THE RYME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER

samuel taylor coleridge

How a ship having first sailed to the equator, was driven by storms to the cold
country towards the South Pole; how the ancient mariner cruelly and in contempt
of the laws of hospitality killed a sea-bird and how he was followed by many and
strange judgements: and in what manner he came back to his own country

CHARACTERISTICS
• Loss of hospitality; anima mundi, nature as a human being.
• The mariner is going to turn down the hospitality that nature offered him by killing
it, another life.
• The mariner is going to be judged.
• Contrast with Wordsworth, who also wants to expand our minds by means of our
imagination and the supernatural—rather than our “inner eye”—, but using a
completely different angle. Coleridge considered that there is more invisible than
visible, and it is also more enlightening.
• Emulation of the style and themes of traditional ballads

Poem analysis
The poem is divided in seven parts. The poem suffered alterations in later editions, we do not have the poem as it has
first printed. One the things that were added is the preface in Latin, also the glosses (notes in the margins) and The
Argument.

In the Argument it says what the transgression that the mariner commits: He kills an albatross, and this goes against the
laws of hospitality.

Coleridge connects the poem with the supernatural in the preface, using a Latin quotation from Thomas Burnet in
which he talks about “more invisible than visible Nature”, expressing that there are more things than those we can see
or touch.

PART I

The mariner is described in the first stanza with “long gray beard and glittering eye”. The beard is a way to convey old age and wisdom and the
glittering eye established some relation with the supernatural. He is “the other”. He is also said to have a skinny (yet strong) hand.

The wedding guest is hypnotised by the mariner with the power of his eyes and his words. Coleridge is making reference to a Greek trellised called “on
the sublime” translated into English in the 18th century where Longinus (the author) introduced the idea of the power of the sublime with the idea of
language and rhetoric and that those in possession of this rhetorical power could transform the hearer into a slave.

As the mariner starts to tell the story, the atmosphere is happy. He is in a feast (a wedding) and there is an adecuation.
The description of the movement of the sun is used to evoke the passing of time, connected with mutability. It’s the natural order of things, it also evokes
movement, in contrast with the sensation of paralysis that we’ll see later on (unnatural).

The festive context is used to create a contrast with the sensation of sadness and solitude of the mariner.

The word “and” is repeated several times in lines 48-54, in order to convey anguish and continuity, how the mariner keeps on adding different things to
the storm.

Line 57: Solitude, loneliness.

Lines 59-62: Ice comes “alive”. They are surrounded by nature and it becomes a threatening nature.

The Albatross appears and seems a good omen because the menace disappears. The Albatross is also a symbol of the cross.

The mariner kills the Albatross, going against the rules of hospitality and nature.

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PART II

The first stanza of the second part is an inversion of the stanza in which he lefts with the ship (lines 25-28). It creates a contrast
between nature before and after he kills the bird. It indicates that something is wrong.

The third stanza has many repetitions, again showing features of a ballad. Also alliterations in order to evoke the wind almost not
moving. The dialogue is also a feature of the ballad.

In the fourth stanza the fog disappears and the sun appears again, so the crew considers that the mariner has done something right
by killing the bird and therefore they become accomplices.

The atmosphere is harmonic because there is movement again (symbol of freedom), but there is silence, which is connected with
solitude and indicates that things are not going as good as it seems.

The stanza that follows beaks that harmony because the movement stops and the silence is more emphasized. That stanza begins with
a chiasmus.

The eighth stanza describes the ship still in the water, no movement at all.

The ninth stanza reminds of the Greek myth of Tantalus, who was condemned to be eternally hungry and thirsty and was chained to a
tree near to a river, but whenever he would try to drink water from the river, the water would retire and whenever he would try to
take an apple the branches of the tree would retire too, so that he could never get them. This shows that the mariner is being
punished just like Tantalus.

From this stanza on, the atmosphere becomes supernatural. Strange creatures appear and also ignis fatuus. In the 11th stanza, the
description of the water changing colours “as a witch’s oil”, is a reference (almost a quotation) of Shakespeare’s Macbeth.

The crew punishes the mariner obliging him to wear the dead albatross hanging in the neck as a penitence. This is another reference
to the albatross as the cross (and, as a religious reading, it’s killing as a lack of faith).

PART III

The first stanza of the third part again has many features of the ballad. The mariner sees something in the air.

As he cannot drink water, he drinks his own blood out of despair. This is the first supernatural feature that we see on him on his
story (this is not supernatural by itself, but it’s a reference to vampirism).

Then, a ghost ship approaches. This is a very common topic in horror literature and movies. The ship only has two passengers:
Death and Life-In-Death, who are portrayed very vampire like. This couple echoes Sin and Death from Milton’s Paradise Lost. This
couple “plays” to decide who wins the soul of the mariner, and Life-In-Death wins. That’s why the mariner appears in the beginning
of the poem as a wanderer, some sort of dead in life.

In the last stanza of this third part the emphasis is made on the moon, connected with the female and the supernatural (both Death
and Life-In-Death are female and supernatural).
Death takes the life of all his crew and, before leaving, all his crew’s souls pass through him, it’s a reference to the cross, indicating
that the death of the crew is his own fault.

PART IV
The fourth part begins with an emphasis on the idea of solitude. The mariner is forsaken. There is some similitude with Christ about to
die on the cross (Matthew 27, 46: My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?).

The atmosphere is of a decaying nature (rotting sea) rotting the deck, this symbolizes corruption.
In the ninth stanza (of the fourth part) there is a mention to “seven days and seven nights”, this is a symbol of time passing by, but not
for the mariner. He is stuck in time, paralyzed, and this, apart from being part of the punishment, emphasizes the idea of solitude.

In the 14th stanza there is a change: He starts to appreciate the creatures and how they are beautiful. This is the first step towards its
redemption, represented by the falling of the Albatross from his neck.

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PART V
At the beginning of part five, the mariner gets to sleep, another signal that he begins to redeem (and a very frequent motif in
literature, especially gothic fiction). When he awakes it is raining, which is a symbol of purification and regeneration (In the poem
Regeneration by Henry Vaughan the rains washes away his sins). Also, he hears the roar of the wind (wind connected with
movement, with the anima mundi, with inspiration).

In the 11th stanza we also have a supernatural atmosphere (the ship is moving but there is no breeze) and the bodies of the crew start
to move, possessed by angelic spirits.

In this fifth part we also find different ideas connected with religion, like the reference to “Queen Mary” (the Virgin Mary) and “the
one who died on cross”.

The following stanza revolves around the topic of sound. He is awakening to nature and the different sounds (of spirits, of creatures).
This is important because of the idea of the Musica Universalis.

PART VI

The sixth part begins with a dialogue between two unknown characters, this remind of a morality play and has religious connotations.

In lines 430-445 we see a lot of words related with the semantic field of sight. He is rediscovering nature and can have relation with
regeneration.

In line 436 there is a reference to the corpses and their “stony eyes” this is a made to create a contrast between the mariner, gaining
real sight of the world, and the crew, unable to see.
Also, this is made to create a connection between this scene and the beginning of the poem, in which we see how the mariner had
some supernatural power relating his eyes.

The wind regains his positive connotations in the 12th stanza and reinforced by the alliterations of the sound “s” in the next stanza.

As he approaches the coast, he sees a lighthouse. The lighthouse symbolizes safety, salvation and enlightment.

At the end of part six a new character, the Hermit, is introduced. The mariner hopes that he will help him and wash his sins because
he is entuned with nature.

PART VII

At the beginning of part seven we change scenarios from the sea to the woods. In lines 430-445 we see a lot of words related with the
semantic field of sight. He is rediscovering nature and can have relation with regeneration.

There is a dialogue between the different characters about the ship and the mariner that shows the perception of the mariner by
society after his travels.

The ship is described to have some supernatural and gothic aura. The reaction of society towards the mariner is of fear.

We also see his last (and everlasting) penance: to re-tell his story, becoming a wanderer. But in this case, the idea of the wanderer is
negatively connoted, being related to the idea of immortality as a curse, an everlasting solitude (relation with the myths of the
Wandering Jew and the Flying Dutchman).

The poem has some sort of circular structure because we go back to the beginning, leaving behind the gothic athmosphere and
entering again in the world of society (the wedding). In this atmosphere, the mariner emphasizes his solitude. This, related with the
fear of the pilot and his boy, reinforces the idea of the Mariner no longer belonging to society, of being an outcast.
The mariner feels happy now because he has company, but he knows that he’ll be alone again.

At the end, we see The Wedding Guest that has changed, he is not the same that he was before hearing the story, he has sort of
moved from innocence to experience, this echoes the Bible and the idea of knowledge making people sad and full of sorrow
(Ecclesiastes 1, 18: For in much wisdom is much grief: and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow).

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