A folk ballad is typically written by an unidentified author, and “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” is a lyrical ballad produced in that style. A ballad is a narrative song poem that can be sung or chanted rhythmically and tells the story of a single, dramatic episode or story (Güngör, 2020). William Wordsworth is frequently mentioned in conversations about English Romantic philosophers and their beliefs today. The enthusiasm for life did not prohibit the emotion of his mind, even though his popularity was not based on his ability to articulate intricate philosophical explanations of world literature.
The first line of “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner”, which first appeared in Lyrical Ballads, announced a new literary epoch. The poem was later updated and released by Coleridge in “Sibylline Leaves.” The narrator disparages modern poets like Wordsworth and Coleridge and declares that he abhors the air of mystery that current poets love, a barely disguised allusion to the paranormal components of Coleridge’s Rime (Fang-Fang & Yan, 2017). “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” describes a fascinating nautical adventure that goes horribly wrong. Crimes against the environment are performed, and the offenders are sentenced. In both poems, the crew finds some solace in the supposedly great energy of the universe, which is shown as, at best, whimsical and, at worst, incomprehensible, despite the forces of nature.
Coleridge gives natural forces, personalities, and motivations. For instance, after the Mariner’s boat crosses the equator, it is propelled to the South Pole by a “storm blast,” which is “tyrannous and fierce” (Coleridge & Lowell, 1916, pp. 41, 42). Therefore, it looks like the wind is a strong opposing force that conflicts with the ship and her crew. The blast considers the Mariner and his boat as its enemies and “pursues” them with a “yell and blow” (Coleridge & Lowell, 1916, pp. 46, 47). The wind’s initial negative impact on the poetry is unexpected for Coleridge because, for both he and Wordsworth, the wind commonly serves as a symbol of poignant or imaginative ability—the breath of daily existence, the breath of language, and the breath of essence combined. However, the poetry and its gloss show that the negative impact, the Mariner’s explanation rather than the poet’s, maybe the wind’s summary of itself as tyrannous.
The fact that the gloss is present suggests that although the Mariner’s tale accurately describes the course of the voyage, its meaning needs to be clarified. The Mariner appears to be alarmed by the wind’s force, much as he is worried by the gravitas of his tale. The crew is taken to a remote, frightening location where there is no contact with humans or other animals. The environment is chilly and sterile, which adds to the experience’s weirdness. Coleridge still uses the wind as a metaphor for language.
The crew’s first assessment of the albatross as a favorable omen or the forerunner of the wind that will assist them in returning northward was supported by the fact that “a good south breeze rose up behind” (Coleridge & Lowell, 1916, p. 71) shortly after the bird appeared. Even after the Mariner shoots the bird, a “nice south wind still blows behind,” proving that there is no direct association between the wind and the bird (Coleridge & Lowell, 1916, p. 87). They experience wind until they cross South America and return to the equator. The breeze that brings them back to the equator is always praised, whereas the storm blow that pushed them to the Pole was dangerous and terrifying due to its ferocity.
Even more than the albatross, the wind represents the crew’s departure from calamity. Without that, the team has “neither breath nor motion” (Coleridge & Lowell, 1916, p. 116), and without it, their communication stops. Speech’s sole purpose in the presence of the wind is to “break the quiet,” which is a harsh metaphor for meaningless words. As soon as this happens, language is rendered unattainable since “every tongue” has been “withered at the root” (Coleridge & Lowell, 1916, p. 136). At this stage, the Mariner must bear the albatross being slung across his neck as an act of repentance because communication becomes sluggish and synchronized with the weather. The first of many tributes the Mariner will make to the world comes when he does a great act of self-sacrifice by sucking his blood and rejuvenating himself with his life energy.
The Mariner recounts the majesty of the water snake darting by the ship in the second stanza of the poem before asserting that “no tongue / their beauty might tell” (Coleridge & Lowell, 1916, pp. 282-283). The albatross falls off his collar at that precise time, causing him to swoon and, according to the gloss, “The enchantment begins to shatter” (Coleridge & Lowell, 1916, p. 288). The Mariner gives the Wedding Guest and the reader a thorough understanding of language through the metaphor of the wind. He argues that human language cannot accurately portray the magnificence of living things, but he tries to in a lengthy account of his experience.
The Mariner connects the wind with new life and motion, even though he indicates that “the loud wind never reached the ship” (Coleridge & Lowell, 1916, p. 327), reiterating this fact with “never a breeze up-blew” (Coleridge & Lowell, 1916, p. 336) and “never a breeze did breathe” (Coleridge & Lowell, 1916, p. 374). The wind, therefore, is present but is not the motive force for the ship and, thus, must be the harbinger of something more than motion. The explanation for the phenomenon of the ship’s movement “Without or wave or wind” (Coleridge & Lowell, 1916, p. 423) is provided by one of two spirits, akin to the polar spirit who has been exacting his revenge, and that explanation is a supernatural one—it is an “angelic power” which is moving the ship (Coleridge & Lowell, 1916, p. 422). Thus, Coleridge forces us to accept supernatural explanations for what would otherwise be a natural phenomenon, which accords with his final description of the spell breaking since, with little reason, the Mariner claims, “And now this spell was snapped” (Coleridge & Lowell, 1916, p. 442).
The epiphany is accompanied by a silent wind that only affects the Mariner and “raises his hair, fans his cheek” (Coleridge & Lowell, 1916, p. 456). He continues by saying that it had a relaxing effect. Even though he emphasizes once more that the breeze he feels is not what is propelling the ship since it blows on him alone, “It mingled weirdly with my concerns, / Yet it felt like a welcoming” (Coleridge & Lowell, 1916, pp. 458–459). The significance of the breeze seems to reside less in how it affects the natural environment and more in how it enables the Mariner to perceive what is happening in that world.
As the Wedding Guest pauses to remind us of the poem’s narrative structure (Coleridge & Lowell, 1916, p. 345), it is more plausible that the wind is working to give the Mariner the strength to remember and relate his story rather than to regenerate the corpses of the crew to operate the ship. Coleridge suggests that the muse, or creative energy, is a constant in the poet’s existence and is frequently mediated via the elements of nature. The natural world is a gift of nature that makes creation possible but also calls for interpretation.
The sun, which helps to identify the ship’s location on Earth, is less symbolic than the lights of the night. The stars stand for things that are in movement, that travel but always stay home, but the moonlight is magical and extraterrestrial. The Mariner appreciates the majesty of the river snake in this setting, which is further highlighted by the gloss’s remark that he sees them “by the light of the moon” (Coleridge & Lowell, 1916, p. 272), and then starts to carry out his punishment. The speed of the ship is described as the motion of the ocean when guided by the moon, “For she directs him smooth or gloomy” (Coleridge & Lowell, 1916, p. 419), a skill the Mariner has yet to learn through the magical components of the two other spirits, partners in the glosses of the pole spirit.
In conclusion, Coleridge does not try to look at things in the poem holding a mirror up to nature or objectively, on the contrary, many things are presented with passion and personal feelings. The poem’s multiple layers of text are organized according to Coleridge’s interest in higher critique. Like the marginal notes found in the Bible, these comments or glosses that are written next to the poem’s text purport to interpret the passages. A considerable number of the stanzas in the poem display lovely images and are demonstrated with unexpected happiness of language.
References
Coleridge, S. T., & Lowell, J. R. (1916). “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner”. UP.
Fang-Fang, X., & Yan, H. (2017). The images in “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.” Journal of Literature and Art Studies, 7(6), 675-678.
Güngör, T. Ö. (2020). Vengeance of nonhuman beings: An ecocritical reading of Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s work “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner”. International Journal of Social, Political and Economic Research, 7(2), 359-371.