AU237 – The Poetry Of Wordsworth and Coleridge

Wordsworth and Coleridge are two of the UK’s finest poets.

This class aims to sharpen enjoyment and pleasure in some of their greatest poems.

We often think of Wordsworth as the poet of the Lake District but he actually wrote some of his greatest poetry in Somerset – where he’d moved to be close to Coleridge in the foothills of the Quantocks. This class will look at some of the poems they wrote in Somerset and elsewhere. It will aim to bring the verse to life by exploring the lives and personalities of the two men and looking at the (often surprising) background to some of their best poems. We’ll discuss the poems and share opinions (and hopefully there will be some lively differences of opinion!).

Some of the themes to be explored are:

Revolution – the impact of the French Revolution on both men

Nature

Friendship

Betrayal

The Women in their Lives

Resilience and Madness

Death