Brain Pain discussion

This topic covers chapter 10, The Aerial Tree, p. 203 - 224

"L'arbre aérien" is probably one of the fascinating sections of this book. I wouldn't be surprised if Bachelard considered elaborating his thoughts on plants into a separate book. Bachelard seems to stray from the topic of Air when he writes about prairies and forests and flowers and trees. However, the main idea is still the same: verticality and the tension between lightness and heaviness (manifest in the case of trees, in the opposing leaves vs roots).

Bachelard references are profuse on this topic: Claudel, Rilke, Hawthorne, D.H. Lawrence, Jean Paul, Jack London, Strindberg. Most interestingly, he mentions mythology (the Pippala of the Rig Veda, the Yggdrasil of the Edda), as a major source for images of trees -- which, in a way, makes Bachelard both a successor of Carl Jung and a predecessor of Joseph Campbell.

Funny he doesn't mention obvious tales like Jack and the Beanstalk for instance. And of course, he could not have known Myazaki, but My Neighbor Totoro is a beautiful example of the poetry of trees.