Lectures on Imagination - by Paul Ricoeur (Hardcover)

About the Book

"When Paul Ricoeur died in 2005, the New York Times described him as "one of the most eminent philosophers of the twentieth century." In his lifetime, Ricoeur published influential works on language, memory, identity, and history, creating an innovative blend of hermeneutics and phenomenology. Despite his major interest in the imagination, however, he never wrote a complete text on the topic. The present volume, Lectures on Imagination, fills this gap, providing an indispensable resource for philosophically inclined readers from all backgrounds. Over the course of these lectures, Ricoeur examines classical and contemporary philosophical theories of imagination, ranging from thinkers such as Aristotle, Pascal, Spinoza, Hume, and Kant to Husserl, Wittgenstein, Sartre, and Ryle. He argues that, with few exceptions, Western philosophy has focused on reproductive rather than productive imagination, thus diminishing the creative capacity of the human mind. For Ricoeur, productive imagination is a form of fiction-a new dimension of reality generated by the human mind. His theory has far-reaching implications. In all domains, we are not restricted by existing structures or institutions, because the productive imagination has the power to break through and transform our sense of our own horizons"--

Book Synopsis

Ricoeur's theory of productive imagination in previously unpublished lectures.

The eminent philosopher Paul Ricoeur was devoted to the imagination. These previously unpublished lectures offer Ricoeur's most significant and sustained reflections on creativity as he builds a new theory of imagination through close examination, moving from Aristotle, Pascal, Spinoza, Hume, and Kant to Ryle, Price, Wittgenstein, Husserl, and Sartre. These thinkers, he contends, underestimate humanity's creative capacity. While the Western tradition generally views imagination as derived from the reproductive example of the image, Ricoeur develops a theory about the mind's power to produce new realities. Modeled most clearly in fiction, this productive imagination, Ricoeur argues, is available across conceptual domains. His theory provocatively suggests that we are not constrained by existing political, social, and scientific structures. Rather, our imaginations have the power to break through our conceptual horizons and remake the world.

Review Quotes

"The much anticipated, posthumous publication of Paul Ricoeur's Lectures on Imagination showcases his distinctive elucidation of the productive imagination as fiction, and, more generally, his sustained reflections on the overarching problematic of the imagination. . . The absence of a published, systematic engagement with the question of the (productive) imagination in Ricoeur's lifetime only makes the Imagination Lectures more significant."-- "International Journal of Social Imaginaries"

"This publication is of tremendous importance not only because of the centrality of the theme in Ricoeur's oeuvre, but also because of the contribution that it makes to phenomenology, hermeneutics, post-Kantian European philosophy and philosophy of imagination. While imagination was a marginal theme in philosophy when Ricoeur delivered his lectures, today it has moved to the very center of intellectual discussions. The lectures include plenty of thought-provoking reflections that will continue to inspire thinkers writing on imagination, both in philosophy and beyond."-- "Review of Metaphysics"

"By its depth and the breadth of the path traveled, [Lectures on Imagination] stands out as nothing less than a centerpiece of the corpus."-- "Le Monde des Livres on the French edition"

"This articulately edited series of lectures reveals key insights into the fruitfulness of Ricoeur's wide-ranging engagement with different intellectual traditions, including phenomenology, analytic philosophy, linguistics, and poetics."--Roger W. H. Savage, University California-Los Angeles

"This eagerly awaited book invites the reader on a fascinating dive into the depths of human imagination. Tracing a philosophical history from Aristotle and Kant to Husserl and Wittgenstein, Ricoeur offers a unique take on the metaphorical power of fiction in poetry and painting. An indispensable book for anyone interested in the sheer pleasure of invention."--Richard Kearney, Boston College

"This volume is an essential text for anyone interested in understanding how the human imagination works. With this careful translation, the editors have given us a necessary piece of Ricoeur's towering contributions to the Western understanding of the creative imagination."--John Arthos Jr., Indiana University

About the Author

Paul Ricoeur (1913-2005) was the John Nuveen Professor in the Divinity School, the Department of Philosophy, and the Committee on Social Thought at the University of Chicago. He was the author of many books, including Memory, History, Forgetting, Oneself as Another, and the three-volume Time and Narrative, all published by the University of Chicago Press. George H. Taylor is professor emeritus of law at the University of Pittsburgh. Robert D. Sweeney (1929-2016) was the Don Shula Chair in Philosophy at John Carroll University. Jean-Luc Amalric teaches at the CPGE Arts and Design in Nîmes and the Research Center for Arts and Language (CRAL), EHESS, Paris. Patrick F. Crosby (1948-2020) was an independent Ricoeur scholar