Samuel Taylor Coleridge

One of the major British Romantic poets. The Romatic period is a literary movement characterized by imagination, passion, and the supernatural and thus his works evolve around for example Ancient Mariners, Vampires and Nightingales.

Biography

Samuel Taylor Coleridge was born as the tenth and last child of the vicar of Ottery Saint Mary near Devonshire, England and he died on the 25th of July in 1834 at Highgate, England.

His father died in 1782 and he was sent to Christ's Hospital for his school education. Dispte a certain eagerness to study he described his school years as depressing, moping and friendless. In 1791 he entered Jesus College, Cambridge, England. In 1793 Coleridge joined the 15th Light Dragoons, a British cavalry unit, due to financial problems. After his discharge in April 1794, he returned to Jesus College but left in the same year without completing a degree, because of his developing friendship with Robert Southey (1774–1843).

He and his friend both shared the same interest in poetry and dislike for the tradition of a return to the Greek and Latin classics. They were also rather radical in politics, since they developed the vision of a "pantisocracy" - an ideal community - to be founded in America. Their utopian plan, however, never came into being. In 1795 Coleridge got married to Sara Fricker, who happened to be the sister of Southey's future wife. The relation between Coleridge and Southey, however, was not a life-time friendship.

Between 1795 and 1802 Coleridge experienced the period his major poetic and intellectual development. During that time he spent a year in Germany and became friends with the Wordsworths. When he returned to England he settled in Scotland in the Lake District. In the following years, however, he led a rather miserable life, because the Scottish climate worsened his many chronic healthproblems. Due to this condition he took laudanum and soon became an addict to this opium-like drug. His marriage was failed not only because of his addiction but especially, because he fell in love with Sara Hutchinson, Wordsworth's sister-in-law. His bad health and his emotional distress are reflected in most of his works. After a two-year stay in Malta he got separated from his wife in 1806 and by 1810 the friendship to the Wodsworths had declined, too. He then moved to London, where he spent the last eighteen years of his life at Highgate and eventually died in 1834.

Major Works

Coleridge is probably known mostly for his hypnotic and lengthy poems: ''The Rime of the Ancient Mariner'' and ''Christabel''. Even those who have never read the Rime have nevertheless come across these elements: the metaphor of an albatross around one's neck, the quote or rather mis-quote of "water, water everywhere, but not a drop to drink", and the phrase "a sadder but wiser man". His Christabel is known for its musical rhythm and language and its Gothic tale, involving both the Vampire and Famme Fatal element. His poem ''Kubla Khan'' is also widely known and loved for it's strange, dreamy imagery. Furthermore, both Kubla Khan and Christabel have a certain romantic aura to them, because they were both never properly finished by Coleridge.

Sources

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[2]

[3]

Bygrave, Stephen. Samuel Taylor Coleridge. Plymouth: Northcote House, 1997.

Everest, Kelvin. "Coleridge's Life", in: (ed.) Lucy Newlyn. Cambridge Companion to Coleridge. Cambridge, New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002: 17-31.

Beer, John. "Coleridge's Afterlife", in: (ed.) Lucy Newlyn. Cambridge Companion to Coleridge. Cambridge, New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002: 231-244.