"Genial" Perception: Wordsworth, Coleridge and the Myth of Genius in the Long Eighteenth Century

William C. Edinger

ISBN 10: 1638040222 / ISBN 13: 9781638040224

Published by Clemson University Digital Press, 2022

About this Item

Genial Perception offers a critical examination of Wordsworth's and Coleridge'snaturalist construction of creative and critical perception, and a historical study of the perceptual dimension of poetic taste. "Genial" is the adjectival form of "genius," and eighteenth-century critical naturalism understands "genial" perception as a gift of nature, as an inborn power operating autonomously through the senses and imagination and thus independently of cultural influence. By exploring the philology of keywords and binaries inherited by the two poet-critics and used to describe and interpret their perceptual experience, both creative (imaginative) and critical, Genial Perception traces how that experience reveals an unacknowledged indebtedness to discourse and language, having beensilently and perhaps unconsciously shaped by patterns and trends in the literary culture in which Wordsworth and Coleridge came of age. This study shows that critical perception, often thought to be too elusive and subjective to make a proper subject for historical investigation, can be approached through study of the terms--the language--of the practical criticism that attempts to communicate it; that both critical andcreative perception are far more dependent on language than is commonly recognized; and that philology, by recovering the original usage, functions, and contexts of critical keywords, provides for an accurate historical understanding of the claims made by critics in the long eighteenth century for"genial" perception, and can illuminate the dynamics of "genial" perception itself.

Seller Inventory # 0104681

Bibliographic Details

• Title: "Genial" Perception: Wordsworth, Coleridge and the Myth of Genius in the Long Eighteenth Century
• Publisher: Clemson University Digital Press
• Publication Date: 2022
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1638040222
• ISBN 13: 9781638040224
• Binding: Hardback
• Condition: New

About this title

Synopsis

Genial Perception offers a critical examination of Wordsworth’s and Coleridge’s naturalist construction of creative and critical perception, and a historical study of the perceptual dimension of poetic taste. “Genial” is the adjectival form of “genius,” and eighteenth-century critical naturalism understands “genial” perception as a gift of nature, as an inborn power operating autonomously through the senses and imagination and thus independently of cultural influence.

By exploring the philology of keywords and binaries inherited by the two poet-critics and used to describe and interpret their perceptual experience, both creative (imaginative) and critical, Genial Perception traces how that experience reveals an unacknowledged indebtedness to discourse and language, having been silently and perhaps unconsciously shaped by patterns and trends in the literary culture in which Wordsworth and Coleridge came of age.

This study shows that critical perception, often thought to be too elusive and subjective to make a proper subject for historical investigation, can be approached through study of the terms―the language―of the practical criticism that attempts to communicate it; that both critical and creative perception are far more dependent on language than is commonly recognized; and that philology, by recovering the original usage, functions, and contexts of critical keywords, provides for an accurate historical understanding of the claims made by critics in the long eighteenth century for “genial” perception, and can illuminate the dynamics of “genial” perception itself.

About the Author

William C. Edinger was a professor of English at the University of Maryland, Baltimore. He was a specialist in poetry and 18th century literature and was a founder of the English Department Honors Program. He passed away in 2021.