Abstract

In this work we seek to analyze the way in which Gramsci approaches the problem of the imaginative dimension of collective action, in order to problematize how this dimension is constituted as a fundamental field in which the struggle for the constitution of a collective will unfolds in history. In this sense, we propose an approach through the work of the Italian communist to analyze, first of all, some juvenile writings in which this dimension is thought around the concept of political myth, of obvious Sorelian roots; therefore, we turn to consider the Quaderni del carcere, where the problem of imagination and myth is re-signified in the context of a non reductionist theorization of the concept of ideology, the deployment of the category of hegemony and a critique of economicist conceptions of the crisis. It is from the framework provided by these categories that, we consider, the problem of the political myth finds a place in the political reflection of Gramsci, insofar as it allows him to take distance both from the spontaneism of Sorel and from the “disenchanted” and “rationalizing” versions of Marxism, constituting in this sense one of the features that give an irreductible singularity to his perspective.