Please read “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” and “Frost at Midnight” for class on Thursday, 9/28.
7 thoughts on “Coleridge’s Poetry”
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Please read “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” and “Frost at Midnight” for class on Thursday, 9/28.
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The poem “The Rime of Ancient Mariner “is talking about a mariner that stops the wedding guest at the door and using his hypnotic eyes to make them stay to listen to his horrible story. The mariner and companions sailed a ship to the sea, and then they ran into bad storm but they get away from this. After this storm, when the mariner saw the albatross, a bird, that people believe can bring the good luck and he killed it with his crossbow. Soon, it got really hot and they eventually ran out of water and food. They think its Mariner’s fault because he shot the albatross. Lately everyone is dying of thirst, the Mariner sees another ship at distance but unfortunately the ship is a ghost ship. Everyone was killed and only the Mariner didn’t. He felt terrible, the angle made the mariner dead bodies still work on the ship, by the powerful spirit, the ship steers the mariner home and after he was saved and the ship suddenly sink. He feels horrible every time think about this. The only thing can make him relief and move on is until the story had been told to the next person.
He wants to find the audience to hear his story that he admits his mistake and he wants lifts the inner pain-atonement. Although he has been devout repentance, deep down inside he knew that he’s never free from it. One of the moral of the story is not to killed nature that was said to bring good luck because eventually karma comes back to bite you from behind. This poem use the verse in supernatural way and full of imagination the purpose is to enhance the impact of emotion, create tense atmosphere, all of which constitute a symbol of romantic literature.
Although that may be one way of viewing the moral of the story, I believe the story has less to do with Karma, and more to do with repentance. Karma is a flimsy thing to define for the common folk (me), so as I see it, it means whatever you’ve done will be done onto you in some manner with the same intensity. In the case of the Ancient Mariner, guilt is not considered Karma – unless you twist my meaning, broaden it, then yes guilt is internal Karma that induces the Mariner with an equal intensity as his action. But besides the point, the Mariner struggles more with internal conflicts rather than external. It may seem external: thirst, heat, death, storms. But they can all be view internally as well, just projected in a physical manner. Inside, the Mariner’s humanity is whithered, close to death, and fighting. However, he finds beauty in life once more, a reason, and is pulled half dead out of his struggling into ‘life’.
Hi, but don’t you think that it is karma that leads to the mariner’s repentance? When he kills the albatross, the mariner himself does not seem to remorse or even regret a little bit. However, it is through the trials of nature (the dryness, death of crew mates, still winds, mystical creatures, etc.) that he finally begins to regret what he did to the Albatross. I felt that this ‘karma’ is actually a response from nature itself, punishing the mariner for not truly seeing the beauty of nature and the value of life. However as we continue on with the poem, we see the turning point of the story is when he suddenly realizes the beauty of those water snakes (which are also part of nature). At this point, I believe it is his realization for his appreciation of nature that led to his freedom, hence the moral of the story.
I feel that the story could be karma, repentance, or just a story told for no reason what so ever by Coleridge. However, if I had to pick between the moral of the story being karma or repentance, I would say that the story had to do more with karma. This is because when he kills the albatross for no reasons whatsoever, bad things started to happen to him and his crew; such as the heat, death of his crew, and the ship not moving due to there being no wind. But, this all turns around when he prays to Mary, blessing the water snake. He eventually ends back on the shore after blessing the water snake. This made me think that the moral of the story was karma, where the mariner killed the albatross leading to something bad happening to him for doing so. Then him doing something good, blessing the water snake, which led to something good happening to him for doing so, which was him getting back to shore alive. He even said that he tells the story for people to hear his mistake and that only people who appreciate God’s creations can gain salvation which was what happened to him.
The poem “The Rime of Ancient Mariner “is talking about a mariner that stops the wedding guest at the door and using his hypnotic eyes to make them stay to listen to his horrible story. The mariner and companions sailed a ship to the sea, and then they ran into bad storm but they get away from this. After this storm, when the mariner saw the albatross, a bird, that people believe can bring the good luck and he killed it with his crossbow. Soon, it got really hot and they eventually ran out of water and food. They think its Mariner’s fault because he shot the albatross. Lately everyone is dying of thirst, the Mariner sees another ship at distance but unfortunately the ship is a ghost ship. Everyone was killed and only the Mariner didn’t. He felt terrible, the angle made the mariner dead bodies still work on the ship, by the powerful spirit, the ship steers the mariner home and after he was saved and the ship suddenly sink. He feels horrible every time think about this. The only thing can make him relief and move on is until the story had been told to the next person.
He wants to find the audience to hear his story that he admits his mistake and he wants lifts the inner pain-atonement. Although he has been devout repentance, deep down inside he knew that he’s never free from it. One of the moral of the story is not to killed nature that was said to bring good luck because eventually karma comes back to bite you from behind. This poem use the verse in supernatural way and full of imagination the purpose is to enhance the impact of emotion, create tense atmosphere, all of which constitute a symbol of romantic literature.
Question for the class, do you believe Coleridge was on opioids when he wrote this story. If so, is this story for pure entertainment and was one of his crazy opioid dreams or is there a theme and purpose to this piece of writing?
I think there was most definitely an influence of opiates in this story. The story is almost like a dream or vision in the way it is written. It is almost as if the poem is being channeled straight from his mind into text like a dream embodies itself within your head. The symbols and images depicted in this work are also dreamlike in their randomness and context. It is almost as if like a dream where each event may be explained by a piece of our subconscious this poem is a story where we as readers get to witness the journey of the Mariner and explain the events and contemplate their meanings like we would with our dreams.