The Rhyme of The Ancient Mariner

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Appunti ballata The Ancient Mariner di Samuel Taylor Coleridge.

The Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner

Tragic story with a final redemption; attention for the sound with rhymes, alliteration, … It is longer and more complex than medieval ballads.

Magic Elements

Recurrent magic elements, in particular numbers: 3 (Earth, Moon, Sun  or the holy trinity) is the symbol of perfection; also multiples of 3: 9, 12, 33; also 7 (the days of the creation).

In the rhyme of the ancient mariner: 3 are the guests stopped; 9 are the days the albatross live with the mariners; 7 are the days that the mariner spend alone; 7 are the fathom by the surface of a swimming spirits that push the boat when he return home; 9 is the tarots number for the hermit.

Mysterious are the glittering eyes which seem to have particular powers. The eyes of the dead crew seem to have a special nature.

The albatross is a bird of good hope and it’s also the reincarnation of the mariners that were died in the sea; the food given to the albatross is considered a symbol of  gift to nature.

The albatross is a victim and it’s comparable to the killing of Christ: both of them bring a good message; the albatross is killed with a crossbow, Christ was crucified on a cross.

The wisps around the ship when the death and the life in death are playing dies to win the lifes of the mariners.

Medieval ballads

Composed by anonymous and transmitted orally; it was acted, language was simple; It consists in a series of rapid flashes of events; one single situation with dramatic elements; presence of dialogue; four line stanzas; repetition with change of small parts to allow the storyline go on (incremental repetition); not a clear separation between magic and real elements.

Interpretations

Religious ones:

-the story of mankind (the original sin of killing the albatross, the punishment and the redemption); -the story of the Ancient Mariner as a man in a figured form;

-albatross is Christ that saves the men that only after understand it.

Others:

-The poet is the albatross that can only fly high in the sky but is killed by men and only after he is recognized as a poet;

-the Night is romanticism and the day is the enlightenment (good things on night, bad during the day);

Psychoanalytic interpretation: the albatross represents the controversial relation with his mother (of Coleridge);

The sea between what is rational and irrational (surface rational; depth irrational).

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