The Importance of Imagination, Part 6

Read Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, and Part 5.

Memory and Simple Fantasy

The nature of the imagination has been discussed extensively by philosophers, poets, and critics. Since the Enlightenment, prominent thinkers in this conversation have included Thomas Hobbes (who divided the imagination into simple and compound), Joseph Addison (who differentiated primary from secondary pleasures of the imagination), common-sense philosopher Dugald Stewart (who distinguished the fancy from the imagination), William Wordsworth (who linked fancy to the temporal and imagination to the eternal), and Samuel Taylor Coleridge (who not only distinguished fancy from imagination, but divided imagination into primary and secondary faculties).

Why all of the discussion? The reason is that we ordinarily use the word imagination to cover several related but distinguishable operations of the mind. While the literature that discusses these operations tends to be rather opaque, we can perhaps review some obvious distinctions.

If we take the term imagination in its common, loose sense, it refers to our capacity to form and entertain mental images. We are able see objects with the mind’s eye that are not actually present to the sight. Under this definition, the most common form of imagination is simple memory. When we remember a thing, we are considering its image in our mind. We are inwardly re-calling its image into being.

Already in the act of remembering, disparities occur between individuals. Suppose three people see a snake. Later on, when they recall it, one remembers the snake’s position (it was wrapped around the limb of a tree). The second recalls its color (it was a vivid green with yellow markings). The third remembers its manner (it was showing its fangs and hissing—and the fangs were really big!). All three people are recalling the same snake, and they are all remembering it truly as far as their individual recollections are concerned. Nevertheless, they are all remembering the snake differently.

They remember the snake differently because they imagine it differently. As a matter of fact, the differences in their imaginations reveal that they actually perceived the snake differently. For all sorts of reasons, we notice different aspects of the objects that we perceive, and we react differently to the aspects that we notice. In other words, we always interpret the facts that we notice.

This difference is, I think, the primary consideration that leads eventually to the production of art. Whatever else art may be, it is fundamentally the endeavor to open a window so that others are able to see what we see in the way that we see it. Art is never mere depiction of an object (mimesis). It is always an interaction between two imaginations.

Memory is the most basic sort of imagination, but we also use other sorts. One of those I shall call the simple fantasy, and I shall distinguish it from the speculative fantasy. A description of the speculative fantasy awaits a future discussion, but we can explore the simple fantasy now.

As the mind remembers different objects, it gains the power to combine the images of those objects. If I understand correctly, this power to combine elements of remembered images is what Coleridge and others meant by the word fancy. Today, we prefer the term fantasy.

By employing its power to combine images, the mind becomes capable of envisioning real things that it has never actually encountered. This is a simple form of the fantastic imagination, and it is relatively easy to illustrate. Suppose someone has never actually seen a snake. You might describe it by saying, “Imagine a three-foot length of brown or black garden hose, tapered toward one end and ending in a tiny football of a head at the other, with a pair of yellow or red pinstripes running the whole length.” That description should enable someone to recognize a garter snake.

Notice the memories that the description invokes. It includes colors (brown and black). It describes a general size and shape (three-foot garden hose) supplemented by a secondary shape (tapered toward one end). It suggests an item of sports equipment (a football) modified in size (tiny). It even borrows an image from textiles (pinstripes). By employing this description, a person who has never seen a garter snake, or for that matter a snake of any kind, can now imagine what a garter snake must look like.

Simple fantasies may also involve conditions that are metaphysically possible but contrary to fact. Boys fantasize about growing big muscles. Athletes fantasize about hitting a grand slam home run or catching the winning touchdown. Lots of people fantasize about winning millions of dollars—witness the success of the gambling industry. While there may be plenty of reasons that these fantasies will never be fulfilled, they are not intrinsically contradictory or metaphysically impossible.

We are all capable of imagining realities that we have never actually encountered. If we did not have this capacity, we would not be able to recognize an object the first time that we came upon it. “I never saw a moor, I never saw the sea; yet know I how the heather looks, and what a wave must be.” Dickinson’s words are a description of the simple fantasy at work.

Simple fantasy is a step beyond memory. In a certain sense, it provides us with a memory of realities that we have never seen. The next step beyond simple fantasy is what I have called speculative fantasy. We shall explore the speculative fantasy in the next essay.

Midnight
Henry Vaughan (1621-1695)

1.
WHEN to my Eyes
Whilst deep sleep others catches,
Thine host of spies,
The stars, shine in their watches,
I do survey
Each busy ray,
And how they work, and wind;
And wish each beam
My soul doth stream
With the like ardour shin’d;
What emanations,
Quick vibrations,
And bright stirs are there!
What thin ejections,
Cold affections,
And slow motions here!

2.
Thy heav’ns, some say,
Are a fiery-liquid light,
Which mingling aye
Streams, and flames thus to the sight.
Come then, my God!
Shine on this blood
And water, in one beam;
And Thou shalt see
Kindled by Thee
Both liquors burn, and stream.
O what bright quickness,
Active brightness,
And celestial flows,
Will follow after
On that water,
Which Thy Spirit blows!

Matth. Cap. 3. Ver. II.
I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance, but
He that cometh after me is mightier than I; Whose
shoes I am not worthy to bear; He shall baptize
you with the Holy Ghost, and with fire.

This essay is by Dr. Kevin T. Bauder, president of Central Baptist Theological Seminary (Plymouth, MN). Not every professor, student, or alumnus of Central Seminary necessarily agrees with every opinion that it expresses.