Unify in a Uniform

"The social sympathies, or those laws from which, as from its elements, society results, begin to develop themselves from the moment that two human beings coexist."

"Poets, or those who imagine and express this indestructible order ... they are ... the founders of civil society ... "

Out of all the words, all this fuss about prophecy, Shelley goes with legislators. After our discussion about elitism and corn dogs, I started to think about this latent theme in Defence of Poetry, one that tends to make me balk, but one that Shelley presumes underneath everything: poet as social contributor.

In the first page, Shelley talks about how "The savage"—the pre-society individual—"expresses the emotions produced in him by surrounding objects" and "his apprehension of them." By "apprehension," Shelley simply means understanding, but I misread it and applied apprehension's connotations of anxiety and doubt. To me, it seemed corny for Shelley to say that only once we enter society do we lose our fear of objects. Only once we live in harmony do we develop the skill to comprehend objects in harmony. Or something.. Shelley isn't belittling the savage like this, of course. But the whole thing seemed sort of silly, skeptical as I am of "Order" as a universal, snotty as I am to call society's order an abstract human construction.

So then I realized: it's my lack of imagination. I simply can't imagine what Shelley seems to have: utter faith in society as a concept.

He seems to say (or presume we already know) that without society, the poet is nothing. Without fellows with whom to share linguistic prophecy, what good is it? Even further than that, if poets have no society, they don't develop the love of harmony. All this assuming that harmony discovery is really poetry's goal. When Shelley's poets apprehend and perpetuate new apprehensions, they "gather a sort of reduplication from that community." Almost as if such transmissions (poet's mega super gee —> the others) need Society (big sweaty beast) not only as a conveyer belt but also as a generator.

So here's the jump. Is it not too far out to assume that Shelley isn't thinking in elitist terms, but thinking of a well-oiled society where everyone has their particular contribution? The order, the order. I mean, he uses phrases like "legislator," the "delicately organized" poet, and even "the cultivation of poetry," as if poems were plucked and piled into SYSCO trucks. How utterly at odds with the poet as anti-social figure, eh? How not the poem as loudmouthed bobble, shouting about the room full of corn dogs. Let's even say that the shouting were supposed to "save everybody." That scene is still pretty disharmonious. Unless, of course, the shouting engenders a "revolution of opinion" and not just social discord.

Sure Shelley might be stroking with a straight face when he likens poets to priests. Calls them hierophants, maybe even more divine than straight-up priests. But if we jump outside the vertical system we had in mind—charges of "elitism" or elevation, "base" as the actual base—we might figure that priest as another cog in a big, messy plane of social contributors. Poets haul that formatted wind to the ears of their brethren. That's their job. Nothing elite about it. Just fitting. Premium on functionality in this system, so who cares how many Slim Jims or American Idols you scarf while you're formatting the wind? So long as you don't "neglect to observe the circumstances," i.e. neglect your most basic task, your (duh duh DUM!) role.

No doubt: this theory is way more serene than it should be. Capitalism, class-consciousness —sort of sullies it. And Shelley still says thinks like "when the poet becomes a man" as if "he" weren't already. But when he calls "patriotism" an emotion, I realize that I'm way outside my comprehension range. We're post-blahblah fractured selves and all that, so it's hard to imagine how something like poetry could tie into idealistic social goals.

You know that paperwork where you fill in your Occupation? Even if poetry occupies the hell out of us, we joke and slither around actually writing "Poet." We slither around saying it. To be a poet is supposedly impossible, self-indulgent, ridiculous, subversive, etc. But one definition of employment is sort of "how we're folded into things." Shelley definitely wants the fabric of society intact—not doubted or poked at, no more than you would poke any sacred thing. He's writing "Poet" for sure. He's getting a badge.