Lyrical Ballads is a collection of poems written by William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge. The first volume was released in 1798 and contained twenty-three poems, four of which were composed by Coleridge. Although Wordsworth wrote most of the poems, Coleridge is sometimes listed as the first author—either because his name comes first alphabetically or because his The Rime of the Ancient Mariner is the first poem in the volume.

The best explanation for the volume as a whole is the "Preface to Lyrical Ballads" that William Wordsworth wrote for the 1800 edition. In that work, he explains what he and Coleridge were attempting to do with the new type of poetry they introduced in Lyrical Ballads. They wanted to write poems that featured "the language of men," that is, everyday language used by everyday people rather than the stilted poetic diction that most poetry had used up until that time.

Their subject matter is various, yet all the poems display the poets' heightened imaginations. They also wanted the characters in their poems to be common people, not members of the aristocracy or ancient heroes. Yet they did not want to abandon the lyrical nature of poetry—the beauty of well-chosen words arranged in metrical fashion. "Lyrical ballads" is appropriate nomenclature for their new type of poetry because the poems maintain the lyrical nature of traditional poetry while adding the "common touch" of folk ballads.

The most famous of Coleridge's poems to appear in the collection is the first one: The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. This poem showcases all the elements the poetic duo wanted their poems to contain. The story is a highly imaginative gothic tale of a sailor who contends with supernatural punishments for killing an albatross. The main character of the ballad is a common man, the "ancient Mariner." The short-lined stanzas and simple word choices make the poem fully accessible to the average reader. Without a doubt, the beauty and rhythm of Coleridge's verse offers some of the most memorable lines written in English. Among them are these:

Day after day, day after day,
We stuck, nor breath nor motion,
As idle as a painted Ship
Upon a painted Ocean.
Water, water, every where
And all the boards did shrink;
Water, water, every where,
Nor any drop to drink.

Lyrical Ballads, as its two authors hoped, changed the style of English poetry forever.