The Early Coleridge: His “Rage for Metaphysics”
In 1797–98 Coleridge wrote a series of five autobiographical letters in which he presumably recounted everything which he remembered or had been told regarding the period from his birth (21 October, 1772) to his departure from Christ's Hospital in 1791. As it turned out, these first recollectio...
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| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
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| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
Cambridge Univ. Press
1961
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| In: |
Harvard theological review
Year: 1961, Volume: 54, Issue: 2, Pages: 99-123 |
| Online Access: |
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| Summary: | In 1797–98 Coleridge wrote a series of five autobiographical letters in which he presumably recounted everything which he remembered or had been told regarding the period from his birth (21 October, 1772) to his departure from Christ's Hospital in 1791. As it turned out, these first recollections were only a beginning, for Coleridge continued to add to them for the greater part of his life, the most notable additions being contained in the Biographia Literaria and in the biographical notes which he gave to James Gillman. When all of the recollections are assembled, they present an account of the boy Coleridge which would seem hardly creditable even if it were consistent, and it has seemed much less creditable when it is compared with the account furnished by the juvenilia. For this reason, perhaps, the account given by the recollections has presented a problem to biographers. Some of them have dismissed it altogether as a creation of Coleridge's over-active imagination; others have respected it by ignoring the juvenilia or by dealing with the recollections and the juvenilia separately, as if they related to two different persons. In no instance has anyone attempted to reconcile the two accounts. It has seemed to me that such a reconciliation ought to be attempted; for, to the extent that the recollections are dependable, they should provide an invaluable clue, not only to an understanding of Coleridge's early writings, but, more importantly, to an understanding of the basis and direction of his mature thought. |
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| ISSN: | 1475-4517 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Harvard theological review
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1017/S0017816000025967 |