The intention of this paper is to focus attention on the nature and value of inspiration as a function of particular importance in all aesthetic work, including psychoanalysis; and to indicate its analogous importance in personality development. Following the poets -the most expressive analysts of inspiration -inspiration is described as a mental process rather than a quality. This paper does not rely solely on mere statements about inspiration. Rather, features of the concept of inspiration are drawn from the aesthetic language of several poets: in particular, Dante, Keats, Milton, Emily Bronte, Plato. Finally, some more explicit links are made to the context of current psychoanalytic theory.

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This essay considers Bion's and Meltzer's enumeration of both artistic and scientific qualities inherent in psychoanalytic practice in relation to the problem of learning from experience. Their work encourages practitioners to value the liberating potential of psychoanalysis as an art form. This is emphasized through the complex cognitive implications of Bion's‘reverie’ and Meltzer's ‘aesthetic conflict’, suggesting that psychoanalytic advance will consist in the marriage of artistic modes of cognition with a scientific body of knowledge.

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