More handpicked essays just for you.
Rime of the ancient mariner analysis essay
Samuel Taylor Coleridge essays
Critical analysis of the rime of the ancient mariner
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
[1]Samuel Taylor Coleridge author of the lyrical ballad Rime of the ancient Mariner, tells a story of three men; wedding guest who are on their way to a wedding, but is stopped by an old sailor; with his hypnotic eyes caught the attention of the guest and tells a story of his disastrous voyage. [2]Coleridge combines striking images with elements of allusions to create assorted tones throughout the poem.
[3] Coleridge exercises biblical allusions to depict an array of unfortunate events the Mariner bought upon himself and the wedding guest.[4] The Mariner saw the Albatross “ As it had been a Christian soul We hailed it in God’s name” (65-66). [5]The Albatross symbolizes the dove in Noah’s ark that lead the boat to safety thus the Mariner
and guest praise it to bring them to safety. [6]One of the unfortunate events that occurred during the voyage was the killing of the albatross by the Mariner.[7]For punishment, “instead of the cross, the Albatross about my neck was hung” (141-142).[8] The sailors are cursing the Mariner for killing a sacred creature and is making him wear the albatross as a reminder for his crimes.[9] According to Andrew Maunder, editor of Encyclopedia of Literary Romanticism insist “ By approving what the mariner had done, the sailors became implicated in his deed, and they too suffered the curse that settled over the ship”(371-373).[10] Everyone suffered for the crime the Mariner caused.[11]He creates an ebullient tone that portrays the crew’s astonishment of the Albatross, but indignant in that they must suffer the curse as well.[12] Furthermore, Coleridge establishes an allusion to Mary Shelley’s novel Frankenstein that reenacts the Mariner’s expedition.[13] The Mariner is alone, “ like one that on a lonesome road, doth walk in fear and dread...Doth close behind him tread” ( 446-451).[14] This particular quote is seen in chapter five of Frankenstein; it means that Victor just created the monster and is horrified when it came to life. [15]For the ancient Mariner, it meant that he was all alone, adrift in Antarctica.[16] Shelley and Coleridge generate an ominous feeling since both characters are struggling and lost.[17] Coleridge reverts back to using biblical references to imply the Mariner’s sorrow and praise towards God.[18] The Mariner reiterates “ For the dear God who loveth us he made and loveth all” (616-617).[19] God created the people and he loves all of us dearly, despite sinning against him.[20] As stated in the Cyclopedia of literary Characters by Dennis Dean “Though the Mariner asks the Hermit for spiritual cleansing, it is the judgment of Life-in-Death that prevails”(2058-2059).[21] God has the ultimate judgement in life or death. [23] Coleridge disguises the allusions to best promote the indwelling desire and faith of the ancient Mariner.
To begin with, the killing of the albatross signified the love that Christ had among his people, and the execution he was forced upon in order for the hope of reassurance of his people. “Is it he? quoth one, “Is this the man? By him who died on cross, With his cruel bow he laid full low The harmless Albatross. The spirit who bideth by himself In the land of mist and snow, He loved the bird that loved the man Who shot him with his bow.” (Lines 398-405). Samuel Coleridge dignifies the crucifixion of Jesus Christ with the execution of the albatross. Religious symbolism reflects the apocalypse meaning throughout the killing of the albatross.
He has to feel a pain in his chest that becomes unbearable until he sees a certain soul that is the right one to tell. No matter what. In the long poem, “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” by Samuel Taylor Coleridge has three lessons about human life: supernatural, pride, and suffering. In “Rime” by Sam Coleridge, the mariner goes through many supernatural events that scare him into submission. Coleridge does a great job of describing the scenery around the boat that the mariner resides in.
The “Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner” is the story of a gruff, grumpy, and old sailor. In the story he tells people of a wedding. When he suddenly killed an Albatross on a voyage for no reason at all. The Albatross that was shot was innocent. The Mariner ended up returning for a big punishment, which he said
As the ancient Mariner described his adventures at sea to the Wedding-Guest, the Guest became saddened because he identified his own selfish ways with those of the Mariner. The mariner told the Guest that he and his ship-mates were lucky because at the beginning of their voyage they had good weather. The mariner only saw what was on the surface -- he did not see the good weather as evidence that Someone was guiding them. Also, when he shot the Albatross, the Mariner did not have any reason for doing so. The Albatross did nothing wrong, yet the Mariner thought nothing of it and without thinking of the significance of the act, he killed the bird. At this, the Guest was reminded of how self-absorbed he, too, was, and the sinful nature of man. At the beginning of the poem he was very much intent on arriving at the wedding on time. He did not care at all about what it was that the Mariner had to tell him; he did not want to be detained even if the Mariner was in trouble. Instead, he spoke rudely to the mariner, calling him a "gray-beard loon", and tried to go on his own way.
“The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” was first published in 1798, it told the story of a sailor who, after capriciously killing an albatross, was forced to hang the sea bird around his neck until he responded to nature with love rather than violence” (Downing). Indeed, this is the central happenings of this specter story. In The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, in this narrative poem, an ancient mariner approaches a young man, who is also about to attend a wedding. The mariner is cursed to wander the face of the earth and tell his ghost story to selected youth, to make his amends for disrespecting
The Albatross, as a representative of nature, means nothing to the Mariner. These thoughts are quickly changed, though, as Nature begins to start the penance leading towards forgiveness - "Water, water, everywhere nor any drop to drink." When "the mariner begins to find his salvation when he begins to look on the 'slimy things' as creatures of strange beauty" (Fraser 203), he understands the Albatross was a symbol of nature and he realized what he had done wrong. The mariner is forgiven after sufficient penance - "We could not speak" - is performed by Nature.
“The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” is a poem about the struggles a mariner goes through on his voyage on the sea. It is said that, “the dead men stood together,” on his ship’s deck. The curse that has caused his sailors to die is not specified and also not forgotten by the captain. The ship continues to sail as, “there breathed a wind on [the mariner]”. The wind gust only blew on the sailor and the hairs on his neck proceeded to stand up. This implies the curse that took the other sailors’ lives. It is showing its presence to the lone man and the despair and regret he feels. Finally, the sailor reaches harbor where “a seraph-man, on every corpse there stood”. This quote explains how upon each dead sailor’s body there was an angel as well. Suddenly the captain, “heard the dash of oars, [he] heard the Pilot’s cheer,” and in an instant a pilot and his son came to rescue the sailor from his despair. The reader can then see a desire for repentance when the mariner asks the captain to forgive him of his sins.
In The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, Samuel Coleridge writes of a sailor bringing a tale to life as he speaks to a wedding guest. An ancient Mariner tells of his brutal journey through the Pacific Ocean to the South Pole. Coleridge suffers from loneliness, because of his lifelong need for love and livelihood; similarly, during the Mariner’s tale, his loneliness shows when he becomes alone at sea, because of the loss of his crew. Having a disastrous dependence to opium and laudanum, Coleridge, in partnership with Wordsworth, writes this complicated, difficult to understand, yet appealing poem, which becomes the first poem in the 1798 edition of Lyrical Ballads. The Mariner’s frame of mind flip-flops throughout the literary ballad, a songlike poem that tells a story, which could be a result of Coleridge’s horrible addiction. Using the senses of seeing, feeling, and hearing as the Mariner tells his tale to a wedding guest in The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, Coleridge demonstrates the use of many sensory details as the ancient Mariner speaks to a wedding guest.
A significant theme in Samuel Coleridge's "Rime of the Ancient Mariner," is Christianity, which is portrayed through the Mariner’s epic journey. This text is set between the physical world and the metaphysical (spiritual world), similar to religious teachings found in the Bible. With the use of vivid descriptions and strong language in this ballad, moral lessons appear that connect both man and God in order to discover an innate bond and understanding. Though this tale is overwhelmingly bizarre and dark, the moral lessons taught are in line with central aspects of both the romantic period and the Christian religion. In Coleridge's ballad, "Rime of the Ancient Mariner," many Christian ideals are represented throughout the treacherous journey of the Mariner, such as sin, forgiveness, and prayer.
The guest walks away, stunned by what he's heard, and the Mariner goes on, as he always has, to tell his tale to someone else who needs the lesson of love and reverence for all of God's creatures. The Mariner goes off, again, to search for another person thirsty for the lesson, and the cycle begins again. The Rime of the Ancient Mariner is a highly significant poem that is very dependent on symbolism. The symbols of the wedding, the albatross, the blood that the Mariner sucks in order to announce the ship, the game between Death and Life-In-Death, the penance that the Mariner serves, and the cyclic nature of the poem are only a few of the symbols that add meaning and depth to the poem. If it were not for the symbols, the poem would simply be the story of a Mariner telling his tale to a hypnotized wedding guest, and then the poem would have no meaning to anyone.
... of a broken and essentially conciliatory force. When seen in these terms, it seems that the mariner may be the image with which Coleridge most closely identified himself, but both are symbols of his creative process.
“He holds him with his glittering eye – The wedding-guest stood still, And listens like a three-years ' child: The mariner hath his will” (Coleridge pg 937). Between 1797 and 1798 Samuel Coleridge wrote his longest poem, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. He used this poem to show his fierce opposition to slavery and slave ships. In the beginning of the poem, three young men are about to enter a wedding celebration, when one of the men gets stopped by an old sailor with a mesmerizing eye. From then on, the Mariner tells the young man a vivid story of his most tragic sail. Throughout this story the young man learns of the many mistakes the Mariner made, with his crew. When he concludes his tale, the young man is truly enchanted. Samuel Taylor
The first example beginning on line 13. “ He holds him with his glittering eye- the wedding guest stood still, and listens like a three years’ child: The Mariner hath his will.” ( ) This points back to romanticism by using magic. The Mariner has a magic eye that makes the wedding guest freeze so he has to listen to his story. “Many Romantics turned to a past or an inner dream world that they felt was more picturesque and magical than the ugly industrial age they lived in.”
The Albatross Around Your Own Neck (An analysis of 3 messages from Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner”) Literary devices are used by every author of every piece of literature to enhance the meaning and development of their message. Authors are trying to leave their reader with one form of impression or another, and literary devices are what helps them to accomplish this task. These devices include things such as allusion, symbolism, imagery, simile, metaphor, and so on and so forth. “Poetic representation plays with connotative structures and literary devices to convey meanings” (Richardson).
I did feel like watching Pirates of the Caribbean today, but instead decided on a delightful tale of death, despair, and the eternal suffering of penance that every 19th century Christian underwent. This is “Rime of the Ancient Mariner”, Coleridge’s poem that kickstarted the basics of Romantic literature. This writing is about an old man’s tale of woe on a doomed ship and the endurance of his own punishment that he must account for. It has all the tropes: imagery of nature, the deep sense of history, sin and punishment, allusions to Christianity, and much more! Of course, what Coleridge brings up that influences the most in this genre is the theme of the relationship and interaction between man and nature, in which he tells that the natural world is to be appreciated and respected, all the while using many supernatural elements to the tale.