No Ideas But In Things

Someone cool once said, "No ideas but in things," or something to that effect. Can someone cite here who said that? And provide the proper quote if I don't have it right?

And, I'm pretty sure we'll need this page, eventually, here. . . . . .?

Ezra Pound said it. It was the credo of his Imagist theory... basically meaning what it says, that theory and abstraction are fairly meaningless and poetry ought to center upon tangible images a chair, a glass of tea, faces in the metro because that's where the story, or the information, is.

William Carlos Williams said something similar, too. Many of the American Modernists (especially the poets) believed this idea.

Jessica, NYU graduate and quasi-English major, putting her degree to good use

"I will show you fear in a handful of dust." - T. S. Eliot

Christy would like to add her rant:

Okay... I don't know who said that, but can I add a few comments here anyway? I love that idea of seeing ideas in things. Maybe its because I'm all confused about the idea of ideas. Where do ideas exist, anyway?

There's a beautiful book called "The Story of B" which talks about seeing all of life in a handful of dirt... that's what life is... that's what flesh is, and bone and all the body. Its dirt. That's what grass is, and trees, and all other plants. Its what all creatures are...

How can I explain an idea? Are ideas captured within words? But words are so limitted... so very limitted.... can we explain words in other things? Yet, if I could show you the sight I saw today, of a bird eating from the berries on a tree, would you understand the ideas within it? What ideas... ideas are so infinate... in that one sight all the ideas of the universe are captured. Could you see the ideas I saw? No, probably not... could you see other ideas? Yes...

Why are people so blind that they see things, and not ideas? So limitted that they run out of things to talk about, that they cannot dream or imagine or see beyond all things? Why can we not see all the universe in a single sight - its there, if we ever really looked.

</rant>

All living things are an expression of life. ~Courtsey of Ms. Quotebutdon'tremember Who Said