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Elan vital

Philosophy
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

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The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

Elan vital is a vital impetus or creative drive that is the fundamental principle of life and evolution. It is a non-material force propelling organisms to grow and adapt.

Detailed Definition
Henri Bergson's élan vital counters mechanistic views of life. In poetry, it is associated with dynamism, creativity, and the raw energy of becoming. Poetic language can embody this vitalism through rhythmic flow, organic imagery, and a celebration of change. This concept informs modernist poetry's break with tradition, valuing intuition and the ongoing creative impulse against static forms and sterile reason.
Example
Example in poetry:
Walt Whitman's "Song of Myself" pulses with elan vital, as his expansive catalogs and rhythmic lines celebrate the procreant urge and the sheer joy of being alive; Dylan Thomas's "Fern Hill" embodies elan vital through its lush, organic imagery of youth and the "green and golden" vitality of nature that cannot be contained; The poetry of D.H. Lawrence, particularly in his animal poems like "Snake," channels a raw, instinctual life force that resists intellect and embraces the dark, unknown energy of the natural world; Mary Oliver's nature poems, such as "The Summer Day," are suffused with elan vital, celebrating the wild, precious life of a grasshopper and the creative impulse that asks "what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?"; The frenetic, visionary energy of Arthur Rimbaud's "The Drunken Boat" is a pure expression of elan vital, as the poem hurtles through a surreal landscape with unstoppable creative force; Sylvia Plath's "Ariel" captures a different, more intense version of elan vital, portraying a furious, liberating energy in the poem's galloping rhythm and the speaker's transformation into a force of nature.
Additional Notes
Élan vital is the term coined by Henri Bergson for the vital impetus or creative life force that drives evolution and all organic development. It is a non-material, intuitive energy that opposes the mechanistic view of life and is characterized by its spontaneity, continuous change, and creative novelty. In poetry, élan vital is often associated with a dynamic, organic, and exuberant style, valuing vitality and instinct over cold reason. Poets like Walt Whitman or D.H. Lawrence are often seen as channeling this energy through their rhythmic, expansive lines and their celebration of the body and nature. For the modern poet, understanding élan vital can inspire a poetics of energy and movement, a desire to capture the flow of life itself in language. It is a key concept for understanding the vitalist strain in modernist and Romantic literature.
Also Known As
Vital force Life energy Creative drive Bergsonian élan
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