Imaginative Capacity as Form-of-Life: Giorgio Agamben, Wallace Stevens and the ‘Inoperative’ Potential of Poetry

IF 0.2 4区 文学 0 LITERATURE
PARAGRAPH Pub Date : 2023-07-01 DOI:10.3366/para.2023.0432
Ian Y. H. Tan
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引用次数: 0

Abstract

This essay compares the poetic and political theories of contemporary philosopher Giorgio Agamben with the poetry of Wallace Stevens in order to outline a dynamic of ‘inoperativity’ that foregrounds the intimate relationship between language, form and an existential expression of possibility. Through a reading of Stevens’s prose essays and poetry, I demonstrate how Agamben’s reconceptualization of potentiality as a power kept in a non-relational relationship towards its formal realization can be mapped onto the self-conscious articulations of Stevens’s poetic speakers who employ poetic tropes and forms only to question and expose their claims to truth and foundationality. Rather than follow a tradition of poststructuralist readings of Stevens’s destabilizations, I argue for a framework of ‘inoperativity’ that preserves Stevens’s poetic attitude towards life, while showing how his emphasis on potentiality delineates an imaginative vigour that brings the poetic self into renewed attunement with his or her environment.
作为生命形式的想象能力:乔治·阿甘本、华莱士·史蒂文斯与诗歌的“无效”潜能
本文将当代哲学家乔治·阿甘本的诗歌和政治理论与华莱士·史蒂文斯的诗歌进行比较,以勾勒出一种“不可操作性”的动态,它预示着语言、形式和可能性的存在表达之间的密切关系。通过阅读史蒂文斯的散文和诗歌,我展示了阿甘本如何将潜力重新定义为一种保持在非关系关系中的力量,以实现其形式化,这可以映射到史蒂文斯诗歌演讲者的自觉表达上,他们使用诗歌的比喻和形式,只是为了质疑和揭露他们对真理和基础的主张。与其遵循后结构主义解读史蒂文斯不稳定的传统,我主张建立一个“不可操作性”的框架,以保持史蒂文斯对生活的诗意态度,同时展示他对潜力的强调如何描绘出一种想象力的活力,使诗意的自我与他或她的环境重新和谐。
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来源期刊
PARAGRAPH
PARAGRAPH LITERATURE-
CiteScore
0.30
自引率
0.00%
发文量
22
期刊介绍: Founded in 1983, Paragraph is a leading journal in modern critical theory. It publishes essays and review articles in English which explore critical theory in general and its application to literature, other arts and society. Regular special issues by guest editors highlight important themes and figures in modern critical theory.
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