Education, Criticism and the Creative Imagination: the legacy of William Hazlitt

William Hazlitt (1778–1830), one of the most important critics of the English Romantic Period, held and published highly developed views about the nature of the creative imagination, the function of criticism and what it means to be truly learned [1]. Although he never advanced an explicit theory of education, least of all one about the purposes of schooling, his principles of thought and action and his thesis about style and structure in writing are highly relevant to contemporary discussions of what counts as genuine learning and teaching and the intellectual vocation of members of the educational academy.