Biographia Literaria
Assigned by 1 of the 9 reading lists, catalogue entry only
- Written
- 1817
- Form
- Essay
- Language
- English
- Length
- Long · 350 pp300 to 700 pages
- Difficulty
- Difficult4 of 5 for a first-year reader
We recommendBiographia LiterariaOxford World's Classics, 2013Adam Roberts' annotated edition; Everyman and Princeton editions also exist.
These links go straight to Amazon and Bookshop.org and earn this site nothing today. Prices are the same either way. How this works.
Part memoir, part philosophy and part criticism, written at speed in 1815 and published two years later. The first volume recounts Coleridge's education, his early poetry and friendship with Wordsworth, then turns to Hartley, Kant and Schelling to argue for a theory of mind in which the imagination is an active power distinct from fancy. The second volume applies the theory to Wordsworth, praising his genius and dissecting the theory of poetic language in the preface to Lyrical Ballads. The book is discursive, digressive and central to English criticism.
No reading guide yet
The catalogue entry above is complete: the dates, the form, the themes and every program that assigns Biographia Literaria are verified against each program's published list.
What is missing is the part that takes real work: the summary, the key passages, and a recommended translation. The edition named below is the one most programs assign, so the buy links are useful already.