Coleridge was that rare creature, a superb poet who could also grapple with the deepest of philosophers. He could brilliantly summarise the two basic possible lines in philosophy: "The difference between Aristotle and Plato is that which will remain as long as we are men and there is any difference between man and man in point of opinion. Plato, with Pythagoras before him, had conceived that the phenomenon or outside appearance, all that we call thing or matter, is but as it were a language by which the invisible (that which is not the object of our senses) communicates its existence to our finite beings ... Aristotle, on the contrary, affirmed that all our knowledge had begun in experience, had begun through the senses, and that from the senses only we could take our notions of reality ... It was the first way in which, plainly and distinctly, two opposite systems were placed before the mind of the world."

Although Coleridge adhered to Platonism, he honestly admitted, "All these poetico-philosophical Arguments strike and shatter themselves into froth against that stubborn rock, the fact of Consciousness, or rather its dependence on the body."

Like other notable literary biographies - one thinks of Holmes' earlier one of Shelley, Richard Ellman's of Oscar Wilde, Peter Ackroyd's of Charles Dickens, Tim Hilton's of John Ruskin, E. P. Thompson's of William Morris, and Leon Edel's of Henry James - this wonderful book arouses our enthusiasm for literature. It shows us again how a great writer's work can help us both to enjoy and to make sense of the world.


Makes excellent reading even for those who aren't into poets   February 20, 2000
 2 out of 2 found this review helpful

Richard Holmes is a wonderful biographer. He writes as if he is talking to the reader. I read this book, before reading the earlier one. Nevertheless, this book reads well by itself and makes the reader want to find out more about the man. I knew very little about Coleridge before reading this book. Apart from struggling with the Ancient Mariner as a 15 year old! After reading Holmes, I bought his earlier book, an audio-tape of poems and a selected collection of poetry. Richard Holmes opened a door for me. He can do the same for you.


Review of Holmes' Book by a Fellow Coleridge Biographer   April 21, 1999
 3 out of 15 found this review helpful

As a spectacularly brilliant but moody young man in his twenties, Coleridge already was a first-rate writer, an erudite thinker, a dedicated diarist, an impressive scholar, a spellbinding conversationalist, a charismatic public speaker, an inspiring religious preacher, a promising dramatist, an accomplished journalist and the author of at least two masterpieces which have stood the test of time (KUBLA KHAN and THE RIME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER). But unfortunately for Coleridge (and for posterity), he also was in the process of becoming an opium-addicted, alcohol dependent manic depressive with a "fatal attraction" to William Wordsworth. Richard Holmes accurately describes that fatal attraction and peculiar attachment to Wordsworth with narrative skill in his well-written, two volume biography. But he bends over backwards not to analyze the conscious and unconscious basis of Coleridge's self-destructiveness. While such conjectural restraint may be commendable as a general principle of biography, it comes at too high a price if the subject is someone like Coleridge (or other "confessional poets" like Sylvia Plath or Ann Sexton)--who actually happens to be actively suffering from one or more major mental illnesses. Although modern psychiatric diagnostic terminology did not exist in Coleridge's day, the conditions existed. From Holmes' account, there is no doubt that many of the physicians who treated Coleridge in his later years recognized the fact that he was suffering from substance abuse and a mood disorder. As a result of his decision to avoid pathologizing his subject by playing amateur psychiatrist, Holmes also avoids engaging in any in-depth discussion of the mercurial moods and mysterious motives which could help shed light on Coleridge's otherwise baffling attachment to Wordsworth. Not only does Holmes ignore Coleridge's manic depression and its downwardly spiralling reciprocal interaction with drugs and alcohol, he also avoids examining Coleridge's latent homosexuality: the compulsive brother hunger and neurotic guilt that drove him into his downwardly spiralling friendship with Wordsworth. Richard Holmes' two volume biography is an excellent study of Coleridge's mind as reflected through the prisms of his poetry, letters and diaries. But it fails to explore Coleridge's unconscious mind and leaves us still searching for answers. Stephen M. Weissman,M.D. Author of HIS BROTHER'S KEEPER: A PSYCHOBIOGRAPHY OF SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE (1985)