Ars biographica poetica : Coleridgean imagination and the practical value of contemplation
This thesis begins by examining how Coleridge Romanticizes Platonism. I argue that Coleridge creatively recasts Platoâs Divided Line analogy, and thereby finds a higher role for a radically re-thought imagination. Through this recast imagination, Coleridge develops a Romantic Platonism by elevating imagination and modifying Platoâs linear scheme into a polarity that harmonizes sense and reason. I argue that Coleridgeâs philosophy develops in response to the Empiricist philosophy that dominated the British practice, and transcendental idealism that flourished in Germany. I argue that Coleridgeâs philosophy is neither Empiricist, nor a mere translation of German idealism, as critics have sometimes suggested, but that it is quintessentially Platonic. Unlike Plato, however, Coleridge elevates the status of imagination, separating it from fantasy (or fancy, as he calls it), which retains the subordinate position it has for Plato. Attacking Empiricist philosophy, Coleridge argues that reason and its Ideas (and not the understanding) constitute and indeed exceed the apex of human thought, a distinction corresponding to Platoâs between noesis and dianoia. I present a view, developing from Coleridge and answering
Cheyne, Peter Robert
Ars biographica poetica : Coleridgean imagination and the practical value of contemplation. This thesis begins by examining how Coleridge Romanticizes Platonism. I argue that Coleridge creatively recasts Platoâs Divided Line analogy, and thereby finds a higher role for a radically re-thought imagination. Through this recast imagination, Coleridge develops a Romantic Platonism by elevating imagination and modifying Platoâs linear scheme into a polarity that harmonizes sense and reason. I argue that Coleridgeâs philosophy develops in response to the Empiricist philosophy that dominated the British practice, and transcendental idealism that flourished in Germany. I argue that Coleridgeâs philosophy is neither Empiricist, nor a mere translation of German idealism, as critics have sometimes suggested, but that it is quintessentially Platonic. Unlike Plato, however, Coleridge elevates the status of imagination, separating it from fantasy (or fancy, as he calls it), which retains the subordinate position it has for Plato. Attacking Empiricist philosophy, Coleridge argues that reason and its Ideas (and not the understanding) constitute and indeed exceed the apex of human thought, a distinction corresponding to Platoâs between noesis and dianoia. I present a view, developing from Coleridge and answering
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