Verbal Imagination: Coleridge and the Language of Modern Criticism

This study traces Coleridge's developing meditation on language in relation to his idea of poetry and in connection with the formation of Cambridge English under the auspices of I. A. Richards. Coleridge on language has haunted the modern critical imagination since the time of Richards; Coleridge's institutional inheritors have defined their orientation not only by their attitude to Richards himself, but also by their sense of Coleridge's achievement, particularly his thought on language and imagination. The New Criticism in America made Coleridge the touchstone of critical value, stressing the idealist implications of his "imagination," but missing the subversive force of his meditation on language. Goodson here provides an integrated account of the development of Coleridge's critical position while following its implications for modern criticism.