The imaginary

Summary

Dominique Pagani conceives of the imaginary as a genus that includes several species. In 2015 he counts four: imagination, memory, dream and myth. Later he keeps only three: imagination, nocturnal dream and memory, understood as an internalised image1. These representations populate an "inner night"2 and, unlike sensations, which are received passively, we project them outward as onto a screen3. For him, imaginary does not mean arbitrary: there is a realism of the imaginary, in which truth takes refuge while waiting for reality to change, and that is its sacred function4. He gives as examples Rousseau, who re-centres the island in the lake according to his fantasy, and Nerval, whose speech absorbs the setting of Senlis. He nevertheless contrasts this imaginary with a deadly imagination. In power, from Nuremberg to May 68, the imaginary becomes the opposite of reason5. Trying to bend reality to what does not exist damages it, like Procrustes' bed, and causes millions of deaths6.

1. 1#4.3 Angélique (de Nerval)11 Dec 2017 · 10:13
2. 2Naissance et carnage - Le massacre des Innocents22 Dec 2023 · 1:25:12
3. 3#5 • Les Attelé(e)s de la confinitude18 Apr 2020 · 1:03:53
4. 4Y comme Yonville8 Jan 2015 · 6:03
5. 5JE ne suis pas celui que vous croyez - L'identité introuvable4 Jan 2024 · 1:20:19
6. 6P comme Peuple30 Dec 2014 · 11:11

Summary produced automatically from 15 of the passages below, to be reviewed; the numbers link to the moment in the session.