This book explores the rich and complex relationship between art and poetry, shedding invaluable light on what makes each art form unique yet wholly interdependent. Jacques Maritain insists on the part played by the intellect as well as the imagination, showing how poetry has its source in the preconceptual activity of the rational mind. As Maritain argues, intellect is not merely logical and conceptual reason. Rather, it carries on an exceedingly more profound and obscure life, one that is revealed to us as we seek to penetrate the hidden recesses of poetic and artistic activity. Incisive and authoritative, this illuminating book is the product of a lifelong reflection on the meaning of artistic expression in all its varied forms.
Jacques Maritain (1882–1973) was a leading French philosopher and the author of many books, including Art and Scholasticism, The Degrees of Knowledge, and Existence and the Existent.
"[Creative Intuition in Art and Poetry] contains a wealth of concrete perception on the most varied aesthetic problems. It is impossible to do more than mention M. Maritain’s beautifully balanced chapter on abstract art, his discussion of the difference between classical and modern poetic imagery, and the gentle irony with which he chides the over-zealousness of modern critics who use Dante to denigrate modern poetry. . . . It is a rare pleasure to read a work characterized by this habit of mind and this sensibility . . . the best attempt yet made to write a poetics of modern art."—Joseph Frank, New Republic
“Wisdom never makes the headlines, and I fear it will take a long time before the full stature of this book is recognized. The reader must take it slowly, learning to follow the lead of the author’s patient, deep, and gentle spirit, which speaks on every page; then he will be rewarded with the most sane and subtle insights into the life of poetry which our time affords.”—Francis Fergusson
