The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Analysis

The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Analysis

What are some examples of personification and paradoxical imagery in The Rime of the Ancient…


Samuel Taylor Coleridge used many archaic spellings in The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. The word rime refers both to a rhyme or poem and to a kind of frost that the Mariner encountered on his journey to the Antarctic. On the most basic level, the rime is about the ancient Mariner. Its also an adventure story about a journey through the rime or frost of the South Pole.

(Critical Survey of Literature for Students)

(Beachams Guide to Literature for Young Adults)

1. It has been said that The Rime of the Ancient Mariner is about twice as long as it needs to be. What would be the effect of reducing the…

Lowes, John Livingston.The Road to Xanadu: A Study in the Ways of the Imagination. Rev. ed. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1931. In this classic work of literary scholarship, Lowes attempts to illuminateThe Rime of the Ancient Marinerby a seemingly exhaustive examination of the poets reading, which was wide. Captivating as the source hunt is, Lowes tells readers little about what the poem might actually mean.


What do Death and Life-in-Death stand for in Coleridges The Rime of Ancient Mariner?

The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, Samuel Taylor Coleridge

(Critical Guide to Settings and Places in Literature)

High seas. Primary location through the poem. Two forms of water trap the shipice and waterthereby becoming its primary locus. Sailors learn to read the moods of the sea, based on the winds that propel its waves. The moon, as well, is reflected in the seas surface. Coleridge uses the sea, as well as other natural forms, as tools to instruct the Mariner on his moral lapse and lack of respect for all creation. The sun rises and sets several times in the poem, not simply to indicate the passage of time. When the sea gives back the suns face in reflection, the Mariner reacts as if all creation were watching and judging him.

(Beachams Guide to Literature for Young Adults)




While Coleridge did not write poetry specifically for young adults, Kubla Kahn is frequently read in schools as a companion piece to The…

Abrams, M. H.The Mirror and the Lamp. New York: Norton, 1958. A time honored examination of the theory of Romantic poetry. Useful for…


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He Prayeth Best, Who Loveth Best


A Sadder And A Wiser Man, He Rose The Morrow Morn

Water, Water, Everywhere

The overt story of the poem is the rather terrifying tale of a sailor beset by troubles at sea.  The underlying themes and the real subjects of the poem are christianity and the supernatural. …

Now Wherefore Stoppest Thou Me?

What is the theme of The Rime of the Ancient Mariner?


(Beachams Guide to Literature for Young Adults)


(Beachams Guide to Literature for Young Adults)

Falke, Cassandra. The Sin of the Ancient Mariner.Lamar Journal of the Humanities29, no. 1 (Spring, 2004): 5-11. Argues thatThe Rime of the Ancient Marinercan be fully appreciated only within the context of Coleridges Christianity, particularly his understanding and use of the concepts of Original Sin and the Cain story.

(Beachams Guide to Literature for Young Adults)


Piper, H. W.The Active Universe: Pantheism and the Concept of Imagination in the English Romantic Poets. London: Athlone Press, 1962. Proposes the influence of various scientific and philosophical ideas upon Coleridge, with several chapters on the poets intellectual development and one devoted entirely toThe Rime of the Ancient Mariner.

Kirk. Unnamed church at which the poem opens and closes. This church, as well as other sites to which the Mariner alludessuch as a lighthouse, a hill, and a harbor bayare evidently located in the Mariners native country. (Kirk is an old and once commonly used word for church in the British Isles, especially in Scotland.) The Mariner comes to understand his place within the universe as one of many creatures that deserve honor and respect, and the church imputes a moral tone to these ideas. Indeed, the Mariner is not simply a relativist, believing that whatever he wants to do is correct for a particular situation. His killing of the harmless albatross emerges from such an incorrect assessment. The church calls this assumption into question. Consequently, the Mariner is compelled to repeat his story to the Wedding-Guest, whom the Mariner believes to be in need of such a lesson.

Newlyn, Lucy, ed.The Cambridge Companion to Coleridge. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 2002. Contains commissioned essays by modern critics reassessing Coleridges poetry and other writing as well as his philosophical and theological ideas.

In developing his themes in The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, Coleridge masterfully expresses concepts through the use of symbols and…

Ship. Unnamed vessel on which the Mariner rides the waves of the sea, beginning in the third stanza of part 1. As his ship continues its voyage, the sea itself reflects the mood, the emotional intensity, of the ships sailors. The men have nowhere else to go so long as they remain at sea, and their ship thus becomes both home and prison to them. When the wind drops, and the ship is becalmed, the Mariner is reminded how confining the ship is. When the ship is trapped among ice floes, the Mariner allows himself to kill the albatross for sport. The Mariners ship becomes the stage for his great sin, as well as for the beginning of his redemption.


In The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, the albatross is a good omen for sailors and sometimes even represented the soul of a lost sailor. So, to kill the albatross is to bring bad luck. Hung on the…

Why does the Mariner kill the albatross? What is the symbolic nature of the action?

The Mariner kills the albatross because he associated the lack of wind with it.  At first all the men thought the bird was good luck since a good wind blew and they moved swiftly.  Then, the wind…

Bloom, Harold, ed.Samuel Taylor Coleridges The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.New York: Chelsea House, 1986. Introduction places the poem in the tradition of Cain and Wandering Jew stories, and essays include studies of the poems sources and symbolism.

Barfield, Owen.What Coleridge Thought. Middletown, Conn.: Wesleyan University Press, 1971. Focuses on Coleridges theological and philosophical thought, including his self-proclaimed passion for Christianity.

The albatross itself is a symbol of innocence and beauty. When the seaman hang the dead albatross around the Mariners neck, it becomes a symbol of his sin, which he bears like a mark of shame. Ultimately, the albatross death leads the Mariner to a spiritual epiphany, allowing him to understand his relationship with God and nature.

There is lots of Personification throughout.  Most of it has to do with the sun.  The sun takes on human qualities and develops a pronoun of he. The sun came up upon the left, Out of the see…

McFarland, Thomas.Coleridge and the Pantheist Tradition. Oxford, England: Clarendon Press, 1969. Wide-ranging assessment of Coleridges coherence of thought, including his literary, theological, and philosophical ideas.

Coleridge personifies the figures of both Death and Life-in-Death, depicting them as two supernatural beings playing dice in order to determine the Mariners fate. Death takes the two hundred hired seaman on the Mariners ship, but Life-in-Death wins the Mariner, whose ancient appearance suggests, if not immortality, then a wizened old age.

(Beachams Guide to Literature for Young Adults)

(Beachams Guide to Literature for Young Adults)

Boulanger, James D., ed.Twentieth Century Interpretations of The Rime of the Ancient Mariner: A Collection of Critical Essays. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1969. A useful collection of scholarly articles dealing with the poem, including an introduction that attempts to reconcile some of the differences of critical opinion.

Coleridge, Samuel Taylor.The Annotated Ancient Mariner. Edited by Martin Gardner. Illustrated by Gustave Dor. Cleveland: World Publishing, 1967. Includes the last and the first versions of the poem, together with interpretive comments of varying utility. Dors illustrations (and those by other artists) remind readers how intensely visual the poem is.



The Nightmare Life-in-Death Was She

It is clear that these two spectres that appear on the ship and play a chilling game of dice for the life of the Mariner represent what their names say they are. Death represents complete death,…

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In The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, Coleridge focuses on humanitys relationship to the natural world. Coleridge makes it clear that the…

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House, Humphry.Coleridge: The Clark Lectures, 1951-52. London: Hart-Davis, 1953. This book of fewer than 170 pages maintains its reputation as a sound introduction to the poet and his works. A thirty-page chapter onThe Rime of the Ancient Marineris sensible and straightforward.

Oh Sleep! It Is A Gentle Thing

What are some examples of symbolism in The Rime of the Ancient Mariner?


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