DIFFERENCE BETWEEN WILLIAM WORDSWORTH AND S.T.COLERIDGE'S VIEW ON POETRY

DIFFERENCE BETWEEN WILLIAM WORDSWORTH AND SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE’S VIEW ON POETRY.                            

Introduction:-

Coleridge and Wordsworth collaboratively published 'Lyrical Ballads' in 1798, marking the rise of the British Romantic movement. According to Coleridge, in their collective plans it was agreed Coleridge would compose a series of lyrical poems exploring the Romantic and supernatural, and seeking there to earn a readers’ “poetic faith,” while Wordsworth decided to use the nature and the everyday as his subject in poems. Pairing these two approaches, the poets expected, to bring into coordination of “the two cardinal points of poetry, the power of exciting the sympathy of the reader by a faithful adherence to the truth of nature, and the power of giving the interest of novelty by the modifying colours of imagination.”

Coleridge contributed his well-known poem, 'Rime of the Ancient Mariner', while Wordsworth ultimately composed the bulk of the collection. After the publication of Lyrical Ballads, the twosome traveled throughout Europe. Afterwards, Coleridge lectured and traveled extensively, and, while battling an opium addiction, moved in with physician James Gillman in 1816. The following year 'Biographia Literaria', a fusion of autobiography, literary criticism, and religious and philosophical theory, was published.

 William Wordsworth’s view about poetry:-

                          In the preface to the Lyrical Ballads, Wordsworth defines poetry

"Poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings; it takes its origin from emotion recollected in tranquility."

                               The "spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings” and "emotion recollected in tranquility" are two opposite statements. "Spontaneous overflow" must be instant.  The expression "recollected in tranquility"; "Recollection" means recollection some memories after some interval of time.  Immediate overflow of emotions has a merger of both good and bad events.  When they are allowed to rest for some time, only the good events remain in the memory. The poet's expression of those powerful feelings must be easy, smooth and natural.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge's view about Poetry:-

“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. He diffuses a tone and spirit of unity that blends and (as it were) fuses, each into each, by that synthetic and magical power to which we have exclusive appropriated the name of imagination. This power, first put in action by the will and understanding and retained under their irremissive, though gentle and unnoticed, control (laxis effertur habenis [i. e. driven with loosened reins]) reveals itself in the balance or reconciliation of opposite or discordant qualities: of sameness, with difference; of the general, with the concrete; the idea, with the image; the individual, with the representative; the sense of novelty and freshness, with old and familiar objects; a more than usual state of emotion, with more than usual order; judgment ever awake and steady self-possession, with enthusiasm and feeling profound or vehement; and while it blends and harmonizes the natural and the artificial, still subordinates art to nature; the manner to the matter, and our admiration of the poet to our sympathy with the poetry. “

— “Biographia Literaria”, Chapter 14

William wordsworth:- 1.)          He sought to give the charm of novelty to things of everyday objects of nature by colouring it with the power of imagination. 2.)          Presented the common and simple life of peasants and shepherds – realistic description of his experience. 3.)          He remained of the earth and his own time. 4.)          Teacher- moralist 5.)          Lack musical quality- ‘has no ear for fine sound’. 6.)          Simplicity in diction- no difference between prose and poetry. 7.)          High priest of nature.

S.T.Coleridge:-     1.)   He sought to give    the charm of novelty to things of everyday objects – by making supernatural natural. 2.) Introduced dream like quality- element of mystery- wonder and supernatural. 3.) Went to Middle Ages- created the atmosphere of magic/mystery. 4.)Artist 5.) ‘epicure in sounds’- master of melody. 6.) Element of mysticism in diction- he differentiates prose and poetry in diction. 7.) Lived in the world of fancy and thoughts.

In Imaginative power and Narrative Skills, Coleridge surpassed Wordsworth.

Difference Between Wordsworth and Coleridge:-

1.) Wordsworth writes in a subjective style. He evaluates his view before composing an imaginative work. This is to a great extent why he experienced passionate feelings for in nature and turned into a nature admirer. He trusts in an ancient relationship between the soul of man and the nature around him. Coleridge then again is very objective. His works emerge out of the truthful and historical priority that involves his life.

2.) Wordsworth’s poetry is very following, genuine and stay in a lonely thought. Coleridge writes in parts and he is not able to keep up a solitary thought likely because of his opium use which he is infamous for.

 3.)   Wordsworth builds up in his well-known prelude that there is no contrast between the dialects of composition and verses as they both one and the same thing. Coleridge separates these two ideas on the premise that verse contains meter and rhyme while exposition doesn't contain these.

4.) Wordsworth’s well-known preface can be viewed as the announcement of sentimentalism on the grounds that it resonances key element fundamental in progress of the sentimental people.

 Coleridge's Biographia Literaria is generally a self-portraying works which drifted from its quick reason along the work's course.

5.) Wordsworth trusts that verse should contain occasions from genuine, regular and ordinary life while Coleridge trusts that this component is excessively restricting.

6.) Wordsworth trusts that a sonnet should  be free and that it should come out of effective feelings which are remembered in rapture or peacefulness, while Coleridge trusts that verse manages the correspondence of both truth and delight and that a few ballads may even need joy and convey just truth as it is.

7.) Wordsworth picked low and rustic life, where the important desires of the heart find a better place to express one’s feelings. They are less under limit and speak a simple and more definite language. In rustic life our basic feelings exist in greater simplicity. The manners of rural life, comes out from those basic feelings and from the necessary character of rural occupations, are more easily realized and are more strong. The feelings of men are combined with the beautiful and permanent forms of nature.

Characters in poems like Ruth, Micha, Coleridge points out, first, that not all Wordsworth characters el, The Brothers, are not low and rustic.

8.) The language of common men is used because they communicate with the best objects from which the best part of language is originally derives. They convey their feelings and ideas in simple and outright expressions because of their rank in society and the equality and narrow circle of their intercourse.

Coleridge objects to the view that the best part of language is derived from the objects with which the rustic hourly communicates. First, communication with an object implies reflection on it and the richness of vocabulary arises from such reflection. Now the rural conditions of life do not require any reflection, hence the vocabulary of the rustics is poor. They can express only the barest facts of nature and not the ideas and thoughts which results from their reflection. Secondly, the best part of a man’s language does not result merely from communication with nature, but from education, from the mind of noble thoughts and ideals. Whatever rustics use, are derived not from nature, but from The Bible and inspired preachers.

9.) Wordsworth made a number of statements regarding the language and diction of poetry.

 Of these, Coleridge refutes the following parts: “a selection or the real language of men”; “the language of the men in low and rustic life”: and, “Between the language of prose and that of metrical composition there neither is, nor can be, any essential difference”.

Coleridge takes up his statements, one by one, and proves that his views are not reasonable. Wordsworth asserts that the language of poetry is:

“A selection of the real language of men or the very language of men; and that there was no essential difference between the language of prose and that of poetry”.

Coleridge replies that,

“‘Every man’s language’ varies according to the extent of his knowledge, the activity of his faculties, and the depth or quickness of his feelings”.

Every man’s language has, first, its individual peculiarities; secondly, the properties common to his class; and thirdly, words and phrases of universal use.

“No two men of the same class or of different classes speak alike, although both use words and phrases common to them all, because in the one case their natures are different and on the other their classes are different”.

The language varies from person to person, class to class, place to place.

CONCLUSION:-

Both the writers Wordsworth and Coleridge have his own views about poetry. Coleridge and Wordsworth’s differences and similarities is what made their bond, each had their own mind-set on what they wrote about, and I think that is what countered each other to make for such great partners. They both used their imaginations to write their pieces. Coleridge seems more complex and uses weird imagery in his poems, while Wordsworth seems more easily understood and displays different views of nature and its tranquility. He also believes that every day used language is what should be used in poetry. Coleridge on the other hand believes that an everyday language isn’t what makes poetry, and doesn’t think it belongs in it. He thinks a more creative language and diction should belong. I do believe that Coleridge did share the same ideology with Wordsworth, but showed it in a more difficult way. For Wordsworth nature seems to symbolize love and misery of man. He uses his imagination, and expresses emotion in his poems. Coleridge says that poetry is clearly different from nature. Reading the poems of both Wordsworth and Coleridge, you can definitely see a difference in the simple-minded views by Wordsworth and the strange conceptions of Coleridge. But that is what makes both of their views in life and poetry harmonious.


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