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to situate the nature of poetry in the poetic act, in the unique individualized
inspirations of nascent literature. A true poetic is really a psychology
of creation, an aesthetic and not mere criticism. It finds its culmination
in a respect for, and a theory of, genius. Since the poetic act is in fact
a kind of communion of the self with an ineffable sacrum, it follows that
the poetic work is, for the aesthetician, only a touchstone, a pretext
for flights into the metaphysics of creation. And a poetic like that of
classical India which is uniquely concerned with the poetic fact is not
only irrelevant to the poetic problem but, lamentably, an obstacle and
a limitation to any proper understanding of it. The attitude of De
towards this poetic reveals itself in distinctions of inner and outer, of
truth and show, of insight and pretense, of genius (art) and scholasticism.
Naturally, a formalist poetic appears to him as a misguided attempt to
impose limitations on the creative freedom of the artist, whose proper
business, the sublime, must surpass all limitations. Croce, speaking of
poetic knowledge, remarks:
INTRODUCTION
Ancora col definire l'arte come intuizione si nega che essa abbia carattere di
CONOSCENZA CONCETTUALE. La conoscenza concettuale, nella sua forma pure
che è quella filosofica, è sempre realistica, mirando a stabilire la realtà contro
l'irrealtà o ad abbassare l'irrealtà, includendola nella realtà come momento
subordinato della realtà stessa. Ma intuizione vuol dire, per l'appunto, indis-
tinzione di realtà e irrealtà, l'immagine nel suo valore de mere immagine, la
pura idealità dell'immagine; e, col contrapporre la conoscenza intuitiva o
sensibile alla concettuale o intelligibile, l'estetica alla noetica, si mira a riven-
dicare l'autonomia de questa più semplice ed elementare forma di conoscenza,
che è stata paragonata al sogno... della vita teoretica ... la discriminazione del
vero e del falso concerne sempre un'affermazione di realtà, ossia un giudizio,
ma non può cadere sulla presentazione de un'immagine o sopra un mero
soggetto, che non è doggetto di giudizio, mancando di qualifica o di predicato.³
www
wrote History of Sanskrit Literature (Calcutta, 1962), hereafter cited as HSL, ef.
pp. 28ff.); A. B. Keith, History of Sanskrit Literature (Oxford, 1928) (hereafter cited
as SL), pp. 344ff.; L. Renou, L'Inde classique, II (Paris, 1953), pp. 110-111.
"Again ... we deny that it has the character of CONCEPTUAL KNOWLEDGE. Conceptual
knowledge, in its true form, which is the philosophical, is always realistic, aiming at
establishing reality against unreality, or at lowering unreality by including it in reality
as a subordinate moment of reality itself. But intuition means, precisely, indistinction
of reality and unreality, the image with its value as mere image, the pure ideality of the
image; and opposing the intuitive or sensible knowledge to the conceptual or intelligible,
the aesthetic to the poetic, it aims at claiming the autonomy of this more simple and
elementary form of knowledge, which has been compared to the dream ... of the theore-
tic life the discrimination of true and false always concerns an affirmation of
reality, or a judgment, but it cannot fall under the head of an image or of a pure subject
which is not the subject of a judgment, since it is without qualification or predicate."
B. Croce, Breviario di Estetica (Bari, 1954), pp. 19-20, trans. by D. Ainslie, "Breviary
of Aesthetic", p. 236.
***
to situate the nature of poetry in the poetic act, in the unique individualized
inspirations of nascent literature. A true poetic is really a psychology
of creation, an aesthetic and not mere criticism. It finds its culmination
in a respect for, and a theory of, genius. Since the poetic act is in fact
a kind of communion of the self with an ineffable sacrum, it follows that
the poetic work is, for the aesthetician, only a touchstone, a pretext
for flights into the metaphysics of creation. And a poetic like that of
classical India which is uniquely concerned with the poetic fact is not
only irrelevant to the poetic problem but, lamentably, an obstacle and
a limitation to any proper understanding of it. The attitude of De
towards this poetic reveals itself in distinctions of inner and outer, of
truth and show, of insight and pretense, of genius (art) and scholasticism.
Naturally, a formalist poetic appears to him as a misguided attempt to
impose limitations on the creative freedom of the artist, whose proper
business, the sublime, must surpass all limitations. Croce, speaking of
poetic knowledge, remarks:
INTRODUCTION
Ancora col definire l'arte come intuizione si nega che essa abbia carattere di
CONOSCENZA CONCETTUALE. La conoscenza concettuale, nella sua forma pure
che è quella filosofica, è sempre realistica, mirando a stabilire la realtà contro
l'irrealtà o ad abbassare l'irrealtà, includendola nella realtà come momento
subordinato della realtà stessa. Ma intuizione vuol dire, per l'appunto, indis-
tinzione di realtà e irrealtà, l'immagine nel suo valore de mere immagine, la
pura idealità dell'immagine; e, col contrapporre la conoscenza intuitiva o
sensibile alla concettuale o intelligibile, l'estetica alla noetica, si mira a riven-
dicare l'autonomia de questa più semplice ed elementare forma di conoscenza,
che è stata paragonata al sogno... della vita teoretica ... la discriminazione del
vero e del falso concerne sempre un'affermazione di realtà, ossia un giudizio,
ma non può cadere sulla presentazione de un'immagine o sopra un mero
soggetto, che non è doggetto di giudizio, mancando di qualifica o di predicato.³
www
wrote History of Sanskrit Literature (Calcutta, 1962), hereafter cited as HSL, ef.
pp. 28ff.); A. B. Keith, History of Sanskrit Literature (Oxford, 1928) (hereafter cited
as SL), pp. 344ff.; L. Renou, L'Inde classique, II (Paris, 1953), pp. 110-111.
"Again ... we deny that it has the character of CONCEPTUAL KNOWLEDGE. Conceptual
knowledge, in its true form, which is the philosophical, is always realistic, aiming at
establishing reality against unreality, or at lowering unreality by including it in reality
as a subordinate moment of reality itself. But intuition means, precisely, indistinction
of reality and unreality, the image with its value as mere image, the pure ideality of the
image; and opposing the intuitive or sensible knowledge to the conceptual or intelligible,
the aesthetic to the poetic, it aims at claiming the autonomy of this more simple and
elementary form of knowledge, which has been compared to the dream ... of the theore-
tic life the discrimination of true and false always concerns an affirmation of
reality, or a judgment, but it cannot fall under the head of an image or of a pure subject
which is not the subject of a judgment, since it is without qualification or predicate."
B. Croce, Breviario di Estetica (Bari, 1954), pp. 19-20, trans. by D. Ainslie, "Breviary
of Aesthetic", p. 236.
***