The Poetics of Space

Since its initial publication in 1958, The Poetics of Space has been a muse to philosophers, architects, writers, psychologists, critics and readers alike. This lyrical journey takes as its premise the emergence of the poetic image and finds an ideal metaphor in the intimate space of our homes. Guiding us through a stream of meditations on poetry, art and the blooming of consciousness itself, Bachelard examines the domestic places that shape and hold our dreams and memories. Houses and rooms; cellars and attics; drawers, chests and wardrobes; nests and shells; nooks and corners: no space is too vast or too small to be filled by our thoughts and our reveries. In Bachelard's enchanting spaces, "we are never real historians, but always near poets, and our emotion is perhaps nothing but an expression of a poetry that was lost."