Learning Path » 5B Interacting
SDecorte - Coleridge's Biographia Literaria
1. The key sentences are: "The thought suggested itself (to which of us I do not recollect) that a series of poems might be composed of two sorts.", "In the one, the incidents and agents were to be, in part at least, supernatural [...] supposing them real.", "For the second class, subjects were to be chosen from ordinary life", "In this idea the plan of the Lyrical Ballads in which it was agreed that my endeavours should be directed to person and characters supernatural, or a least romantic", "The poet, described in ideal perfection, brings the whole soul of man into activity, with the subordination of its faculties to each other according to their relative worth and dignity.".
2. Topics in Wordsworth and Coleridge's conversations
a) The powers of poetry (par. 1):
1. The power of exciting the sympathy of the reader by means of a faithful adherence to the truth of nature.
2. The power of giving the interest of novelty by means of the modifying colours of imagination.
b) Writing a collection of poems of two kinds (par. 1):
1. Subject: supernatural incidents and agents.
2. Subject: characters and incidents from ordinary life.
c) Plan of the Lyrical Ballads (par. 2):
| Coleridge | Wordsworth |
Subject: | supernatural person and characters | ordinary person and characters
|
Aim: | to suppose them real | to give them the charm of novelty |
Procedure: | by the dramatic truth of such emotions, as would naturally accompany such situations | by directing the mind's attention to the loveliness and wonders of the world
|
Profile of the ideal poet (par. 3)
1. He "brings the whole soul of man into activity".
2. He is gifted with "the subordination of its faculties to each other according to their relative worth and dignity".