Reality of the Imagination
Rebecca Smarcz
Poetry is a dichotomy of imagination and reality. It requires metaphors and abstract symbols as representatives of the poet’s imagination. These metaphors and symbols are depicted through concrete images in order to correlate with the reality that the reader and poet exist in. According to Roy Harvey Pearce’s essay Wallace Stevens: The Life of the Imagination, Stevens refers to himself as an “exponent of the imagination” and “As poet, he [Stevens] is…an ‘exponent of the imagination’…But, as human being, he finds that he must hold the imagination to concrete reality” (Pearce 117). Pearce, along with many other critics, believe that the diverging relationship between an imaginative world and reality is one of Stevens’ biggest concerns and struggles in his poetry. This battle between imagination and reality existed for Stevens in poetry as well as in his everyday life. In a letter to Ronald Lane Latimer in March 1937, Stevens wrote, “I have been trying to see the world about me both as I see it and as it is” (Beckett 117).
This struggle between imagination and reality is extremely apparent in Stevens’ poetry, specifically in Evening Without Angels and A Fading of the Sun, both of which were published in the 1936 volume Ideas of Order. Stevens contrasts images of light and dark, sun and night, in Evening Without Angels and A Fading of the Sun in order to illustrate a dichotomy between imagination and reality as well as truth and individual perception. While Stevens establishes a strict opposing relationship in the beginnings of these specific poems, by the conclusion of each of the poems he recognizes that both imagination and truth are necessary components of art and life by the uniting imagination and reality as complements of each other, rather than divergent elements. He uses poetry as a medium to address the relationship between imagination and truth, and these poems are no exception.
In the very beginning
Rebecca Smarcz
Poetry is a dichotomy of imagination and reality. It requires metaphors and abstract symbols as representatives of the poet’s imagination. These metaphors and symbols are depicted through concrete images in order to correlate with the reality that the reader and poet exist in. According to Roy Harvey Pearce’s essay Wallace Stevens: The Life of the Imagination, Stevens refers to himself as an “exponent of the imagination” and “As poet, he [Stevens] is…an ‘exponent of the imagination’…But, as human being, he finds that he must hold the imagination to concrete reality” (Pearce 117). Pearce, along with many other critics, believe that the diverging relationship between an imaginative world and reality is one of Stevens’ biggest concerns and struggles in his poetry. This battle between imagination and reality existed for Stevens in poetry as well as in his everyday life. In a letter to Ronald Lane Latimer in March 1937, Stevens wrote, “I have been trying to see the world about me both as I see it and as it is” (Beckett 117).
This struggle between imagination and reality is extremely apparent in Stevens’ poetry, specifically in Evening Without Angels and A Fading of the Sun, both of which were published in the 1936 volume Ideas of Order. Stevens contrasts images of light and dark, sun and night, in Evening Without Angels and A Fading of the Sun in order to illustrate a dichotomy between imagination and reality as well as truth and individual perception. While Stevens establishes a strict opposing relationship in the beginnings of these specific poems, by the conclusion of each of the poems he recognizes that both imagination and truth are necessary components of art and life by the uniting imagination and reality as complements of each other, rather than divergent elements. He uses poetry as a medium to address the relationship between imagination and truth, and these poems are no exception.
In the very beginning
Cited: Beckett, Lucy. Wallace Stevens. New York: Cambridge UP, 1974. Print. Pearce, Roy H. "Wallace Stevens: The Life of Imagination." Wallace Stevens. Ed. Marie Borriff. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, 1963. N. pag. Print. Quinn, Sister M. Bernetta. “Metamorphosis in Wallace Stevens.” Wallace Stevens. Ed. Marie Borriff. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, 1963. N. pag. Print. Stevens, Holly. Souvenirs and Prophecies: The Young Wallace Stevens. N.p.: Alfred A. Knopf, 1977. Print. Stevens, Wallace. The Collected Poems of Wallace Stevens. New York: Vintage, 1990. A Fading of the Sun & Evening Without Angels. Print.