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Coleridge

Coleridge and Auden on Puns

By Mark McGuinness

Great minds think alike: And Puns, then best when exquisitely bad; (S.T. Coleridge, poem quoted in Letter to John Thelwall, 31 December 1796) Good poets have a weakness for bad puns. (W.H. Auden, ‘The Truest Poetry is the most Feigning’) I’m tempted to call this 1-0 to Auden: he trumps Coleridge for pithiness, memorability and […]

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