Who Is Coleridge's 'Work Without Hope'?

Written in 1825, Coleridge’s “Work Without Hope” is a sonnet relating nature to the emotions of the speaker. The imagery used throughout the poem is both a reflection of the natural world and a reference to the speaker’s mental state. Seasons are used in the poem to relate what the speaker is feeling, and how it affects his life. Described as “lines composed on a day in February,” or during the beginning of spring, we realize that the speaker is truly contemplating the ideas presented throughout the poem.
“Work Without Hope” is a sonnet, although it is not written in traditional sonnet form. The development of the poem is presented the same way as in a sonnet; the poem develops in the first 12 lines. The last two lines then present the overall