Henri Bergson’s philosophy was incredibly popular during the early part of the twentieth century and unsurprisingly his influence on a range of disciplines, including literature and the arts, was significant. There is only one work, his book on laughter (
Le Rire,1900), which directly addresses literary tropes, but there is a recurrent theme of creativity that subtends his broader philosophical investigations, and Bergson’s thought had a pervasive influence on Modernist writing in English, notably through his admirer T. E. Hulme and the poet T.S Eliot, who both attended his lectures in Paris. T.S. Eliot’s early work and ideas owed a debt to Bergson, although it was his later criticisms that received greater attention, based on the mistaken assumption that the philosopher’s work…
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Citation: Atkinson, Paul. "Essai sur les données immédiates de la conscience". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 03 January 2011 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=10518, accessed 21 November 2024.]
