by John Dougill
At the end of March 2015, I attended a stimulating conference on Coleridge and Contemplation at Notre Dame University. A couple of the sessions were of particular relevance to a theme that has long intrigued me – the connection of writing and creativity. When doing my PhD, I was amazed to learn that Oxford dons of the nineteenth century regularly took afternoon walks of four to five hours through the surrounding countryside. Healthy body, healthy mind for sure, but there’s something more underlying the practice which has to do with what the Romans called ‘solvitor ambulando’ (it is solved by walking). How and why should this arise?
In his talk on ‘Walking, Contemplation, Writing’, Prof Eamonn Wall of the University of Missouri-St. Louis spoke of the formative effect of activities on the human mind. Nicholas Carr for example in his book The Shallows had demonstrated the deleterious effect of the internet on the way our brain functions, significantly shortening attention span by providing adrenalin rushes for the thrill of the new. The practice of deep reading can be presumed then to shape the brain in other ways, by slowly augmenting what is already there and allowing the imagination room to roam. ‘True enlightenment comes only through contemplation and introspection,’ claims Carr. Walking too can be a form of contemplation, which in turn fosters creativity as evidenced by such notable walkers as Rousseau, Kant, Nietzsche, Thoreau, R.L. Stevenson, Rimbaud, Kerouac – and most famously, Coleridge, Wordsworth and other Romantics.
For Coleridge walking was a primary way of engaging with the world, bringing mind and body into alignment as the pedestrian passes through the surrounding nature. Rather than being disinterested, the walker is immersed in the environment and constantly stimulated by the changing scenery. Moreover, the regular rhythm of the gait induces an almost hypnotic, self-absorbed state conducive to reverie as passing images become fused with the brain’s store of ideas and memories, creating new and liberating patterns of thought. The walking reverie is thus a means of tapping into the fertile realm of semi-consciousness. ‘An author who composes while walking .. is not the slave to other volumes, not swollen with verifications, not weighted with the thought of others,’ writes Frederic Gros in A Philosophy of Walking, before offering this advice: ‘Think while walking, walk while thinking, and let writing be but the light pause, as the body on a walk rests in contemplation of wide open spaces.’
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