Samuel Taylor Coleridge: Day 2

"[F]rom my early reading of fairy tales and genii etc. etc. my mind had been habituated to the Vast and I never regarded my senses in any way as the criteria of my belief. I regulated all my creeds by my conceptions, not by my sight, even at that age. Should children be permitted to read romances, and relations of giants and magicians and genii? I know all that has been said against it; but I have formed my faith in the affirmative. I know no other way of giving the mind a love of the Great and the Whole"
Robert Browning to Thomas Poole, October 1797

Points of Reflection

1. in what ways do the words above echo the epigraph that begins "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner" (1797; 1798)?

2. do the prefatory "Argument" and explanatory, marginal glosses throughout this poem add to or detract from the reader's enjoyment?

3. what rescues the ancient mariner from the curse he is under?

4. what clues does Coleridge provide in lines 123-65 of "Christabel" (ca.1815; 1817) that Geraldine is not quite what she seems?

5. what appears to be motivating Geraldine's actions in lines 255-70?

6. it has been said that, ever since the popularizing of Sigmund Freud's theories, modern critics cannot look at either physical or emotional closeness between individuals without reading sex into what they see. In Part I of "Christabel," does there appear to be anything intrinsically sexual going on between Christabel and Geraldine?

7. why does Christabel briefly convince herself that her vision of Geraldine as evil was but a dream (2.370-86)? What makes Sir Leoline forget his old anger against Geraldine's father, Roland de Vaux of Tryermaine (2.408-82)?

8. what do you think is Geraldine's endgame?

Rime of the Ancient Mariner: Plate VII
Gustave Doré

Paul Marchbanks
marchban@email.unc.edu