The Rime of the Ancient Mariner

by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

and The Waste Landby T.S. Eliot

Background and Introduction

Backgrounds Coleridge

Written in 1797/8 Reflects man’s need

for spiritual salvation Regarded by critics as

too obscure and archaic; the “gloss” was added in 1815/6

Signaled a transition into romanticism

Eliot Written in 1922 Reflects the post-war

sense of depression and futility

Provoked a violent literary controversy

A landmark of the literary modernist era

Backgrounds Coleridge

Inspired by A Voyage Round The World by Way of the Great South Sea (1726) by Captain George Shelvocke, in which a sailor shoots an albatross, Coleridge envisioned “tutelary spirits”

Eliot Based on archetypal

constructs drawn from non-fiction works: Sir James George Frazer’s The Golden Bough and Jessie L. Weston’s From Ritual to Romance

Coleridge Eliot

Introductions Coleridge

Style: archaic language combined with religious imagery

Style: description of fantastical spirits and dream-like experiences

Tone: haunting, mystical, inspired

Structure: a narrative literary ballad

Eliot Style: condensed use

of language Style: a wealth of

historical and literary references

Tone: erudite, cryptic, satirical, earnest

Structure: lack of narrative sequence

Introductions Coleridge

Structure: seven sections which explore a soul guilty of a terrible sin and its guidance toward redemption

Theme: Man’s violation against nature is atoned for in the redemptive embrace of spiritual guides

Eliot Structure: five sections

which explore the psychic stages of a soul in despair, struggling for redemption

Theme: Spiritual stagnation of the modern era is contrasted with fertility myths of the past

Introductions Coleridge

Coleridge portrays oceanic spiritual “otherworld”

The Ocean = the deep spiritual realm

The town = the hectic human communal realm

Eliot Eliot portrays a

decaying twilight world

The Waste Land = spiritual drought

The city = paralysis

The Themes Coleridge

Life is lived in pursuit of selfish pleasure

The ennobled Wanderer must force his listener to suspend the spiritless pursuit of pleasure and admonish him to nurture his soul

Eliot Modern life is

comprised of suffering The cruelty of

existence must be investigated through the noble legends and mystical poetry and art of the past

The Themes Coleridge

Spiritual death is a state of suspension which can arbitrarily deliver us to “tutelary spirits”

Coleridge’s vision is wild yet optimistic

Eliot Death can be both

tragically meaningless and conceivably redeeming

Eliot’s vision is depressing but not pessimistic!

The Poems Coleridge

An unnamed Wedding- Guest is waylaid en route to the celebration

The wandering Ancient Mariner is entrusted with singling out the spiritually lost and entrancing them with his story of redemption

Eliot An unnamed persona

moves through the Waste Land of his society and soul, seeking salvation

The modern world is a land without values, a mechanical world of arid souls

The PoemsColeridge

Man must respect his integral position with both the natural world and the spiritual world

Communal man is spiritually selfish, reflectively ignorant, and morally afflicted

Eliot There was a time

when man was vibrant with life: he had ideas, moral values, and responded to natural forces

Modern man is morally sterile, sexually impotent, and culturally stagnant

The Poems Coleridge

Communal man serves the flesh and ignores the spirit

The sea is fluid depth of the unconscious and fountainhead of spiritual life

Remember The Odyssey!

Eliot Modern man is a

mechanical man: physically alive but spiritually dead

The land is arid because man’s soul is arid

Remember the Fisher King!

The Poems Coleridge

Communal man busies himself with activity and must be made to suspend his exertion to nourish the spirit

The Wedding-Guest realizes that there is a spiritual order to the universe

Eliot The modern Waste

Land is man-made: therefore it is within man’s power to regenerate his dead world

The persona realizes that there is supreme order in the universe

The Poems Coleridge

Salvation and the restoration of order are available to the Wedding-Guest through spiritual supplication

Man must submit himself to spiritual sanctity to bring order into his soul and into the world.

Eliot Salvation and the

restoration of order are available to the persona through spiritual/religious belief

The persona must merely submit himself to this supreme power to bring order into his soul and into the world.