Wallace Stevens

Wallace Stevens (October 2, 1879 - August 2, 1955) was an American Modernist poet.

Worldview

Stevens considered the world and our perception of the world to be separate. We approach reality with a piecemeal understanding, putting together parts of the world in an attempt to make it seem coherent. To make sense of the world is to construct a worldview through an active exercise of the imagination. For Stevens, the imagination is not a flight of fancy, but rather the interractive relationship with reality, as best a person may understand it.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Stevens applies several metaphors through the life of his poetry and uses the metaphor of the imagination as his primary focus. Each person interracts with the world in an effort to find the imaginative reality which will "suffice," which will rise out of his time and place as an organic order. That said, each imagining is likely to remain local to that time and place and, though it may inspire, any given imagining is unlikely to fulfill the needs of a future people. To show the interrelatedness of a person to the landscape, Stevens likens perception to a spider spinning webs

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:The webs of your eyes

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:Are fastened

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:To the flesh and bones of you

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:As to rafters or grass.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:There are filiments of your eyes

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:On the surface of water

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:And in the edges of the snow.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:From "Tattoo"

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

In the same way that a philosophy, religion or worldview may embody an individual's imagination, cultures embody a people's collective imagination; and in each case the individual and the collective imagination represent a relation to the locale in which that person or people live, as in the poem "Anecdote of Men by the Thousand", where

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:There are men whose words

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:Are as natural sounds

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:Of their places

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:As the cackle of toucans

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:In the place of toucans.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:The mandoline is the instrument

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:Of a place.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

: ...

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:The dress of a woman in Lhassa,

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:In its place,

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:Is an invisible element of that place

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:Made visible.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

If the imagination were seasons, spring would represent a period of vigorous discovery and awakening to the possibilities of a new understanding of reality; summer would be the ripening of the idea into its mature form; autumn personifies the period where the ability of an idea to describe reality is shown to be inadequate, and the hold of the idea on our world begins to decline; and winter would be the time of impoverishment between imaginings, when the last understanding of reality no longer gives life to the landscape, but when a new imagining has not yet taken shape.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

The metaphor of the seasons is informed by the metaphor of light. Light determines the seasons and light stands for enlightenment brought about by a new understanding. The sun is the source of light, the generative energy of all life and change, the personfied source of the imagination. But light can also brutalize human expectations, in the form of uncomprimising reality. So to encounter the sun in a Stevens poem is to encounter the creative source of the imagination. The sun at midday and the blue sky represent the imagination at its apex.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

In the poem, "The Sun This March," Stevens utilizes many of these metaphors. March is the beginning of spring, when a new imagining begins to take hold.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:The exceeding brightness of the early sun

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:Makes me conceive how dark I have become,

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:And re-illuminates things that used to turn

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:To gold in broadest blue, and be a part

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:Of a turning spirit in an earlier self.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:That, too, returns from out the winter's air

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:Like an hallucination come to daze

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:The corner of the eye.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Similarly, to extend these metaphors, the north represents a season of the impoverished imagination, where a new conception of reality has not come into existence and the old reality no longer works. The extended summer of the tropics represent a land of an imagining that persists over time.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

The sun is the creative source and the unfettered creativity of nature. Unlike the moon, with its cold, reflected light, the sun actively constructs a world. So the sun is the ultimate metaphor for imaginative creation.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

The intellectual currents of Stevens' day regarded the existence of God with skepticism. Stevens shares this view, and his poetry has a strong atheistic undercurrent, as in "The Sense of the Sleight-of-Hand Man".

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:Could you have said the bluejay suddenly

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:Would swoop to earth? It is a wheel, the rays

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:Around the sun. The wheel survives the myths.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:The fire eye in the clouds survives the gods.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Another occasional theme in Stevens's poetry is that of the hero and his place within the larger framework of war.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

An example of a part of Stevens' imagination that will not survive his time and place is his derogatory attitude towards people of African descent.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~