Lake poets

William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge collaborated together in creating a collection of poems - "Lyrical Ballads" ("Лирические баллады") (1798). In the preface to the 2^nd edition of the collection Wordsworth proclaimed their literary credo. He stated that poetry should be simple and understandable to common people, i. e. it should be written in the living language and should deal with day-to-day realities. In a way he followed this principle. Most of his poems tell about the life of the peasants and are full of love for them as well as naivety and simplicity of childhood (as for example in the following poems - "We are Seven" ("Нас семеро"), "The Last of the Flock" ("Последний из стада"), "The Idiot Boy", ("Юродивый мальчик"), "Lucy Gray, or Solitude" ("Люси Грей"), etc.).

Wordsworth also revived the genre of the sonnet which had been forgotten for almost 2 centuries. The most famous collection of his sonnets is the "Sonnets Dedicated to Liberty " ("Сонеты, посвященные свободе") (1802 - 1807), in which he glorifies the national liberation movements in Europe.

Nevertheless the most famous sonnet by Wordsworth is the following one - "Scorn not the Sonnet" ("He хмурься, критик") (1827) in which the author traces the history of the sonnet as a genre. This sonnet was translated by Pushkin.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge dreamed of establishing an ideal human society. And to implement the dream he together with S о u t h e у planned to sail to America and set up a perfect community called "pantisocracy" ("пантисократия"), where all people would be equal. But they had too little money to realize the idea.

To the collection of " L у r i с a 1 Ballads" he contributed a long narrative poem "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner" ("Сказание о старом мореходе"). This poem tells of "the old mariner", who kills an albatross (this bird is a good sign for sailors). As a result a disaster befalls the ship: there is no wind at sea and the ship cannot move. All the sailors die one by one and the only person who survives is that mariner. God sees his repentance and saves him. In the poem the author shows his ability to combine a beautiful language and a profound moral.

Coleridge also wrote a number of short lyrical poems, full of profound meditation of life and literature. There are also some other poems which Coleridge left unfinished - "Kubla Khan" ("КублаХан"), "Christabel" ("Кристабель") (both- 1816).

Robert Southey was the most revolutionary of all the Lakers in his youth, and the most conservative in his older age.

In his youth he published a poem which was dedicated to the leader of the Peasants' Revolt -Wat Tylor ("Уот Тайлер") (1793). But then he wrote panegyric poems to the King and the Royal family.

Most of his poems are dedicated to historical past or folklore (ballads). They are permeated with fantasy and mysticism - "The Old Woman of Berkeley" ("Баллада, в которой описывается, как одна старушка ехала на чёрном коне вдвоём и кто сидел впереди") (1799). Southey's ballads were translated by many Russian poets - Pushkin, Zhukovsky, Gumilev, etc.