Samuel Taylor Coleridge by Peter Vandyke © National Portrait Gallery, London

Information source from the British Library: “One of the most influential and controversial figures of the Romantic period, Samuel Taylor Coleridge was born in 1772 the son of a clergyman in Ottery St Mary, Devon. His career as a poet and writer was established after he befriended Wordsworth and together they produced Lyrical Ballads in 1798.

For most of his adult life he suffered through addiction to laudanum and opium. His most famous works – ‘The Rime of the Ancient Mariner‘, ‘Kubla Khan‘ and ‘Christabel’ – all featured supernatural themes and exotic images, perhaps affected by his use of the drugs.

Coleridge was as much a prose and theoretical writer as he was a poet, as revealed in his major work, Biographia Literaria, published in 1817. Coleridge’s legacy has been tainted with accusations of plagiarism, both in his poetry and critical essays. He also had a propensity for leaving projects unfinished and suffered from large debts. But, such was the originality of his early work, that his place and influence within the Romantic period is undisputed.

Further information about the life of Samuel Taylor Coleridge can be found via the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.”

Sketch map & notes of the Lake District from Notebook (Vol II)

“In August 1802, Samuel Taylor Coleridge set out from his home at Greta Hall, Keswick, for a week’s solo walking-tour in the nearby Cumbrian mountains, a feat that required both daring and physical stamina. His circular route took in Scafell, England’s highest mountain. He kept detailed notes of the landscape around him, drawing rough sketches and maps as well as describing in words what he saw. These notes and sketches are in Notebook No 2, one of 64 notebooks Coleridge kept between 1794 and his death. 55 of them are now in the British Library. Together, these form a fascinating record of his random thoughts and observations, with drafts of poems and extracts from the books he was reading.” (credit)

More resources:

Blog post analyzing Coleridge’s walk(s), including maps, and photographs from present day.

Wiki post analyzing Coleridge’s friendship with Wordsworth, includes further links