Poetic Works of Coleridge Edited by William B. Scott

Poetic Works of Coleridge Edited by William B. Scott.

PRESENTING A RARE EDITION hardback copy of The Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge Edited with an Introductory Memoir and Illustrations by William B. Scott, London, George Routledge and Sons, The Broadway, Ludgate. New York: 416 Broome Street, from 1874.

This RARE book has some condition issues (reflected in the price)….. some wear to the cover (especially on the back). Its spine is loose and overall it could well use professional rebinding. Some minor foxing….but ‘all in all’ in fair condition for it’s age.

Some lovely gilding on the front cover and spine.

This is a RARE Edition!!

Samuel Taylor Coleridge (/ˈkoʊləˌrɪdʒ/; 21 October 1772 – 25 July 1834) was an English poet, literary critic, philosopher and theologian who, with his friend William Wordsworth, was a founder of the Romantic Movement in England and a member of the Lake Poets. He wrote the poems The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Kubla Khan, as well as the major prose work Biographia Literaria. His critical work, especially on William Shakespeare, was highly influential, and he helped introduce German idealist philosophy to English-speaking culture. Coleridge coined many familiar words and phrases, including suspension of disbelief. He had a major influence on Ralph Waldo Emerson and on American transcendentalism.

Throughout his adult life Coleridge had crippling bouts of anxiety and depression; it has been speculated that he had bipolar disorder, which had not been defined during his lifetime.^[1] He was physically unhealthy, which may have stemmed from a bout of rheumatic fever and other childhood illnesses. He was treated for these conditions with laudanum, which fostered a lifelong opium addiction.

Coleridge is one of the most important figures in English poetry. His poems directly and deeply influenced all the major poets of the age. He was known by his contemporaries as a meticulous craftsman who was more rigorous in his careful reworking of his poems than any other poet, and Southey and Wordsworth were dependent on his professional advice. His influence on Wordsworth is particularly important because many critics have credited Coleridge with the very idea of “Conversational Poetry”. The idea of utilising common, everyday language to express profound poetic images and ideas for which Wordsworth became so famous may have originated almost entirely in Coleridge’s mind. It is difficult to imagine Wordsworth’s great poems, The Excursion or The Prelude, ever having been written without the direct influence of Coleridge’s originality.

As important as Coleridge was to poetry as a poet, he was equally important to poetry as a critic. His philosophy of poetry, which he developed over many years, has been deeply influential in the field of literary criticism. This influence can be seen in such critics as A. O. Lovejoy and I. A. Richards.

Link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Taylor_Coleridge