Imaginal Love: The Meanings of Imagination in Henry Corbin and James Hillman

by Tom Cheetham

Corbin’s work on the role of imagination in the religions and its fundamental place in human life has had a lasting and wide-ranging influence on contemporary poetry and the humanities. Among his most influential readers were the poets Charles Olson and Robert Duncan and the archetypal psychologist James Hillman. Central to their common vision is the creative power of language, understood not as a human invention but as a fundamental feature of reality. This new book by philosopher, biologist, poet, and teacher Tom Cheetham provides an overview of Corbin’s “psychocosmology” and its significance for Hillman’s archetypal psychology, contemporary poetics, and spiritual practice. It will be of interest to psychotherapists, artists, poets, and anyone who has ever wondered at the mysterious power of language and the imagination to transform the human soul.

Genres: Psychology, Philosophy, Spirituality, Religion, Mysticism

200 pages, Paperback

First published March 24, 2015

About the author

https://tomcheetham.com/biography/

Reviews

[Gord Clements · Rating 5 out of 5]

A stunning book. This is one of my all time favourites, one that I am sure I will reread numerous times. Cheetham does us a profound service in exploring the writings and life views of Henry Corbin and James Hillman, including poets Robert Duncan and Wallace Stevens and others..He writes about the consequences of attachment to abstract nouns and literal understanding, encouraging a life view living through being and a practice of reflecting in verbs and adverbs as a way of moving out of subject object consciousness. Seeing in terms if events rather than objects. He writes in a way that is inquisitive, that he has discovered something life changing and that he intuitively relates to in Henry Corbin and James Hillman. A genuine desire to find in humans what is authentic is obvious and in that, he has come to see the wonderful aspects of being human that we all have access to. He writes about our creative and expansive and compassionate human nature that becomes trapped in the narrowing of our human perceptions. He does not illustrate any of this as an idealistic pursuit or success or as something to be achieved but more out of an unraveling and letting go and a returning to what we inherently are.

[Christian · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book taught me in a deeper sense that the best kind of thinking, the best kind of imagining, is always concrete. Think with colors flowers, lampshades, your pets; imagine with a bit of texture from your middle-school's gym wall, or with a descriptive detail from that Neil Gaiman book you just read. And what's more, this book helped me remember that true intimacy only comes when you realize the particularity or "eachness" of things in the world--a polytheism of perception.

[Bill Bridges · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very insightful look into the work of two of the 20th Century's great apostles of the imagination. I am fascinated by Henri Corbin's thought, although I find his books difficult to read (even more so in this "screen" age, where my attention span wanders like everybody else's), but Cheetham's previous books have been a good window into his dizzying world. This one no less so, if not more so. I am absorbed into studying James Hillman's complete works, and this book is a good complement, filling out how Corbin has influenced Hillman and how Hillman has gone his own way with that influence (even to Corbin's frustration).

It's hard for me to judge how well this book would work as an introduction to Corbin and Hillman for those unfamiliar with them, but Cheetham's accounts of his own personal wrestling with these ideas are helpful companions on the path. I hesitated with only 4 stars here. It probably deserves 5, but really, Hillman and Corbin's own original works get those stars.

[Anne Lee · Rating 5 out of 5]

A blend of depth psychology, reflections on Sufism and Islamic theology, this is ultimately a reflection on the profound and central role of imagination in our lives and as a means through which we find meaning. A worthwhile read for artists, writers, actors and anyone who is engage in the aspects of spiritual life that require reflection and an inner journey.

[Jonatan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Si en El mundo como Icono Cheetham se concentraba en explicar el término "tawil" de Corbin, en este libro, Imaginal Love, nos hace partícipes de su lectura comparativa entre Henry Corbin y James Hillman. Ambos ponen énfasis en el mundo imaginal como fuente tanto de los sentidos y la materia como del pensamiento y el espíritu. Sin embargo, mientras que Corbin sitúa el mundo imaginal por encima de sentidos y pensamiento, de forma un tanto trascendente, en una especie de neoplatonismo, Hillman lo sitúa en la inmanencia, en una especie de no-dualismo.

Gracias a este libro, como me suele suceder, he entendido mejor el concepto de vacuidad del budismo mahayana, así como el no dualismo, y esto a pesar de que no se nombra ninguno de los términos en el libro. Es cosa de mi lectura.

Le pongo cinco estrellas, aunque el libro merecería cuatro, porque para mí ha sido muy importante. Y es que con Corbin, pero sobre todo con Hillman, se cierra para mí un círculo. Hace varios años me alejé de la filosofía heideggeriana post-metafísica y de la filosofía japonesa, para adentrarme en el mundo de la teoría junguiana. Pues bien, es con Corbin y sobre todo con Hillman, con quien se cierra el círculo: Hillman es tan junguiano como heideggeriano, lo que me permite volver ahora a la filosofía japonesa pero entendiéndola mucho mejor que antes, desde la teoría junguiana. Así pues, con Imaginal Love se abre una puerta para mí, que lleva a un mundo que, creo, tardaré años en recorrer. No pienso dudar a la hora de traspasarla.

[Simão Cortês · Rating 4 out of 5]

Tom Cheetham is very enthusiastic about the subject of imagination. That in itself is already quite interesting. It's not always easy to find accessible and learned authors that discuss imagination as a gift of humanity (or of the soul).
He draws a lot on the thought of Hillman, Corbin and Jung, however don't read this (as I read!) thinking it's an introduction to their thought! Tom Cheetham has his own ideas and will discuss them. One thing that's painfully obvious is that he sides with Hillman and Jung on the great metaphysical questions that imagination poses, which makes Corbin's thought slightly less obvious in the book. He takes several liberties on the quite well defined thought of Corbin, just as Hillman did. Of course he warns the reader he is doing this.
It is, however, a great first step into the modern discussion of imagination, poetry and even metaphysics.
I disagree with most things Cheetham says about platonism. I think his criticism of Platonic forms comes from something that is more lexical and less semantic. Anyway, the swinging between platonism and postmodernism was, I have to admit, quite stimulating since I feel it a lot myself.
The kindle edition has some problems, namely that THERE ARE WORDS MISSING. The book is already a bit dense, with words missing it becomes quite hard to follow some passages. The good side is that you have to exercise the imagination! :D

[Nate Fetterolf · Rating 5 out of 5]

Incredible book. One of my all time favorites I think so far. I’m extremely fascinated by the imagination and the imaginal realm Corbin and Hillman talk about. I was introduced to it by my favorite teacher in college, in his poetry classes. He’s a bit of a wizard himself. The implications of this knowledge here don’t only portray a different knowledge of things but a change in mind and perception, a change of how reality looks and feels, is understood and lived. it has the potential of deepening one’s immediate experience of reality, of opening up the gates of life as fully as they can be, a continuous opening and opening and opening to the inherent boundlessness of life that exists. Thinking, feeling, sensing, and intuiting itself becomes redefined and re-experienced. the boxes we knowingly and unknowingly put ourselves in fall away, fall away in the sense that the boxes no longer matter, they exist still to a degree but become permeable and transparent, no longer fixed and opaque, but living and breathing. life becomes alive and fuller in its aliveness, the possibility of possibilities becomes realized, we have the capacity to live and experience and imagine life in a deeper and richer way. It’s a life lived with clearer eyes, eyes of love, of love for all particular things shining in their own right, being witnessed in their own right. Even if the reading is not fully understood the effect it has on one is palpable and felt. highly recommend for all.

[garon nemyre · Rating 5 out of 5]

excellent discourse on the psycho-cosmology formed from the intersections of hillman and corbin’s work. i discovered corbin through hillman (as i believe many do) and this is an excellent way to be introduced to their shared views and what separates them. additionally cheetham does a beautiful job of keeping it all tactile and grounded, pulling in his own personal experience wrestling with their work, and in so doing, helps move the theory forward with added perspective. fully recommend to anyone interested in developing deeper relationship to a ‘soul psychology’ of personified animism.

[Stanislav Kiverin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Unaproachable entrance

Although the book inspires to look for your own ways for imaginative power source, as well as gives much food for reflection, it leaves you with a sense of perplexity: the questions it broaches are far more numerous than answers and solutions it gives.
Beautiful perspective of spirituality is opened up though.

[Lizelle Van · Rating 5 out of 5]

A deceptively easy read; maybe because it's more than 'a read'. It is itself also a journey of 'imagining, exploring, loving".

[Anders · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good introduction into the imaginal without ever resorting to complex vocabulary--yet at the same time this book never entirely made room for the imaginal. It felt held back by something.