Sublime in the Rime of the Ancient Mariner by Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Essay Example

? ‘Sublime’ in the Rime of the Ancient Mariner by Samuel Taylor Coleridge ‘Sublime’ in the Rime of the Ancient Mariner by Samuel Taylor Coleridge Sublime is a philosophical concept. It is the value and worth of greatness, whether it is ethical, intellectual, physical, metaphysical, arty, spiritual or aesthetic. It refers to the importance which is beyond all types of calculation. It cannot be measured. This notion of Sublime has been in the world since years. The first recognized study dates back to the 1 century AD and was written by Greek teacher, Pseudo-Longinus. For him, sublime was an adjective which illustrates raised and grand thoughts and language. Sublime enthuse terror and reverence with immense persuasive authority. Longinus’s writings also contain references and indications from biblical sources like from the Genesis. The concept also came into prominence in the 18th century in Britain. This was regarded as an aesthetic excellence which was different from the perception of beauty and splendor. Authors such as Anthony Ashley-Cooper, Joseph Addison, and John Dennis have addressed the notion of sublime in various works. Edmund Burke was a British Philosopher whose Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful was in print in 1757. His concept of sublime was that the sublime and beauty are jointly exclusive. He mentions that light can be seen as beauty but intense light or even darkness can be sublime. His writings also focus on the psychological effects of the sublime and the fear horror or terror that it is associated with. He describes this sensation as ‘negative pain’ which is distinctive from positive delight but still gives amusement to a person. For him, terror is the ruling principle of sublime and how astonishment suspends all the emotions of the soul and leaves some degree of horror. Adding to the emphasis he sets on terror he also elucidates the differences in sublimity and beauty through a physiological theory. He defines happiness and pain as the two sources of aesthetic sensation and links beauty to delight and sublimity to the feeling of gloom. Moreover he says that the fibers in the human body have a relaxing effect on them through beauty and in times of stress and gloom which is associated with sublimity constricts the fibers. Burke’s was the first English writer who came up with an aesthetic enlightenment of the effects of beauty and sublimity and how do these sensations shape the development of perception and its influence on the perceiver. Adding on to the concept of sublime, German philosopher and enlightenment thinker Immanuel Kant holds the phenomenon that the sublime is of three kinds; the noble, the splendid and the terrifying. He believes that there are two varieties of sublime. One is the mathematical and the other is dynamical. Moreover in comparing beauty and sublime, he gives his thoughts that beauty is objective and it has boundaries and can be measured, whereas he says that sublime is the concept which possesses no boundaries and limitations. The Rime of the Ancient Mariner was written in 1978-1979 by the English poet, Samuel Taylor Coleridge. There are differences in views as to where the poem is inspired from. Some believe that it was inspired by James Cook’s second voyage of exploration of the Pacific Ocean and the South Seas. William Wordsworth brings in a different view and says that it was inspired when the he along with his sister and Coleridge were out for a walk in the hills in Somerset. It is also said to be influenced by the legends of the Wandering Jew who was forcefully made to stroll in the earth because he mocked Jesus on the day of his Crucifixion. Lastly, Bernard Martin believes that the poem was inspired by the life of an Anglican clergyman who had life threatening experiences on a slave ship. The years 1744-1760 were the years of the French-English wars which further led to more hassles and competition for the growth of economy and transatlantic ocean voyages. Economies were shaping up and slavery was a significant reason for economy growth or crumbling. In Britain the global trade was settled after the defeat of Napoleon. Romantic poetry was created, played and sung everywhere around which gave encouragement to mariners and also veneration of colonial expansion. The balladry of Coleridge’s The Rime of the Ancient Mariner was not any exception rather a representation of the social relations of that time. Regardless of the lectures against the colonialism under pressure of Burke, an isocratic colony had been desired by Coleridge over the sea, thus signifying the fact that he was also influenced by the philosophy of finding what was prevalent. The rebellious voice of exposing and debunking the national hero did not show that Coleridge was against the colonial expansion. In fact he was anxious of the future of the British sailors. In his poem “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner”, Coleridge explains the power which the world emphasizes and stresses its overwhelming power and authority over man. He made it clear that the sacred world commands the natural world. The Ancient Mariner disobeyed God by mistreating His creature. That is the reason why He advocates respect and esteem for the natural world so that he could please the God to gain His mercy. Therefore he admired the Hermit who was living in accordance with the physical as well as the natural world. For example The Ancient Mariner suggests the Wedding guest in the end that if you want access to the sublime and inspiration, then you should be aware of how to give respect to the ordinary. Coleridge’s “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” is a beautiful poetry of vengeance and retribution, as the ancient mariner has to develop amendments for the reckless and off hand blunder he made by killing the Albatross. The spiritual world and its people retaliate and punish ancient mariner and his ship mates by executing physical and mental havoc and mayhem. In "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” by Coleridge, the poet focuses our attention, not only to deliver the story of the ancient mariner but also tries to extract the message obtained from the story. This message that he delivered to his audience is also directed towards us. The word “teach” utilized by Coleridge portrays the ancient mariner’s storytelling, and further tells that he has a "strange power of speech". The poet according to his understanding not only struggles to please others but quench a painful urge. The poet is captivated and aggrieved in the same way by his imagination. Both are fanatics, and storytelling is their drug; both are addicts, and storytelling is their drug; it offers only transitory reprieve until the desire to enlighten returns. In current psychological ways, the Ancient Mariner as well as the writer of the poem relies on "the talking cure" to alleviate himself of his psychological load. Coleridge expresses evenly prevailing and wretched image of the writer. For the ancient mariner reliving the experience is a cure but when the same experience is repeated it is a torture so the ancient Mariner inspires others to bring changes in themselves and awakens as a new person. The notion of Sublime carries on throughout the story and the various themes of the story incorporate the concept of sublime. The natural world's authority in "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner" is indisputable. Coleridge highlights the ways in which the natural world dwarfs and declares its overwhelming power over man. Coleridge includes subsidiary shines and it is apparent that the spiritual world controls and exploits the natural world. This is related to the concept given by Burke and Kant of the relation of beauty and sublime. Britain relied heavily on its naval superiority to maintain its representation of a Western identity. The ability of the British naval to maintain its naval dominance over other powers and to discover new lands and regions is a major matter that is debunked in Coleridge’s poem “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner”. The indirectly twisted legend of the national hero recognized with the power of Britain’s Navy and the mission surrounding the civilization, was a strong rationalization for imperialism in the realm of Romantic Orientals. The approval given by the Mariner of the Oriental water snakes in his journey indicates the mission of the Western power to take the blessings to the East, thus this could be regarded as indirect explanation of colonialism. The Britain ambitions to imperialize other regions were put into legend of its naval power along with the national hero. Britain gained superiority in the Mediterranean Sea under the leadership of Lord Nelson and defeated the French. Although the Orient was built as passive, yet it was dominant and posed a threat to the British superiority. Thus the British navy stood as an obstacle in front of the Orient, as it was under constant threat of attack from either the Orient or Napoleon. The heroic identity of the sailors is crushed in words in this poem, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. Coleridge exposed and debunked the concept that British sailors remain hero of the nation for good. The British wanted to ensure that their white identity remains unmixed. The killing of the Albatross by the Mariner could be regarded as an act of colonial killing of the locals, thus exposing him to the other world, which is the colonial world, and transformed him into a victim of the slave business. He became exposed to the moral and physical dishonesty. The connection of the local dominion (West) with the colonial region (East) signifies that the Mariner is responsible of breaching the dialogue of dissimilarity between self and other, and is positioned unstably in between. He becomes like a slave exposed to first moral and later on physical corruption. As mentioned earlier about Burke’s concept of sublime, it is now easier to turn to the famous artist, Joseph Mallord William Turner. The romantic painters during that time centralized the concept of sublime in their painting which carried forward the concept given by Edward Burke. The sublime was an effort to rejoin the subject and the object i.e. the man and the nature. In the expansion of this idea, Tuner played very vital roles. He was able to visualize sublime and he captured and portrayed that visualization and imagination he had of the concept through paintings. He made the people ‘feel with their eyes’ by depicting the concept in his paintings. Secondly, he made the experience of sublime accessible to the masses. He secularized the notion of sublimation which was only monopolized by the church and had religious touch to it. Turner selected great themes for his paintings. They mainly revolved around big cities, huge mountains, wild seas and oceans, storms, and these paintings had Greek, Roman and Biblical references and scenes too. Also, he chose subjects that instilled fear in the people. The paintings displayed burning ships, fire, shipwrecks, sea storms etc. immense similarity can be viewed between Burke’s theory and Turners paintings on sublime. Burkes points out that seas and oceans are more threatening and thrilling than landscapes. Turner depicts this theory and his paintings which present the sublime are mostly naval. Burke believes that naturally these oceans and sea storms horrify us and the similar concept is vivid in Turner’s paintings as well. Hence the concept of sublime is pursued in the same way in this poem by relating everything to sea life. The ship is driven to the south and gets off course due to storm and reaches Antarctica. The mariner shoots the albatross and his fellows then realize their mistake of supporting him in this crime as they will be a victim to the wrath of the albatross. When the mariner’s fellows suffer from thirst, they make him wear the dead albatross across his neck. The crew members die day by but the mariner lives on to see the revenge the corpses of his fellows. Later on the mariner prays and the dead people are possessed by good spirits and take charge of the ship back home. With this concept in mind, the idea of sublimity is portrayed where strong, rough, and dark, frightening picture is depicted. In order to visually feel and sense The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, one can have a look on the paintings by Turner which are very much related to this idea of sublime and assist in better understanding. References: Clewis, Robert. 2009. The Kantian Sublime and the Revelation of Freedom. Kitson, Peter. 2000. Bales of Living Anguish: Representations of Race and the Slave in Romantic Writing. Lee, Debbie. 1998. Yellow Fever and the Slave Trade: Coleridge’s The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. McClintock, Anne. 1995. Imperial Leather: Race, Gender and Sexuality in the Colonial Context. M. Wheele, Kathleen. 1981. The creative mind in Coleridge's poetry. W. Said, Edwards. 1978. Orientalism: Western Conceptions of the Orient.   Read More