The Poetic Structure of the World: Copernicus and Kepler

Description

The Poetic Structure of the World is a major reconsideration of a crucial turning point in Western thought and culture: the heliocentric revolution of Copernicus and Kepler. Conceiving of their work not in terms of a history of science or astronomy, but as events embedded in a wider field of images, symbols, texts, and practices, Fernand Hallyn insists that these new representations of the universe cannot be explained by recourse to theories of "genius" and "intuition." The scientific imagination is not fundamentally different from a mythic or poetic imagination, and the work of Copernicus and Kepler, Hallyn contends, must be examined on the level of rhetorical structure. Thus the new sun-centered universe is shown to be inseparable from the aesthetic, epistemological, theological, and social imperatives of both Neoplatonism and Mannerism in the sixteenth century. Fernand Hallyn was a professor in French Literature at Ghent University. Perhaps his best-known book is 'La structure poétique du monde: Copernic, Kepler' (Paris, Seuil, 1987), translated into English as 'The Poetic Structure of the World' (New York, Zone Books, 1990). Among his other books are 'Formes métaphoriques dans la poésie lyrique de l’âge baroque en France' (Geneva, Droz, 1975), 'Les structures rhétoriques de la science' (Paris, Seuil, 2004), 'Descartes: dissimulation et ironie' (Geneva, Droz, 2006), 'Gemma Frisius, arpenteur de la terre et du ciel' (Paris, Honoré Champion, 2006), and an edition and translation of Galileo’s Siderius Nuncius ('Galilée: Le messager des étoiles', Paris, Seuil, 1992). The Poetic Structure of the World: Copernicus and Kepler Contents Introduction PART ONE: COPERNICUS OR THE RENAISSANCE OF THE COSMOS I Science and Irony II Science and Anagogy III “The Principal Consideration...” IV Synecdoches V Metaphor of the Center PART TWO: KEPLER OR THE MANNERIST COSMOS VI From Copernicus to Kepler VII The Semiosis of the World VIII The Cosmographic Mystery IX Thinking the Ellipse X The Musical Metaphor XI The Lunar Dream Conclusion Notes Index