The Poetry and Practice of Meditation
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 4375221 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Elizabeth Bradburn (Western Michigan University, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2019 |
| Volume | 40 |
| Issue | 3 |
| Pages | 597-614 |
| Publication date | 2019-09-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Poetics Today (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0333-5372 • E-ISSN: 1527-5507 |
| Publisher | Duke University Press (PUBLISHER • US) |
| DOI | 10.1215/03335372-7558178 |
| OpenAlex | W2975600888 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 12 |
Is reading poetry good for you? Drawing on evidence that reading poetry involves some of the same brain structures as those upon which human psychological well-being depends, this essay argues that George Herbert's devotional lyrics, long understood as Christian meditations, center on recurring images in a manner consistent with the modern practice of mindfulness meditation. There is a significant overlap between the way meditation was understood by seventeenth-century Christians and the way it is understood by modern meditators in a secular and therapeutic context. Neurally, meditation means the reduction of activity in the brain's default mode network; phenomenally, it means repeatedly bringing wandering attention back to a chosen meditation object. Poetry can be isomorphic with meditative practice because the image of meditation has an identifying pattern of movement-spontaneous wandering and controlled return-that can be created in several sensory modalities. Complex enough to characterize Herbert's poetry as meditative, the pattern of wandering from and returning to a focal image potentially defines a meditative literary mode with a distinctive relationship to the imagination. The therapeutic potential of meditative poetry speaks to the value not just of poetry but of humanist education in general
Aesthetics · Art · Buddhism · Humanism · Linguistics · Literature · Meditation · Mindfulness · Poetry · Psychotherapist · Theology · Action Observation and Synchronization · History · Mind wandering and attention · Neuroscience and Music Perception · Philosophy · Psychology
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |