Blake and Novalis

The author interprets the works of Blake and Novalis as two comparable and coherent arguments on the foundation, scope and effectiveness of poetry in life. Both poets aim at a synthesis of such typically romantic incompatibilities as imagination and reality, aesthetics and ethics. Their involved search provides us with the most extensive poetic typology of romantic intent, dilemma, and success in either the English or German tradition. Even later admirers, such as Yeats or the French Symbolists, found it impossible to perform an equally comprehensive inquiry and integration.