Bergson and Imagination

What is probably most notable about Bergson's theory of Imagination is that he has none. Perhaps he considers one unnecessary, since he classifies all objects of Consciousness, including outer ones, as already "images", thereby preempting any need to attribute them to some mental faculty. In any case, the lack of such a theory is potentially damaging to his cardinal thesis that Intuition is the creative mode of Consciousness. For, both conventional wisdom and many philosophers associate mental creativity with Imagination, not with a receptive faculty like Intuition. Now, Bergson can be excused for his unfamiliarity with Sartre's not yet extant theory of the radical creativity of Imagination, and he might argue that a notion with which he is familiar, Kant's theory of Productive Imagination, is ultimately only at the service of Intellect, and, hence, is not truly creative. Still, it is difficult to accept that it never occurs to someone who appreciates music as much as he does that the inspiration for the compositional process is at least sometimes the sudden imagination of a melody. In contrast, Bergson, as has been previously argued, never successfully demonstrates that, as he seems to presume, the Consciousness of Creativity is a Creative Consciousness. Accordingly, his thesis that Intuition is the pre-eminent creative mode of Consciousness seems implicated in his generally unsatisfactory speculations, e. g. his Spiritualistic interpretation, of the meaning and value of the immediate data of lived experience.