(http://undoomed.wetpaint.com/page/Rime+of+the+Ancient+Mariner)
Coleridge in his poem “The Rime of
the Ancyent Marinere” juxtaposes Christian religious undercurrents with those
of superstition. The theme of
spirituality, one of the more prominent themes of the work, draws material from
both religion and secular notions of the sublime. I would say Coleridge does this in attempt to neutralize
spiritual undertaking, without necessarily attacking believers of either camp.
The nature of the character of the
marinere for me indicates Coleridge’s attitude towards spiritual wanderers.
(Note that this isn’t to say that I think Coleridge agrees with his own
character’s conclusions.) The
marinere at sea partially believes the superstition of an augural albatross,
praising it for its good humor but also as a bringer of peaceful weather. However, for one untold reason or
another, the marinere kills the bird.
Symbolically, if we the readers take the bird as the sailors do, as some
sort of spiritual being, the killing of the bird is an act of provocation. The marinere, although he does not
reveal his motives, chooses to make a move towards connecting or inquiring
about this spiritual realm, which he invokes as both “a good Christian soul”
and secularly (ln 63-64).
The albatross represents an emblem
of the supernatural for the marinere.
The superstition holds that the bird acts as a beacon of fortune, less
upon his own accord, but in service to higher forces. Killing it would merely be an address to its master. The notion of the marinere seeking
spiritual authorities is supported by the nature of the marinere’s
situation. He is literally a
wanderer on the sea, unaware of outside forces, and capable only of passivity.
Killing the albatross is the least he could do. We know that the killing of the albatross is important
because the tale of the marinere is about its consequences. The arbitrariness of the marinere’s
decision also lends itself to the passive, almost accidental—above all,
uncontrollable—interactions with the supernatural that Coleridge sees spiritual
seekers finding.
By the marinere’s tale, what stands
before him, for the retribution of the albatross, are two secular spirits. Coleridge in these beings as well,
combines spiritual designations.
Death and Living Death, no doubt contrasting with the bride and groom,
holds the marinere to his ‘sin,’ but at the same time lets fortune take his
fate.
Coleridge puts the marinere in a
narrative position of wisdom.
From him, (whether or not the readers and the wedding guest agree,) a
moral message is put across. He
comes to another man to tell his story, similar to the goal of a missionary,
and comes to him at a singularly important event in life, when advice is always
sought and celebrated. The poem,
“The Rime of the Ancyent Marinere,” is about what the marinere expresses. This platform of importance heightens
the stakes of what the marinere actually says. The marinere’s superfluous lesson of “He prayeth best who
loveth best, / All things both great and small,” seems hardly related to the
situation Coleridge put the marinere in (ln 645-648). Neither is this revelation related to the wedding guest
directly, nor does it adequately portray the experience he has just expounded. In this way, Coleridge may be mocking
the keepers of spiritual advice, by morphing a non-secular truth with a
seemingly secular experience. Not
only does the wedding guest fear the marinere as a symbol of death, with
specter-like hands, but the marinere is attributing the actions of spiritual
entities named Death and Living Death—names completely absent from the
Christian canon—to the Christian God.
In depicting the marinere as a man
of spirituality in secular and non-secular ways, and also acting in his
situation of parallel flux, for me, Coleridge does not establish his work as leaning
towards one religion or another.
The charge of the marinere’s rhyme is in his emotional experience of the
circumstances that come with inquiring of the spiritual realm: uncertainty, but power of belief.
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