Thinking Activity: Wordsworth & Coleridge:

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Maharaja Krishnakumar Singhji Bhavnagar University at, Head of English Department Dr. Dilip Barad sir, This work given to students by two blogs -Thinking Activity: Wordsworth & Coleridge:

1. Write a brief note on the views of Wordsworth and Coleridge on Poem.

Stephen Maxfield Parrish, Cornell University No statement in the Preface to Lyrical Ballads provoked Coleridge so sharply as Wordsworth's claim that "there neither is, nor can be, any essential difference between the language of prose and metrical composition." Quoting the claim in Chapter 18 of Biographia Literaria, Coleridge called it "the most important" of the points he desired to refute, "its examination having been, indeed, my chief inducement for the preceding inquisition" (by which he seems to have meant Chapter 17). The refutation he arrived at  could hardly have been blunter: "there may be, is, and ought to be an essential difference between the language of prose and of metrical composition." In the course of his argument, Coleridge was driven to a close analysis of meter. Wordsworth, having ruled out all other candidates, had left meter, so Coleridge reasoned, as "the sole acknowledged difference"  between verse and prose, and that a relatively slight one. Coleridge, therefore, bent on asserting & deep and essential difference, seemed to elevate meter to high importance, setting it in intimate union with other discriminants of verse-language, style, passion. Where Wordsworth, in short, disparaged meter as ornamental, "adventitious to composition," no more than a "superadded charm," Coleridge defended meter as organic, essential to composition, uniquely valuable in stimulating the reader to keener aesthetic perception. Or so convention has it. But I should like to suggest that convention errs; that this view, however widely held, is misleading, even inaccurate. It seems to me hardly too bold to assert that Wordsworth, far from the disparaging meter, gave it the highest possible importance, while Coleridge made it a relatively insignificant feature of poetry. Wordsworth's ideas, in particular, seem to me to have been misgendered Selincourt and Darbishire, eds, Poetical Works of William Wordsworth, s vols (Oxford, 1940-49), 392. Hereafter cited as PW. Biegraphia Lileraria, ed. J. Shawcross, a vols. (Oxford, go), n, 45. Hereafter cited as BL Among the most recent authoritative studies to echo this view is René Wellek's History of Modern Criticism: 1750-1950, Vol u: The Romantic Age (New Haven, 1955), Pp. 169-70: "Coleridge...writes an excellent defense of meter against Words- worth's comparative disparagement of it as a mere 'superadded charm." The last phrase, incidentally, though much-quoted, does not appear in Wordsworth.

2. Analyze 2 poems with reference to Wordsworth and Coleridge's views.

1). "Daffodils" by William Wordsworth poem

Historical Context
William Wordsworth was not without his share of loss. In fact, he lost his mother when he was seven, and his father when he was thirteen. As if that were not enough loss for one person, three of his children preceded him in death. This background gives this particular poem greater meaning. The poem reveals that the speaker feels far more comfortable and peaceful when thinking about the afterlife than he feels at home on his couch in real life. This reveals a sense of longing for what is after and a sense of disappointment in the earthly life. This experience of wandering like a cloud was either a dream or a vision, a glimpse of heaven. Whatever this experience was, it is clear that Wordsworth holds on to the memory of this experience to give him hope in life.

This poem is very simple, and it is considered one of the loveliest and most famous in the Wordsworth canon. It revisits the familiar subjects of nature and memory, this time with a particularly (simple) spare, musical eloquence. It also reflects his concept of the romanticism imagination and his belief in the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings, which he acknowledged as the theory of poetry. The plot is extremely simple, depicting the poet’s wandering and his discovery of a field of daffodils by a lake, the memory of which pleases him and comforts him when he is lonely, bored, or restless. The daffodils are continually personified as human beings, dancing and “tossing their heads” in “a crowd, a host.” This technique implies an inherent unity between man and nature, making it one of Wordsworth’s most basic and effective methods.

     It was inspired by an April 15, 1802 event in which Wordsworth and his sister, Dorothy, came across a “long belt” of daffodils, Written in 1804, it was first published in 1807 the poems in two volumes, and a revised version was released in 1815, which is more commonly known. It consists of four six-line stanzas, in iambic tetrameter and an ABABCC rhyme scheme.

       As the Journal notes, it was a stormy day, which the reader would never guess from reading the poem. He later writes that it rained on them, and they had to go home. Again, somebody thinks that “I wandered lonely as a Cloud” is the perfect poem for a rainy day, and the image of dancing daffodils is a sure-fire cure for a mild case of the blues. Plus, it’s slightly hilarious.  It is a poem that just makes the reader feel good about life. It says that even when someone feels lonely and missing his friends, he can use his imagination to fine new friends in the world around him. His happiness of the narrator does not last forever – he’s not that unrealistic – but the daffodils give him a little boost of joy whenever he needs it, like recharging his batteries. The poem is combined with the theme of man and the natural world, theme of spirituality and theme of memory and past.

2).“Kubla Khan”by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

The poem Kubla Khan is highly imaginative, in which, after each stanza, the level of imaginations and creativity goes deeper. The poem focuses on the “willing suspension of disbelief” i.e. the reader must quit his rationality in order to understand the creativity of the poem.

To understand that poetry is very fictional, Dr J .H Khan, Professor and Head, Department of English, Sardar Patel University,. For more information on the depth of Samuel Taylor Coleridge's work Click here 

Thank you