Wednesday, May 21, 2008

Samuel Taylor Coleridge, (1772-1834)


Born: 21 October 1772

Birthplace: Devonshire, England

Died: 25 July 1834 (heart attack)

Best Known As: The author of The Rime of the Ancient Mariner

English poet, critic, and philosopher. Coleridge studied at the University of Cambridge, where he became closely associated with Robert Southey. In his poetry he perfected a sensuous lyricism that was echoed by many later poets. Lyrical Ballads (1798; with William Wordsworth), containing the famous "Rime of the Ancient Mariner" and "Frost at Midnight," heralded the beginning of English Romanticism. Other poems in the "fantastical" style of the "Mariner" include the unfinished "Christabel" and the celebrated "Pleasure Dome of Kubla Khan." While in a bad marriage and addicted to opium, he produced "Dejection: An Ode" (1802), in which he laments the loss of his power to produce poetry. Later, partly restored by his revived Anglican faith, he wrote Biographia Literaria, 2 vol. (1817), the most significant work of general literary criticism of the Romantic period. Imaginative and complex, with a unique intellect, Coleridge led a restless life full of turmoil and unfulfilled possibilities.

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