The Profession of Poetry
OR, TRAILS THROUGH THE NIGHT FOR M. MARITAIN
Harold Rosenberg
JACQUES MARITAIN
thinks of poetry as a practical activity carried
on in a dangerous relation to spirit. Poetry, he maintains, is pri·
marily a craft. Existing in the material world it has a
"raison"
of
its own, needs and aims proper to its particular "making," on
which every practitioner must unwaveringly
fix
his eyes. Indeed,
the poet must hold more rigorously to his craft than the fabricator
of chairs or hoe handles; because, dealing with spiritual sub–
stances, like the philosopher, scientist, or saint, he is constantly
tempted by the soul, or absolute, lurking within his practice.
Poetry's rebellious spirit is Beauty, an unlimited metaphysical
power, which the written poem with its worldly conditions can
never encompass. The demon dwells in the body of the art, but
seeks to escape from it and abandon it to dissolution. And by a
divine ordinance, no sooner does the apprentice forsake his bench
than, inevitably, he is driven to poke among the infernal retorts.
Therefore, though he accompanies his advice with supernatural
threats, Maritain urges a "materialistic," even a utilitarian, ap·
proach to the arts. His philosophy, to the surprise of those who
expect just the opposite in a "religous" thinker, stresses the role of
technique and professional discipline, opposes transcendental pos·
turing, and sets up the work of art-not the soul-adventures of the
artist-as the esthetic aim. It reminds the poet or painter that
spiritual satisfaction is to be found in the artistic labor itself, pre·
cisely in the evolution of skill, in the formation of that individual
"habitus"
(a very eloquent word brought up to us from the Schol–
astics) which grows steadily more gracious and unerring, until it
fills the whole being with light.... Moreover, Maritain's New–
Catholic esthetics is linked with a social theory which provides a
solid place for the artist in a community entirely given up to crea–
tion on the same modest, even, and spiritually progressive scale as
his own. So that all burdens are lifted, except those fruitful ones
inherent in the artistic work itself.
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