‘Could a rule be given from without, poetry would cease to be poetry, and sink into a mechanical art. It would be μóρφωσις, not ποίησις. The rules of the IMAGINATION are themselves the very powers of growth and production. The words to which they are reducible, present only the outlines and external appearance of the fruit. A deceptive counterfeit of the superficial form and colours may be elaborated; but the marble peach feels cold and heavy, and children only put it to their mouths.’ [Coleridge, Biographia ch. 18]

‘ποίησις’ (poiēsis) means ‘a making, a creation, a production’ and is used of poetry in Aristotle and Plato. ‘μóρφωσις’ (morphōsis) in essence means the same thing: ‘a shaping, a bringing into shape.’ But Coleridge has in mind the New Testament use of the word as ‘semblance’ or ‘outward appearance’, which the KJV translates as ‘form’: ‘An instructor of the foolish, a teacher of babes, which hast the form [μóρφωσις] of knowledge and of the truth in the law’ [Romans 2:20]; ‘Having a form [μóρφωσις] of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away’ [2 Timothy 3:5]. I trust that's clear.

There is much more on Coleridge at my other, Coleridgean blog.

Sunday 17 September 2017

Incomparable Programme Eclipsing All Former Triumphs



I'm working through the whole of H G Wells's oeuvre and blogging about it (in Another Place) as I go. And now I'm into his 1914-1918 writing, which I'm supplementing with a little, rather desultory if I'm honest, for-context reading about the First World War. In the course of which I chanced upon this Canadian victory poster. I love the aesthetic mash-up of medievalised and modern styles in its main image, but the panel of text at the bottom is pretty wonderful too.


Tractors! Poultry shows! More than commonly picturesque! I'm sold.

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