The Rime of the Ancient

Mariner
STRUCTURE
S. T. Coleridge
• is written in loose, short ballad stanzas usually either four or six li-
nes long

• Most stanzas have four-lines, called a "quatrain,"

• odd lines are generally tetrameter, while even lines are generally tr
imeter.
• The rhymes generally alternate in an ABAB or ABABAB scheme,
though again there are many exceptions

• the nine-line stanza in Part III, for instance, rhymes AABCCBDDB

• Many stanzas include couplets in this way—five-line stanzas, for

example, are rhymed ABCCB, often with an internal rhyme in the
first line, or ABAAB, without the internal rhyme.
• Coleridge divides the poem into seven parts. Most of the stanzas in
the poem have four lines; several have five or six lines. In the four-
line stanzas, the second and fourth lines usually rhyme. In the five-
and six-line stanzas, the second or third line usually rhymes with
the final line. 
• The line lengths alternate between eight syllables in the first and
third lines, and six syllables in the second and fourth. 

• The meter is characterized by a lot of iambs, the most common

metrical unit in English. An iamb is a short beat followed by a long
one, or, if you prefer, an unaccented syllable followed by an
accented one:
• Foreshadowing- Since the Mariner only states that he shot the bird
without describing the scene, the Wedding-Guest's reaction to the
expression on the Mariner's face helps show us how deeply the
Mariner regrets this action and foreshadows the consequences the
Mariner later faces for killing the Albatross.