Abstract

This paper addresses the question of the hermeneutic function of imagination through a study of Ricoeur’s notion of semantic innovation. Furthermore, it argues that the interpretation implied in semantic innovations must be differentiated from the explicative interpretation and can be qualified as a pre-interpretation. The “metaphoric interpretation” is to be considered a pre-interpretation, which must be distinguished from the pre-understanding and the pre-figuration. Through the many semantic innovations, which are products of imagination, the latter is acquiring a hermeneutic function, since the semantic innovation is a creation in language which implies a revelation in the world. However, this revelation is unclear and has to be appropriated by a reader in order to become an interpretation in the proper and critical meaning of the word. The hermeneutic function of imagination therefore appears with the most clarity in the primary phase of the interpretation of the world, which lies in the semantic innovations.