Coleridge-ch-1 - Biographia Literaria

Name: Sonal Baraiya.

Roll No.: 34.

Sub: Paper. No-3-Literary Theory & Criticism

Topic: Biographia Literaria Ch.14: Coleridge

                           

               Samuel Taylor Coleridge was born on 1772 in Devonshire, and was the youngest of the thirteen children of the Vicar of Ottery St Mary. As a child he was unusually precocious:

                                ‘‘I never thought as a child,’’

he says,

                           ‘‘never had the language of a child,’’

that are we see in his ‘‘Biographia Literaria.’’ In  the 1817, when he had shaken himself free from opium, he published –

                           ‘‘Biographia Literaria,’’ and

                             Sibylline Leaves.’’

                                                  Biographia Literaria is his most valuable prose work. It pretends to record his literary upbringing. Biographia Literaria in establishing Coleridge as the greatest of English critics. Coleridge’s critical work is contained in 24 chapters of Biographia Literaria (1815 – 17). In this critical disquisition, Coleridge concerns himself not only with the practice of criticize but also, with its theory.

                                         

                                                When we see his practical approach to criticism, Coleridge the poet but whereas in theoretical discussion, Coleridge the philosopher came to the center stage. In philosophical terms, Coleridge’s view on nature and function of poetry is discussed. The poet within Coleridge discusses the difference between poetry and prose, and the immediate function of poetry whereas the philosopher discusses the difference between poetry and poem. S. T. Coleridge was the first English writer to insist that every work of art is, by its very nature, an organic whole.

                                 

                       Here S. T. Coleridge discussed –

                Two cardinal points of poetry:

Coleridge begins this chapter with his views on two cardinal points of poetry. To him these cardinal points are –

(1)  The power of exciting the sympathy of the reader by a faithful adherence to the truth of nature, and

(2)  The power of giving the interest of novelty by modifying with the colours of imagination.

         According to him, it was decided that Wordsworth would write poetry dealing with the theme of first cardinal points and the other was to be dealt by him. For the first type of poetry, the treatment and subject matter should be, to quote Coleridge,

       ‘‘The sudden charm, which accidents of light and shade, which moon – light or sun – set diffused over a known and familiar landscape, appeared to represent the practicability of combining both. These are the poetry of Nature.’’

            In such poems, subjects were to be chosen from ordinary life and through this poet express his or her point of view very clearly.

            In the second type of poetry, the incidents and agents were to be supernatural. In this sort of poetry to quote Coleridge,

    ‘‘the excellence aimed at was to consist in the interesting of the affections by the dramatic truth of such emotions as would naturally accompany such situation, supposing them real. And real in this sense they have been to every human being who, from whatever source of delusion, has at anytime believed himself under supernatural agency.’’

        Thus with the help of imagination  the natural will be dealt supernaturally by the poet and the reader will comprehend it with – willing suspension of disbelief.’’

                 The Lyrical Ballads consists of poems dealing with these two cardinal points, wherein the endeavour of Coleridge was to deal with – ‘‘persons and characters supernatural,’’ and that of Wordsworth –

             ‘‘was to give the charm of  novelty to things of every day, by awakening the mind’s attention from the lethargy of custom, and directing in to the loveliness and the wonders of the world before us.’’ 
                                  

               Coleridge’s views towards Wordsworth’s poetic creed.

               

        In defense of Wordsworth’s poetic creed: Coleridge, even though he did not agree with Wordsworth’s views on poetic diction, vindicated his poetic creed in chapter 14 of Biographia Literaria. Coleridge writes in defense to the violent assailant to the ‘‘Language of real life’’ adopted by Wordsworth in the Lyrical Ballads. There had been strong criticism against Wordsworth’s views expressed in preface also. Coleridge writes in his defense:

               ‘‘Had Mr. Wordsworth’s poems been the silly, the childish things, which they were for a long time described as being; had they been really distinguished from the compositions of other poets merely by meanness of language and inanity of thought; had they indeed contained nothing more than what is found in the parodies and pretended imitations of them; they must have sunk at once, a dead weight, into the slough of oblivion, and have dragged the preface along with them.’’

     He wrote that the ‘eddy of criticism’ which whirled around these poems and preface would have dragged them in oblivion. But it has not happened. Instead, to quote Coleridge,

                                            ‘‘Year after year increased the number of Mr.Wordsworth’s admirers. They were found too not in the lower classes of the reading public, but chiefly among young men of strong ability and meditative minds; and their admiration was distinguished by its intensity, I might almost say, by its religious fervor.’’

                  

       Thus, Coleridge gives full credit to the genius of Wordsworth.

        Hence, we  may say that, Coleridge is frank enough to point out that some of the views of Wordsworth were wrong in principle and contradictory, not only in parts of the preface but also in the practice of the poet himself in many of his poems.

     Difference between prose and poem – The poem contains the same elements as a prose composition. But the difference is between the   combination of those elements and objects aimed at in both the composition.

POEM – composition in verse.

PROSE – Universal writing.

·       The difference of the object will be the difference of the combination.

·       The object of the poet may simply be to facilitate the memory to recollect certain facts.

·       He would make use of certain artificial arrangement of words with the help of metre.

·       As a result composition will be a poem.

·       Because it is distinguished from composition in prose by metre, or by rhyme.

·       One might attribute the name of a poem to the well-known enumeration of the days in the several months; Thirty days hath September, April, June, and November,&c.

·       Thus, to Coleridge, mere super addition of meter or rhyme does not make a poem.

·       In scientific and historical composition, the immediate purpose is to convey the truth.

·       In the prose works of other kinds, to give pleasure is the immediate purpose and the ultimate end may be to give truth.

·       Thus, the communication of pleasure may be the immediate object of a work not metrically composed.

Now the question is – would then the mere super addition of metre, with or without rhyme, entitle these to the name of poems? – Then Coleridge gave answered that –

                         ‘‘Metre should not be added to provide merely a superficial decorative charm. Nothing can permanently please, which does not contain in itself the reason why it is so, and not otherwise. If metre is super added, all other, parts must be made constant with it. They all must harmonize with each other.’’

          Thus, according to Coleridge, the poem is distinguished form prose compositions by its immediate object. The immediate object of prose is to give truth and that of poem is to please. He again distinguishes those prose compositions from poem whose object is similar to poem i.e. to please. He calls this poem a legitimate poem and defines it as,

               ‘‘it must be one, the parts of which mutually support and explain each other; all in their proportion harmonizing with, and supporting the purpose and known influence of metrical arrangement.’’

·       According to Coleridge – the journey of reading poem should be pleasurable.

·       Poem has its own distinctive pleasure.

·       Pleasure arising from the parts.

·       This pleasure of the parts supports and increases the pleasure of the whole.

The difference between poem and poetry –

           In that Coleridge quote that poetry is so nearly with the poem. The one is involved in the solution of the other for it is a – ‘‘distinction resulting from the poetic genius itself, which sustains and modifies the images, thoughts, and emotions of the poet’s own mind.’’

John  Shaw cross – writes ‘‘this distinction between ‘poetry’ and ‘poem’ is not clear, and instead of defining poetry he proceeds to describe a poet, and from the poet he characteristics of the imagination.’’

·       ‘Poetry’ for Coleridge is an activity of the poet’s mind.

·       A poem is merely one of the forms of its expression.

·       A verbal expression of that activity.

·       Poetic activity is basically an activity of the imagination.

David Daiches – writes ‘poetry’ for Coleridge is a wider category than a ‘poem’; that is, poetry is a kind of activity which can be engaged in by painters or philosophers or scientists and is not confined to those who employ metrical language, or even to those who employ language of any  kind. Poetry, in this larger sense, brings, ‘ the whole soul of man; into activity, with each faculty playing its proper part according to its ‘relative worth and dignity’.

                           This takes place whenever the synthesizing, the integrating, powers of the secondary imagination are at work bringing all aspects of a subject into a complex unity, then poetry in this larger sense results.

·       Virtue of Coleridge’s imagination, which is a synthetic and magical power.

·       He harmonize and blends together various elements.

·       Thus diffuses a tone and spirit of unity over the whole.

·       It manifests itself most clearly in the balance or reconciliation of opposite or discordant qualities – Such as:

             (A)of sameness, with difference,

             (B) of the general, with the concrete,

(C) the idea, with the image,

(D)    the individual, with the representative,

(E)  the sense of novelty and freshness, with old and familiar objects,

(F)   a more than usual state of emotion, with more than usual order,

(G)       judgment with enthusiasm.

And while this imagination blends and harmonizes the natural and the artificial, it subordinates to nature, the manner to the matter, and our admiration of the poet to our sympathy with the poetry. Doubtless, as Sir John Davies – observes of the soul – ‘‘Doubtless this could not be, but that she turns…

    Finally, Good sense is the Body of poetic genius, fancy its Drapery, Motion its Life, and Imagination the soul that is everywhere, and in each; and forms all into one graceful and intelligent whole.

                                            Thus, Coleridge is the first English critic who based his literary criticism on philosophical principles. He interested in the creative process that made it.