Romanticism & Esoteric Tradition

Book excerpt: Spiritual quest is at the very heart of poetry, but in our materialistic climate as we begin the twenty-first century, this has been largely forgotten, even by those who claim to be experts in interpreting literature.How does the worldview common to the main esoteric traditions of East and West correspond to the aims of Romantic poets such as Shelley, Keats, Blake, Coleridge, and Wordsworth? In Romanticism and Esoteric Tradition, Paul Davies maintains that the intended meaning of the poetry and thinking of the Romantics can be understood only in the light of the spiritual teachings of those traditions.This is one of the few books that connects the creative nature of poetry to the core teachings of the esoteric tradition. It reveals the true meaning of several Romantic writers whose works have been trivialized by a culture that has marginalized the spiritual and bound itself only to material, historical, and social concerns.The author also shows that the Romantics were the first Western poets to imagine the relationship of the self to the environment as personal encounter. In this sense the Romantics recalled a long-held secret of the esoteric "human sciences" rather than inventing a new one.This book brings the deepest interests of the Romantics directly into contact with issues closest to present-day students of the spiritual traditions and holistic perspectives.