Authors who often wrote works in the Gothic and Dark Romantic period were sometimes referred to as Dark Romantics. Their startling stories used imagination, feelings, and intuition. Unlike past periods, Dark Romantics focused on the importance of a single person verses a whole group. There are many characteristics that make a piece a part of the period, and The Rime of the Ancient Mariner is one of those pieces. The Rime of the Ancient Mariner is characterized as Gothic or Romantic literature because of its foreboding, omen motif, and the environment describe in the story. “The ice was here, the ice was there, the ice as all around: it cracked and growled, and roared and howled.” (58-60) Before the Albatross arrived, the ship was trapped. The ocean was gloomily and doomed and painted a sense of hopelessness. Once the Albatross arrived, the ship took off again. “And a good spring wind sprung up behind; The Albatross did follow.” (70-71) The words “good spring wind sprung They were desolate before, but now due to new fortunes they are hopeful; this is greatly represented by nature. After The Mariner kills the Albatross things go from good back to bad. “Still hid in mist, and on the left went down into the sea.” (85) It was foggy and hard to see. This was an allusion to the fact that their futures were uncertain. Foreboding is fearful apprehension, or the fear that something bad will happen; this is a common theme in The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. From the start, the Mariner showed supernatural influence over people. “The Wedding-Guest he beat his breast, yet he cannot choose but hear: And thus spake on that ancient man, the bright-eyed
The first stanza of ‘The Rime of the Ancient Mariner’ begins with the line ‘The Sun now rose...’. Coleridge has immediately drawn the reader in with the use of the temporal adverb ‘now’, allowing the stanza to be read in the present tense, thus immersing the reader into the poem. Like the previous part, the sun is again personified in line two when Coleridge writes that ‘Out of the sea came he’. Referring to the sun as ‘he’ poses great significance when examining the background of this play. The weather plays a vital role in the journey of a sailing ship - the sun is used to tell the time, provide light, and usually where there is sun, there is no stormy weather and thus no rocky water for sailors. Therefore, on a journey like the one described in ‘The Rime of the Ancient Mariner’ the sun is incredibly important, and thus Coleridge’s reference to the sun using the personal pronoun ‘he’ suggests that the sun is as, if not more, important as the actual people on the ship. Also, ‘The Rime of the Ancient Mariner’ was written in 1797, which had a very patriarchal, male dominant society, and so using the masculine pronoun ‘he’ conveys the superiority of the sun itself.
In an article on sin, Samuel Taylor Coleridge defines sin as “an evil which has its ground or origin in the agent, and not in the compulsion of circumstances.” (65). Coleridge’s definition of sin excludes any outside cause of sin, besides the agent himself. Coleridge’s poem The Rime of the Ancient Mariner is a poem of sin, but it is also a poem that questions etiology. John Livingston Lowes writes “The relentless line of cause and consequence runs likewise, unswerving as the voyage, through the poem”(68). Cause and consequence in the poem, however, should not be taken at face value. Certainly the violent act of the Mariner has consequences, but Coleridge also brings a logical fallacy into light: Post hoc ergo propter hoc, or after this, therefore because of this. Every action that occurs after the Mariner’s assault on the Albatross is not necessarily a result of that act, contrary to what the Mariner and his shipmates believe. Nevertheless, the Mariner must deal with his attack on the albatross, and the guilt that ensues. Coleridge explores the Mariner’s sin, guilt, and isolation in The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, while questioning the causality of all three.
... There is nowhere here or elsewhere in the book [The Road to Xanadu] a hint of the history behind the Mariner's glittering eye, a suggestion of the poet's bold transfer of the glitter in the dead seamen's eyes (Death) to those of the Mariner (Life-in-Death). The poet introduces the Mariner abruptly and repetitively as one with a glittering eye. A similar emphasis is given to the epithet bright-eyed (as in the penultimate stanza of Part VII); and when the fearful question, "Why look'st thou so?", is asked, our thoughts revert to that sinister glitter. Now consider this stanza in Part III:
Just when it seemed that all hope was lost, the crew spots an albatross emerging from the fog. The sailors, desperate for any sign of good fortune, immediately deem the great sea-bird as a positive sign from God. With the albatross comes a great wind from the South, pushing the ship away from its icy trap, “As if it had been a Christian so...
What the Mariner learns from his whole ordeal is that we should love all of God’s creatures. He seeks to spread this message around, but the “crime” does not fit the punishment. The death of an albatross does not...
As a result, the Mariner was won by Life-in-Death and the Death won the crew who are stripped of their souls as the mariner watched in horror for precisely seven days and seven nights. These events seem oddly haunting and mystical, which further attributes to the elements of Gothic literature. Supernatural occurrences do not halt, especially when monstrous sea creatures appear in the water. This is misleading to the mariner because he asserts his curse as being lifted when in reality it’s only the beginning of penance, which is, too, the power of imagination.
The biblical symbolism found in this poem mainly reflects the apocalypse, as it deals with the Mariner's revelation that good will triumph over evil, and
The heavy use of nautical imagery reiterates the movement of the poem. This use of a nautical metaphor further reveals the specific sense of the speaker's journey through life. It is heavy with depictions of the sea and its storms, as well as objects involved with seafaring, bringing the reader into the feeling the speaker has of being lost at sea. It is an air of total isolation.
The albatross is the main idea, so it plays a huge role in the theme of the poem. It enhances the mystery, suffering, pride, and adventure that the poem portrays throughout the story line. The poem’s main theme is transformation in that the Mariner starts out as a sailor who does not appreciate the superstitions or the albatross that in turn ends up blessing the ugly sea creatures as an act of redemption. The poem states, “He prayeth best, who loveth best all things both great and small; for the dear God who loveth us, he mad and loveth all” (Coleridge, 1680). When he prays for the sea creatures, he is showing how he loves all the creatures, big or small, created by God himself. All of these themes were brought on by the single act of the albatross. The tone of the poem is fear and admiration. The albatross developed these qualities by causing the Mariner fear when he did not know what was going to happen to him from the effects of killing the bird. The admiration of the poem was seen when the Mariner saw only the greatness in life, such as the sea creatures.
The narrator mentions Sophocles, an ancient Greek Tragedian playwright, having heard [the eternal note of sadness] and that it brought his mind “human misery.” This is significant because there is the comparison between the human mind, ebbing and flowing with misery, and the sea, ebbing and flowing. The human mind and the sea have a multiple similarities like: the ability to have deep, dark places, the ability to be beautiful, and the ability to vast beyond human comprehension, just to name a few. The narrator could feel that the comparison between the human mind and the sea is important because the narrator relates to the sea’s constant changes; and how the narrator’s mood constantly changes because of their depression.
In The Rime of the Ancient Mariner by Samuel Coleridge, there is a Mariner who kills an almighty Albatross. It just so happens to be that the creature is extraordinary. It symbolizes all of Nature and everything that comes with its glory. However, the Mariner did not think of his actions, and shot the bird killing it without motive. The events that happened thereafter, were unthinkable. The Mariner would remain the rest of the story tortured continuously causing guilt. Therefore, the holiness of the Albatross and guilt in The Rime of the Ancient Mariner causes the poem to be laced with pathetic fallacy.
In the short story Rime there was many different themes to show the main topic. There is pride, suffering, and isolation, which the pride is for the important sins that happen throughout life. Suffering is the only way that people can be changed for the better due to the uphill battle. Isolation is for the man that travels the sea all by himself looking for the lost souls of his other mates that were on the boat with him. In the short story Rime there has been many life lessons that can be learned.
As soon as the bird was killed, the wind that propelled the ship became still. It wasn’t long before the Mariner realized the consequences of his actions, “for all averred, I had killed the bird that made the breeze to blow.” Then suddenly “down dropped the breeze, the sails dropped down, Twas sad as sad could be; and we did speak only to break the silence of the sea!” (35). Since the Albatross was a gift from the spirits, it was seen as a symbol of god....
Have you ever heard a story from an older person and your mind was blown with what you have just heard? Well in The Rime of the Ancient Mariner by Samuel Coleridge an old mariner told a boy a story that blew the boys mind. Have you ever seen dead people come back to life? Well in The Rime of the Ancient Mariner people came back to help the old mariner after he realized something. In The Rime of the Ancient Mariner by Samuel Coleridge there is three messages that Samuel Coleridge wants people to realize.
Often, Christianity is portrayed using symbolism. A commonly used Christian symbol is water. In The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, Coleridge uses water symbolism to portray the Christ and his teachings.