Imagining

Imagining

A Phenomenological Study

Second Edition

Edward S. Casey

A classic firsthand account of the lived character of imaginative experience.

"This scrupulous, lucid study is destined to become a touchstone for all future writings on imagination." —Library Journal

"Casey's work is doubly valuable—for its major substantive contribution to our understanding of a significant mental activity, as well as for its exemplary presentation of the method of phenomenological analysis." —Contemporary Psychology

". . . an important addition to phenomenological philosophy and to the humanities generally." —Choice

". . . deliberately and consistently phenomenological, oriented throughout to the basically intentional character of experience and disciplined by the requirement of proceeding by way of concrete description. . . . [Imagining] is an exceptionally well-written work." —International Philosophical Quarterly

Drawing on his own experiences of imagining, Edward S. Casey describes the essential forms that imagination assumes in everyday life. In a detailed analysis of the fundamental features of all imaginative experience, Casey shows imagining to be eidetically distinct from perceiving and defines it as a radically autonomous act, involving a characteristic freedom of mind. A new preface places Imagining within the context of current issues in philosophy and psychology.

[use one Casey bio for both Imagining and Remembering]

Edward S. Casey is Professor of Philosophy at the State University of New York at Stony Brook. He is author of Getting Back into Place: Toward a Renewed Understanding of the Place-World (Indiana University Press) and The Fate of Place: A Philosophical History.

Studies in Continental Thought—John Sallis, general editor

Contents

Preface to the Second Edition

Introduction The Problematic Place of Imagination

Part One: Preliminary Portrait

Examples and First Approximations

Imagining as Intentional

Part Two Detailed Descriptions

Spontaneity and Controlledness

Self-Containedness and Self-Evidence

Indeterminacy and Pure Possibility

Part Three: Phenomenological Comparisons

Imagining and Perceiving: Continuities

Imagining and Perceiving: Discontinuities

Part Four: The Autonomy of Imagining

The Nature of Imaginative Autonomy

The Significance of Imaginative Autonomy