Collection: Samuel Taylor Coleridge
Samuel Taylor Coleridge (born 21 October 1772, died 25 July 1834) – English poet, together with William Wordsworth considered a forerunner of Romanticism in British literature. One of the so-called Lake Poets.
Coleridge made his debut in 1796 (with the volume Poems on Various Subjects ), but he gained real fame two years later. Together with William Wordsworth, whom he met in 1795, he planned and published Lyrical Ballads (the second edition, with Wordsworth's Preface, appeared in 1802), which are called the first romantic volume of poetry in English literature.
Later, in London, Coleridge, already addicted to opium, became interested in political and theological issues (he became a fervent follower of Christianity), as evidenced by his serious essays: Secular Sermons (1812), Aids to Reflection (1825), or On the Structure of the Church and State (1830).
Literary historians often emphasize that all of Coleridge's most outstanding works were written between 1797 and 1803 (the last one – the ode Despondency ), and especially in just one year – 1797 and the beginning of 1798. One historian even wrote: All that is really great in Coleridge's poetry could be printed in a few pages.
