The Rime of the

Ancient Mariner
Study Guide by Course Hero

part.
What's Inside
TENSE
Both the present and past tense are used in The Rime of the
j Book Basics ................................................................................................. 1 Ancient Mariner.

d In Context ..................................................................................................... 1 ABOUT THE TITLE

a Author Biography ..................................................................................... 4
h Characters ................................................................................................... 5
k Plot Summary ............................................................................................. 7
c Part Summaries ....................................................................................... 13
g Quotes ......................................................................................................... 17
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner is a rime, an alternate spelling
of rhyme, told by an old sailor, or a mariner. The ancientness of
his status suggests a kind of eternal wisdom, as if the Mariner
has something to share with readers. However, rime can also
mean "frost," an icy substance that can form on sails and ships.
Antarctica, one of the locations detailed in the poem, also
evokes this frosty image. The Mariner, too, is often described
with frost imagery.

l Symbols ..................................................................................................... 20

m Themes ........................................................................................................ 21 d In Context

e Suggested Reading .............................................................................. 23

The Romantic Movement

j Book Basics The Romantic period in English literature spans the latter part
of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th century.
Characterized by individual thought and personal feeling, the
AUTHOR
Romantics wrote about their own unique experiences,
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
expressing their work through the lens of their own particularly
YEAR PUBLISHED intense emotional response to something (usually something in
1798 nature). While the Neoclassical period imitated the style of the
Greeks and Romans, focusing on formality and artificiality, the
GENRE Romantics believed that poetry should no longer focus on
Drama strict architecture but rather strive to be more organic in
nature. Coleridge's descriptions of the ice, the storms, and the
PERSPECTIVE AND NARRATOR
sea serpents in The Rime of the Ancient Mariner are beautiful
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner has two levels of narrative: it is
and powerful verbal depictions of the beauty of the natural
a story within a story. The narrator uses a third-person limited
world.
voice. This narrator knows the thoughts of the Wedding Guest
but not of the Mariner. However, the Wedding Guest is only Another hallmark of the Romantic period was a focus on
present at the beginning and end of the poem for the most
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Study Guide
imagination, led by Samuel Taylor Coleridge who viewed it as
the supreme poetic quality. The Romantics and their works
expressed a newfound interest in the workings of human
unconscious, dreams, visions, and the supernatural. Coleridge's
Kubla Khan—a dream poem reportedly composed under the
effects of opium—and The Rime of the Ancient Mariner with its
focus on the supernatural events and visions plaguing the
Mariner, are examples of these ideas.
This change in subject matter signaled another change, this
time in the use of language and expression. Gone was the
stilted diction of the Neoclassical poets of earlier centuries,
where order, accuracy, and structure were the general rule.
The stale language and elite subject matter were not relevant
to everyday folk. Wordsworth especially believed that poetry
should be composed in the type of language spoken by
ordinary people. This concept ties in with the more organic
view of poetic composition. We see this change present in
Coleridge's work: in The Rime of the Ancient Mariner he
chooses to compose a ballad—a folk song more common to
the medieval period—and in Kubla Khan he indulges in a
fanciful dream narrative.
Religion and Coleridge
Coleridge wrote numerous works on religion throughout his
career. When he returned to the Church of England, the state
church of England, in the early 1800s, he continued writing his
essays, composing some of his most significant religious
essays during this time.
Coleridge believed that prayer was the pinnacle of what the
human heart could express. Thus prayer plays an important
part in The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. For the Mariner to be
deprived of the ability to pray is something that Coleridge
considered horrifying. The Mariner is unable to reach God until
he can accept nature's place under God's umbrella. Coleridge
considered his worship of the natural world as a way of gaining
a more profound relationship with God, something the Mariner
cannot experience until he accepts all of the creatures of Earth
as being part of the Creator.
The Wedding Guest also serves as a reminder of the power of
religion. He wants to go in and enjoy the celebration and is less
interested in the actual exchange of the marriage vows. A
wedding mirrored Christ's relationship with the Church, and the
ceremony and vows are meant to have the participants (bride
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In Context 2
and groom as well as those witnessing the event) form a closer
bond to God. If the Wedding Guest is only focused on the
merrymaking, he has missed the point of the service. The
Mariner's tale serves as the Wedding Guest's touchstone to a
deeper understanding of the Divine. The story the Mariner tells,
and the admonition at the end of it, result in an awakening
within the Wedding Guest, imparting a wisdom that wasn't
present before. The Wedding Guest sees that not only are
people connected but also every living thing: "He prayeth best,
who loveth best / All things both great and small; / For the dear
God who loveth us / He made and loveth all." The Wedding
Guest sacrificed his selfish pleasures to think of the Mariner's
final words to him.
Finally, there is the Albatross. It is nearly impossible to
categorize, though many have argued a Christlike symbolism
with regard to its death and the mark of sin that the Mariner
carries when it is draped around his neck. However, the
Albatross defies interpretation, much as God and nature do.
They are all beyond the comprehension of mankind, and each
time man (the crew, the Mariner) attempt to classify the
Albatross, something terrible happens. The Albatross, like
nature—and therefore God—are meant to remain unknowable.
Nested Narratives
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner is an example of a frame
story. There is more than one "narrator" involved in the poem:
the speaker who tells of the Mariner stopping the Wedding
Guest and his reaction and the Mariner who tells his tale. The
frame story allows readers to experience the Mariner's tale
and to witness the Wedding Guest's response to it. Readers
are privy to both stories. This is key to understanding why
Coleridge has the Mariner tell his story to the Wedding Guest
and thus to the reader. By including the frame story, readers
see the Wedding Guest's reaction to the Mariner's tale as well
as its aftereffect. The Mariner changes the way the Wedding
Guest sees the world after hearing the Mariner's words—this is
something that all Romantic poets hoped to do with their
readers. They wanted to effect changes in their worldviews. In
this way the Mariner is as much a stand in for Coleridge as the
reader is for the Wedding Guest.
The Mariner's motivation comes from his guilt: he feels
compelled to tell his tale of woe to someone, but not to just
anyone. The Mariner will know the right listener when he sees
his face. This is a person who, like the readers of the poem, will
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Study Guide
benefit from the sailor's tale of suffering and redemption,
someone likely to be affected by his words. The Mariner and
the speaker reflect each other as tale-tellers. They seek to
enlighten, to warn, and to challenge the listener and reader to
examine themselves and their relationships to the world. Unlike
the Mariner, the speaker assumes readers want to hear the
tale of the Wedding Guest, that there is a desire to listen. The
Mariner's arresting of the Wedding Guest speaks of a need:
the Mariner's to confess and the Wedding Guest's to hear and
understand the moral so he can avoid the same pitfalls.
There is power in both the tale and the manner in which it is
told. The Mariner is compelling as much as he is
compelled—the Wedding Guest cannot look away from him
because of his strange, almost supernatural intensity. The
Mariner wants to tell as much as the Wedding Guest is called
to listen, and the speaker dutifully records their meeting. Now
the Mariner's narrative is no longer fluid. By recording the
meeting—and the Mariner's tale—the speaker in the poem has
trapped it in time. This is the only narrative that matters. But
this is not the first time the Mariner has told his story. Not only
do readers have the frame story but also they have the idea of
multiple stories-within-stories when readers think of how many
times the Mariner might have stopped a passerby before this
one. If the Mariner tailored his tale of woe to accommodate the
moral the listener most needed to hear, then the speaker has
trapped the Mariner, silencing his voice as effectively as the
thirst did when he was on the ship. The malleability of the story
has become lost to readers with the framing. The frame is just
that—it restricts the narrative to only encompass this one view.
Narrative Voice and Poetic
Elements
The poem has two levels of narrative, a story within a story.
The narrator uses a third-person limited voice. We and the
Wedding Guest never know what the Mariner is thinking unless
he tells us, which raises the question of the Mariner's reliability.
The narrator gives us the internal conclusions of the Wedding
Guest (who is a stand in for the reader), but the Mariner
remains a mystery. This obscurity of narrative intent ties into
the strange, supernatural feel of the poem. We don't know
what it is the Mariner wants from us, we don't know if he is
trustworthy, and we don't know why we have been chosen to
hear his tale. These mysteries link the overall mystery of what
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In Context 3
really happened aboard that ship, which is something only the
Mariner himself can answer. We, like the Wedding Guest, are
left to make up our own minds as to whether we believe the
tale the Mariner tells us and the tale Coleridge tells us.
The Mariner's voice is very distinct. The Rime of the Ancient
Mariner is a ballad—a poem or song that tells a story in short
stanzas—and Coleridge uses the tone and language of a
traditional balladeer. The Mariner uses distinctive language, far
older than the 19th century when Coleridge wrote the poem.
He uses internal rhyme—when words inside the line rhyme as
in line 69 with "The ice did split with a thunder-fit"—as well as
end rhyme—when words at the end of lines rhyme as with "Of
the spirit that plagued us so; / Nine fathom deep he had
followed us / From the land of mist and snow"—to create a
rhythm. Coleridge also uses repetition to reinforce the
important information so that the listener will remember it.
This is a poem that is meant to be read aloud, much like the
Mariner is performing his tale for his audience—the Wedding
Guest. The Mariner practices anaphora—the deliberate
repetition of the first part of a sentence in order to achieve the
desired effect—with lines such as "Her lips were red, her looks
were free, / Her locks were yellow as gold: / Her skin was as
white as leprosy"—and alliteration, which is the repetition of the
same letter or sound at the beginning of adjacent words to
keep the beat and hold the listener's interest: "The fair breeze
blew, the white foam flew, / The furrow followed free."
The Albatross in Maritime Lore
Albatrosses have been linked with sailors and maritime lore for
many centuries. These birds can travel long distances in short
periods of time because they fly using dynamic
soaring—gliding along wind up-drafts above the waves for
greater lift with little effort. During their journeys, albatrosses
feed on organisms found on the ocean's surface; because of
this habit they often follow along behind ships to feed on the
fish waste thrown overboard. Because of their perceived
symbiosis, both in the way ships and albatross travel and the
link between the crew's disposal of food waste and the
albatross's way of feeding, the albatross and sailors have
become linked in maritime lore.
The albatross represents both good luck and bad omen in
maritime superstition. Some sailors believe that albatrosses
carry the souls of dead sailors. Other sailors believe the
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Study Guide
sighting of an albatross signals good luck: the soul of the dead
mariner will protect the ship and crew or bring good winds for
sailing. Others think that an albatross is an omen of death,
predicting that a sailor will die soon. Both interpretations of an
albatross's presence require a sailor to have died. The
interpretation is dependent on the sailor himself and/or the
crew's belief as to what type of omen the sighting of an
albatross represents. Good or bad, sailors still believe that
killing an albatross means a curse will befall the entire crew.
Coleridge draws upon this perceived maritime curse when
composing The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and creating his
cursed sailor and doomed crew. Readers see the differing
reactions to the sailor's action of shooting the Albatross. The
crew seems divided on what to think—at first they subscribe to
the typical superstition that the Mariner did a horrible thing,
damning them all. But when nothing bad happens, they praise
the Mariner for killing a creature that caused them harm. The
curse of the Albatross seems to hold only so much weight as
the crew gives it. When they celebrate the killing of a harmless
beast, this acts as an affront to nature, which then triggers the
curse. It is only once the ship is calmed and the men are thirsty
that they realize their mistake of cheering the death of an
innocent creature. While the Mariner does the actual killing, the
crew is complicit in reveling in the death and also receive their
punishment. They try to distance themselves from it by tying
the carcass of the Albatross around the Mariner's neck, but
they are still guilty to a lesser extent.
a Author Biography
Early Life and Education
Samuel Taylor Coleridge was born in a Devon village of Ottery
on October 21, 1722, the 10th and youngest child of Ann
Bowden Coleridge and John Coleridge. His father was a vicar
or clergyman and a schoolmaster. Coleridge's childhood was
spent surrounded by books, and he read widely, especially
romances and fairy tales.
John Coleridge died suddenly in 1781. A year later Coleridge
went to London to attend school at Christ's Hospital. In 1791 he
attended Jesus College at Cambridge. He continued his habit
of voracious reading, and he was interested in imaginative
works and visionary philosophy. Due to financial problems,
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Author Biography 4
Coleridge left Cambridge in his third year and enlisted in the
military under an assumed name. He served less than half a
year. Because he was miserable in the military, his family
bought out his commission and he returned to Cambridge.
While at Cambridge, Coleridge became embroiled in the
political debates of the time—the social and political mayhem
of the French Revolution (1789–99) had affected all of
Europe—and he befriended the English poet Robert Southey
with the idea of setting up a small society. They left Cambridge
for Bristol, where Coleridge worked as a public lecturer.
Coleridge married Sara Fricker in October 1795. Shortly after
the marriage, Southey and Coleridge abandoned their idea of a
separate society. During this time Coleridge and English poet
William Wordsworth began to work together, and Coleridge
spent the better part of the next decade traveling with
Wordsworth and his sister, Dorothy. Coleridge met Sara
Hutchinson in 1799 and fell in love with her, which put a strain
on his relationship with his wife. Hutchinson ultimately rejected
Coleridge.
Writing Career
Coleridge helped usher in the Romantic period of literature in
England, along with his friend William Wordsworth, with their
joint publication of Lyrical Ballads in 1798. Lyrical Ballads was a
sharp change from the contemporary conventions of English
poetry, emphasizing natural speech over poetical, simple
themes over stylized symbolism, the beauty of nature over
urbanization, and emotion and imagination over abstract
thought.
Coleridge used a conversational tone and rhythm to unify his
poetry to develop a new, less formal style. He became best
known as a poet of imagination, one who explored the interplay
between the natural world and the mind. Kubla Khan (1816), one
of Coleridge's most famous poems, was composed during the
aftermath of an opium dream. Famous for the vivid, fantastic
imagery, critics considered it a frivolous and unsubstantial
work, while others believe it to be a statement about the nature
of human genius.
Coleridge and Wordsworth collaborated on The Rime of the
Ancient Mariner, a ballad that first appeared in Lyrical Ballads.
The volume was meant to be experimental, and The Rime of
the Ancient Mariner led the way as the opening work. It was
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Study Guide
met with mixed reviews.
To make ends meet for himself and his family, Coleridge began
his career as a literary critic. His lectures of 1811 and 1812 on
British playwright William Shakespeare revived interest in the
Elizabethan playwrights. He published his Biographia Literaria
in 1817, his response to Wordsworth's Preface of Lyrical
Ballads and his musings on English poetry.
Death and Legacy
In an attempt to treat his opium addiction, Coleridge moved to
Highgate to live with Dr. James Gillman, a physician, in 1816. He
remained there for the rest of his life, writing and preparing
lectures. Coleridge died on July 25, 1834.
While Lyrical Ballads is considered more Wordsworth's work
than Coleridge's, the imaginative imagery in Coleridge's poems
inspired the next generation of English Romantics and
Victorians, the period during Queen Victoria's reign
(1837–1901) that fused Romantic and Realist styles of writing.
Poets Percy Bysshe Shelley, John Keats, Robert Browning,
Alfred Tennyson, and Algernon Charles Swinburne were all
poetically influenced by Coleridge. Coleridge's work helped
shape the Romantic movement, and his essays in Biographia
Literaria offer invaluable insight into the formation of the
theories behind the movement.
h Characters
Wedding Guest
The Wedding Guest is a man on his way to a wedding and is in
a hurry to attend the festivities. He attempts to get away from
the Mariner several times before the sailor begins to tell his
tale but is always stopped by the Mariner's presence. At
several points during the Mariner's tale, he interjects to ask
questions and to comment on the Mariner's expression. He is
deeply affected by the Mariner and what he has to tell him,
despite being unwilling to listen at first. When the Mariner
offers his moral, the Wedding Guest doesn't even go to the
festivities; instead he returns home to think on what the
Mariner told him. He awakes the next morning greatly changed
by the experience.
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Characters 5
Mariner
The Mariner was once a sailor, part of a crew of a sailing ship.
During a sea voyage he, along with the ship, is stranded in the
ice of the South Pole. It is only when an Albatross appears that
the ice breaks and the ship is freed. The Mariner befriends the
bird—it comes at his call. But then, for some unknown reason,
he shoots and kills the Albatross. By killing the innocent
creature, he sets in motion a string of horrors. His crew dies,
but he lives on with his sin. It is only when he accepts that the
bird was part of God's great creation that he is partially
absolved of his sin. But his penance is not done even with that
realization. He must tell his story far and wide before moving
on again. His is compelled into an act of confession by a
supernatural force that even decides who he should tell the
tale to.
Albatross
The Albatross functions more as a symbol than a character,
but its death brings about the Mariner's eventual awakening to
the sublime beauty and power of God's creations. It is an
innocent creature that did not deserve the wrong done to it,
and the Mariner is punished for his sin.
Life-in-Death
She is the personification of life-in-death. She arrives in a
tattered, ghostly vessel with Death, and she wins the Mariner's
soul during a dice game. She is described as being both
beautiful and terrible. While only in the poem a short time, she
still has power over the Mariner and his narrative. He cannot
die, even going seven days and nights without food and water.
It is her influence that keeps him in this limbo. Even still, we
must wonder how old the Mariner is and how long he has been
telling his story to strangers. Can he ever die? Since Life-in-
Death won his soul, it would seem he must go through eternity,
unable to die like everyone else.
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Study Guide Characters 6

Character Map

Wedding Guest
Man on his way to a wedding

Storyteller

Mariner
Experienced sailor;
cursed with immortality

Killer

Tormentor

Life-in-Death
Albatross
Ghostly female presence;
Sea bird
takes the Mariner's soul

Main Character

Other Major Character

Minor Character

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The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Study Guide Plot Summary 7

Full Character List Part 2

Believing the bird had brought favorable winds, the crew
Character Description
becomes angry. Then crew members are glad that the Mariner
shot the Albatross because they believe the bird brought a
The Wedding Guest is a man attending
Wedding Guest thick fog. The ships sails into strange waters and then the wind
his kinsman's wedding.
ceases. Suffering from terrible thirst that drives them mad, the
men hang the dead Albatross around the Mariner's neck.
Mariner The Mariner is an old sailor.

The Albatross is a sea bird that the

Albatross
Mariner kills. Part 3
Life-​in-​Death is a woman aboard the The Mariner spies a strange ghostly ship, piloted by Death and
Life-​in-​Death
ghost ship. Life-in-Death. The two figures roll dice to see who will take the
Mariner's soul, and Life-in-Death wins the game. Death takes
The First Voice is a voice that the the lives of the crew, leaving the Mariner the only live person
First Voice
Mariner overhears.
on the ship.

The Second Voice is a voice that the

Second Voice
Mariner overhears.
Part 4
The Pilot is a man who rescues the
Pilot The Mariner has no food or water, but still he lives. He watches
Mariner in the harbor.
sea serpents swim in the water, blessing their presence. When
The Pilot's Boy is his son, also in the the Albatross breaks free from the Mariner's neck, he is
Pilot's Boy boat with the Pilot when he rescues suddenly able to pray again.
the Mariner.

Hermit
The Hermit is a holy man who is also in
the boat with the Pilot.
Part 5
The Mariner sleeps and wakes to find rain that he can drink. As
a storm approaches, the ship sails on, seemingly without any
k Plot Summary wind to propel it. Their bodies taken over by angels, the dead
crew members help sail the ship. Suddenly the ship is tossed
about and the Mariner falls into a swoon where he hears two
voices talking about him and the penance he must do.
Part 1
Intent on relating his tale, an old sailor stops a young man on
Part 6
his way to a wedding. The Mariner tells of an ocean voyage
with a sailing crew. Once the ship gets blown off course, it
When the Mariner wakes, night has fallen. The crew members
ends up at the South Pole, trapped in ice. When an Albatross
continue to sail the ship until it appears in the Mariner's home
passes, its presence seems to break the ice surrounding the
harbor. Then the spirits inhabiting the bodies leave, and the
ship. The crew sails away with the Albatross following. The
crew members collapse, truly dead. A Pilot, his son, and a
Mariner then shoots the Albatross for no reason.
Hermit approach the ship.

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The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Study Guide Plot Summary 8

Part 7
The ship sinks, but the Mariner is hauled aboard the Pilot's
boat. They are all shocked when he speaks, thinking him dead.
When they return to land, the Mariner tells the Hermit his tale.
When he is finished, he feels better. The Mariner tells the
Wedding Guest that the need to tell his tale grows inside of
him and then he must find someone to tell it to or the pain
becomes unbearable. His tale told, the Mariner leaves the
Wedding Guest, who goes home and ponders what the Mariner
told him.

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The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Study Guide Plot Summary 9

Plot Diagram

Climax

11

10
12
9
Falling Action

Rising Action 8
13
7

6 14
5
15
4
Resolution
3

2
1

Introduction

9. He blesses the sea snakes that allow him to pray.

Introduction
10. Voices speak about his penance for killing the Albatross.

1. The Wedding Guest is stopped by an old sailor.

Climax

Rising Action 11. The dead sailors help sail him home.

2. The Mariner and his crew set out on a sea voyage.

3. The ship and crew are trapped in ice at the South Pole.
Falling Action
4. An Albatross appears and the ice breaks, freeing the ship.
12. A whirlpool sinks the ship.
5. The Mariner kills the Albatross.
13. The Mariner tells his story to the Hermit.
6. The ship is calmed, and the crew begins to die of thirst.
14. The Mariner delivers his moral to the Wedding Guest.
7. Life-in-Death wins the Mariner's soul.

8. The Mariner is surrounded by the dead for seven days.

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The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Study Guide Plot Summary 10

Resolution

15. The Wedding Guest thinks on what the Mariner told him.

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The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Study Guide Plot Summary 11

Timeline of Events

Present

Mariner stops the Wedding Guest to tell his story.

Past

Mariner leaves on a sea voyage.

Past

The ship is stuck in ice at the South Pole.

Past

An Albatross appears.

Past

The ship is freed from the ice.

Past

The Mariner kills the Albatross.

Past

The ship is calmed.

Past

The crew runs out of water.

Past

The crew hangs the Albatross around the Mariner's

neck.

Past

Life-in-Death wins the game of dice.

Past

The crew dies except for the Mariner.

Past

The Mariner blesses the sea creatures he previously

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The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Study Guide Plot Summary 12

cursed.

Past

The Albatross falls from his neck.

Past

The dead men rise to pilot the ship.

Past

Two voices speak of the Mariner and his penance.

Past

The Mariner arrives at his home harbor.

Past

The spirits imbuing the dead men depart.

Past

The Mariner is rescued by the Pilot, the Pilot's son, and

the Hermit.

Past

The Mariner tells his tale when compelled.

Present

The Wedding Guest goes home to think on what the

Mariner has told him.

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The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Study Guide
c Part Summaries
Part 1
Summary
An old man stops a younger man who is on his way to the
wedding of his family member—he is kin to the groom. When
the Wedding Guest tries to brush past the Mariner, the Mariner
stops him, and with "his glittering eye" and "skinny hand" and
strange manner he compels the Wedding Guest to listen to his
story by beginning, "There was a ship."
As part of the crew of a ship, the Mariner sets off to sea. The
ship sails southward, eventually arriving in the Antarctic where
they see icebergs and are surrounded by the icy cold. The ship
becomes trapped in the ice until an Albatross appears. When
they feed it, the ice holding them fast breaks apart and the
helmsman steers them away.
As they sail the Albatross follows behind, answering to the
calls of the Mariner. The Wedding Guest comments on the look
on the Mariner's face. The Mariner confesses that he shot the
Albatross with his crossbow, giving no reason for the act.
Analysis
The narrator sets up the frame story as the Wedding Guest is
stopped by the Mariner. Readers are launched immediately
into the Mariner's story with his line of "There was a ship,"
offering no introduction beyond that. The power of the
Mariner's presence swamps the Wedding Guest's sense of
urgency to attend the nuptials and compels him to listen. The
Mariner is already associated with the supernatural with his
"glittering eye" and the force of his will to speak his story.
The natural world plays a large part in both the poem and in
Romanticism. The sea, the storm, and the ship's eventual
arrival at the South Pole typify the grandeur of the natural
world. This illustrates the sublime, one of the main themes of
Romanticism. The sublime is thought of as the realm of
experience beyond rational thought, which arises from the
beauty and awe-inspiring phenomena of the natural world.
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Part Summaries 13
Coleridge took a differing view of the sublime than his
contemporaries, believing that the sublime could only be found
in nature in the sky, the sea, and the desert because of their
boundlessness. The beauty of the ocean, the storm (sky), and
the ice and mist are all present in The Rime of the Ancient
Mariner.
The appearance of the Albatross in a land where living things
are scarce appears magical or supernatural. Birds are often
depicted as messengers from beyond, of being both a part of
nature and beyond it. For sailors the albatross can be seen as
a sign of good luck or a bad omen. Albatrosses were believed
to carry the souls of dead sailors and would ensure good wind
for the sails. However, they were also looked at as an omen of
ill luck as they could be a warning of someone's imminent
death.
When the Mariner shoots the Albatross, he commits a sin that
he must serve penance in the hope of absolution. The cycle of
the Mariner's penance is reminiscent of the Wandering Jew.
Whether Coleridge meant the bird to represent the Mariner's
crime against nature—the death of an innocent creature that
trusted the Mariner and helped the crew—or a Christlike
sacrifice is open to interpretation. Coleridge would certainly
have been aware of the Wandering Jew narrative: a Jewish
man is doomed to walk Earth because he taunted Jesus on his
way to the Crucifixion. He cannot die until Jesus comes again,
an eternal penance. The Mariner's penance works in a similar
fashion only with the additional urge to share his story, a
confession of sorts.
Part 2
Summary
At first the crew is angry that he killed the bird, but then they
say the Albatross brought with it fog and mist that obscured
their visibility, so it is good that the Mariner shot the bird. They
continue to sail south with the wind and come to a sea that
none of them have ever seen. They are calmed.
They spend days beneath the hot sun with no wind to power
their sails. They run out of water on the ship, though there is
plenty of (undrinkable) water around them. The Mariner details
the strange sea they sail on, full of horrible creatures.
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Study Guide
Some of the crew begin to dream that the slain Albatross has
followed them from the Arctic. Its spirit haunts the ship. The
sailors are all so parched they can't speak, and eventually they
hang the carcass of the Albatross around the Mariner's neck.
Analysis
The superstitions surrounding the Albatross come into play. At
first the crew is upset with the Mariner, thinking he killed the
bird that brought the breezes that filled the sails. But when the
winds continue and the fog burns away, they change their
minds, choosing to believe the bird was a bad omen; they are
pleased with the killing. The crew is now complicit with the
Mariner and they are all guilty of the same sin.
Once the ship is calmed, the curse of the Albatross (according
to the maritime superstition) takes hold. Nature (or the spirit of
the South Pole that loved the Albatross) punishes the men with
the slow death of dehydration, made worse by the fact that
they are surrounded by undrinkable water. "Water, water, every
where / Nor any drop to drink" is one of the most famous lines
of the poem, and they imply a tortuous death.
The strange, fantastic creatures that crawl atop the waves are
another glimpse of the supernatural. These creatures are part
of the natural world that the Mariner finds repugnant, indicated
by his choice of words. The Mariner does not appreciate the
sublime revealing itself to him. The imagery in Part 2 is vivid
and unearthly, with lines like "About, about, in reel and rout /
The death-fires danced at night; / The water, like a witch's oils,
/ Burnt green, and blue and white." The Romantic interest in
dreams and visions also appears in Part 2. In dreams some of
the crew begin to realize that the spirit from the South Pole
has been following them.
The Christlike imagery continues when the crewmen decide to
mark the Mariner for his crime. He's not crucified, but he is
forced to wear the sign of his sin nevertheless. "Instead of the
cross, the Albatross / About my neck was hung," he says. The
Mariner references Jesus and the Crucifixion with this line,
drawing a parallel for penance, with the bird serving as an
atonement of his sin much as Christ did for humanity. The
Albatross around his neck is the Mariner's own cross to bear.
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Part Summaries 14
Part 3
Summary
The Mariner spies something approaching from the west. It is a
ship that seems to move without wind or current, and it comes
toward them. He bites his own arm and sucks the blood to
relieve his thirst so he can speak, crying out, "A sail!" It is a
ghost ship, with tattered sails and cracked hull. The ship is
sailed by Death and Life-in-Death.
The two are playing a game of dice for the Mariner's soul. Life-
in-Death wins the game. The entire crew, save for the Mariner,
drop dead. Their souls zip past him, leaving him alone on the
ship with their bodies.
Analysis
The thirst continues, robbing the Mariner and crew of their
voices. This could be seen as another form of punishment, a
contrast to the penance the Mariner must perform later in the
poem with his act of confession in this tale of woe to the
Wedding Guest. The Mariner cannot even attempt absolution
because he cannot even pray for forgiveness.
In fact the Mariner must bite his arm and drink his own blood in
order to counter the thirst that has made him unable to speak.
He pays a price in blood to regain his voice. This also
reinforces the Christian references in the poem. Christ's blood
turns into wine during the sacrament of the Eucharist via
transubstantiation. The drinking of it is to imbibe in Christ's
blood shed for salvation. The Mariner drinks his own blood to
be able to hail the strange ship, thinking it will offer salvation to
him and the crew.
The appearance of Life-in-Death's ship is a masterwork of
imagination. Again Coleridge probably draws on maritime
legends, this time of the Flying Dutchman. The tale of the
Flying Dutchman was known to Dutch sailors. It involved a
captain who had been condemned to sail eternally through the
seas around the Cape of Storms (Cape of Good Hope) as
penance for some unnamed sin. Other legends sprung up
around a phantom ship: that the devil visited it to play dice for
the sailor's soul, that a woman might spare the sailor from his
fate, but the tale of a ghostly ship remained the same.
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Study Guide Part Summaries 15

Hope for salvation is dashed when the Mariner perceives the

ship's appearance as it approaches. He can make out the
tattered, ghostly sails, and the ship's ribs show through the
damaged hull. It is a horror, not a savior, made only worse
when he sees Death and the woman beside him. Coleridge
introduces the supernatural into his natural world, turning the
whole scene otherworldly. Life-in-Death's description is, "Her
lips were red, her looks were free, / Her locks were yellow as
gold: / Her skin was as white as leprosy, / The Night-Mare
LIFE-IN-DEATH was she." It straddles the line between natural
and supernatural, just as she does and just as the Mariner will.
The natural order is overturned as Life-in-Death wins the dice
game (for the Mariner's soul, much like in one version of the
Flying Dutchman legend) and the sun disappears, night falls,
and the moon rises. It's like the Mariner and his ship have
crossed over into some strange world where nature no longer
makes sense, where the rules have been reordered. The
crewmen still can't speak, but they convey their anger at the
Mariner with their eyes before they all fall down dead while he
is still left alive.
Though it is strange that the crew should be punished for the
death of the Albatross with death, it is greater punishment for
the Mariner. He is left isolated, alone, and consumed with the
guilt over the death of not just the Albatross but his own
shipmates. He must make absolution for all of their souls too.
His penance has become that much greater. The fact that he
doesn't know if their souls ended up in heaven or hell must
further upset his conscience.
Part 4
Summary
Analysis
There is a brief interlude where the Wedding Guest speaks,
upset that the Mariner might too have died and come back as a
ghost or revenant. The Mariner assures him that he is still alive.
Coleridge inserts a brief respite in the natural world of the
frame story before delving back into the supernatural elements
of the tale. This break also serves to remind us that the
Mariner's penance is still ongoing.
The Mariner's isolation, trapped on a ship surrounded by the
dead bodies of his crew, is part of his punishment. He can't
even pray, the comfort of confession denied him. It's telling
that the Mariner looks out over the sea and sees "a thousand
thousand slimy things / Lived on; and so did I." He is angry that
these creatures are alive and his crew is not, but he also
equates himself with them. He is also a slimy thing that lives on
when better men than him lie dead all around him.
The punishment continues as the dead men continue to stare
at him, even seeming to follow the Mariner when he closes his
eyes. Seven days he lives with those staring eyes, caught
literally between life and death. The bodies do not decay, and
the Mariner does not die of thirst or hunger or exposure. The
sun does not appear. He sails in a never-ending sort of night,
his only company those horrible creatures he so hated earlier.
But after these seven days, the Mariner begins to notice the
beauty in the sea serpents swimming beside the ship. He
describes them: "Blue, glossy green, and velvet black, / They
coiled and swam; and every track / Was a flash of golden fire."
This is quite a change from the thousand slimy things from just
a few stanzas earlier. He rejoices in their presence, "O happy
living things! no tongue / Their beauty might declare: / A spring
of love gushed from my heart, / And I blessed them unaware"
and accepts—even loves—their existence.

This acceptance of the supernatural and natural worlds

The Wedding Guest is disturbed by the Mariner's tale, but the
unlocks the Mariner and he is able to pray. By embracing the
Mariner continues. He is alone on the sea with the dead bodies
Romantic ideal that these creatures are natural, beautiful, and
of his crew and the monsters in the water. He tries to pray, but
beings created by God just as he is, the Mariner has completed
finds himself unable to do so. The bodies do not rot, and they
a portion of his penance, and the Albatross slips from his neck.
all stare at the Mariner with a curse in their eyes.
By reaching the understanding that everything in the natural
For seven days and nights the Mariner is aboard the ship with world is connected, he partially absolves himself of the sin of
his dead crew, who are unable to die. As he watches the sea killing the Albatross.
serpents in the ocean, the Mariner admires their beauty and
blesses them silently. At this moment the Albatross falls from
his neck and sinks into the water.

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The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Study Guide
Part 5
Summary
The Mariner falls asleep and wakes to find it raining. A storm
blows up around him, and the ship moves on despite the wind
not reaching it. The dead crew rise up and began to take their
posts and sail the ship.
When the Wedding Guest expresses his fear of the tale, the
Mariner assures him that these were good spirits inhabiting the
bodies of his crew. The Mariner believes it was the spirit of the
Albatross that caused the ship to move without wind or waves.
The ship stops, then makes a sudden lurch that causes the
Mariner to faint. He hears two voices discussing his fate. The
first voice says that the spirit that lived in the Arctic lands loved
the Albatross that the Mariner killed. The second voice says
the Mariner must serve his penance for his actions.
Analysis
This breakthrough gives the Mariner respite through sleep and
rain, allowing him to quench his thirst. But his penance is not
complete. The natural world is still in upheaval, as evidenced by
the violent storm that follows.
The storm, however, never reaches the ship, due in part to
another appearance of the supernatural. All of the dead sailors
return to their duties on the ship and sail it. These men are not
possessed by demonic forces, as the Wedding Guest fears,
but by angels (called seraphs). Here is another aspect of the
sublime—the grandeur of nature's storm on the sea paired with
the spiritual power of God in light of His angels. Still another
instance of the supernatural intrudes, as the spirit from the
South Pole continues to steer the ship even after the angels
disappear. All three are united to bring the Mariner home to
safe harbor so he can continue his penance.
Whether the Voices the Mariner hears during his fit are
supernatural or spiritual in nature is left open to interpretation.
The Voices acknowledge that the Mariner was the man who
shot the Albatross (giving another reference to Christ), that the
bird was loved by the lonely spirit, and that he has performed
penance but is still not finished. The Mariner understands a bit
better what he did and what is going to be expected of him.
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Part Summaries 16
This ties in with the story of the Wandering Jew once more, in
that the Mariner's penance seems to be never-ending. If Life-
in-Death truly did win his soul in the earlier stanza, such a thing
makes sense.
Part 6
Summary
The voices are still speaking about the ship and how it moves
with wind or water. The Mariner wakes to find it is nighttime
and the crew is gathered on the deck, staring at him. The ship
sails on until it reaches a lighthouse in a harbor.
When the Mariner turns around, he sees the crew once more
as dead bodies. This time he sees seraphs collecting the spirits
of the crew. The Mariner hears the approaching Pilot and his
son, and he also hears a Hermit singing and thinks that the
Hermit will be able to help him expiate his sin of killing the
Albatross.
Analysis
The Voices continue their explanation, stating that the Moon
and ocean are working together (along with the spirit) to steer
the ship to port. Nature is working in harmony to get the
Mariner where he needs to go to fulfill the next phase of his
penance.
When the Mariner wakes from his trance, he realizes that he
only received a respite from the curse as he once again sees
the dead men staring at him. He loses the ability to pray again,
and only manages to break the spell by observing the sublime
beauty of nature surrounding him. Nature's beauty protects
and elevates him, a uniquely Romantic idea. He is able to pray
once more.
And he does pray as he realizes he has returned home—he
prays to God that this isn't a dream. The spiritual spell ends
with the angels departing the bodies and the natural world
reasserting itself fully as the Pilot, the Pilot's Boy, and the
Hermit approach the ship in a small boat. When the Mariner
realizes that the Hermit is aboard, he realizes that the man, he
hopes, can absolve him of the crime he committed when he
killed the Albatross. His desire for confession, to "shrieve" his
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Study Guide
soul (that is, to shrive, or confess one's sins in order to be
forgiven), marks the next phase of his penance.
Part 7
Summary
The ship sinks and the Mariner is hauled into the Pilot's boat.
The Pilot thinks him dead, so he is surprised when the Mariner
takes up the oars to row. When the Mariner reaches the shore
of his own country, he asks the Hermit for absolution.
The Mariner tells the Hermit his tale—he feels a compulsion to
do so, and he is relieved when he is finished. The Mariner tells
the Wedding Guest that it has been this way since that night:
he feels horribly compelled to tell his tale and must do so or
suffer great pain. The Mariner travels from place to place to
find the next person he must tell his tale to.
As the Wedding Guest hears the wedding ending, the Mariner
wraps up his tale. He leaves the Wedding Guest with advice to
love everyone and everything that God made. The Wedding
Guest walks away from the wedding after the Mariner leaves
him, and he is left to ponder the meaning and moral of the
Mariner's story.
Analysis
As the Pilot's boat approaches, Coleridge hearkens back to the
description of the ghostly ship that carried Life-in-Death. The
Pilot and the Hermit observe the Mariner's ship, describing the
sails and boards in a similar fashion to that of Life-in-Death's
ship. "Dear Lord! it hath a fiendish look— / (The Pilot made
reply) / I am a-feared" is the Pilot's response to the sight, his
terror mirroring the Mariner's. The Mariner has come out the
other side of his journey profoundly changed, and this allusion
is a manifestation of that journey. This signals the end of the
supernatural events in the poem (aside from the Mariner's
presence).
Nature consumes the ship as a whirlpool suddenly sucks the
craft down beneath the waves. The Mariner is saved by the
Pilot, the lone survivor, and surprises them all when he speaks
because they thought he was dead. This is another allusion to
Life-in-Death and her winning his soul. It was why he didn't die
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Quotes 17
with the rest of the crew and why he can't die now, even
though he probably appears half-dead after his ordeals. His
otherworldly appearance is confirmed again when the Pilot's
Boy says, "The Devil knows how to row."
The Hermit is a representative of the Romantic Movement, and
it is fitting that he is the first person the Mariner tells his story
to. The Hermit lives a quietly pious life, existing in harmony with
nature. (Although, ironically, the Hermit loves talking to people.)
He sees that the Mariner has been touched by the unnatural,
asking, "What manner of man art thou?" It is then that the
nature of his penance reveals itself—the sharp pain that he
knows will only grow in agony until the Mariner tells his story.
His tale finished, the Mariner tells the Wedding Guest that he
has wandered around the world telling his story whenever he
feels the pain return. Another supernatural element of his
cursed penance is that he claims to always know the man with
whom he must share his story. This is the final component of
the penance—imparting his moral to the proper audience. The
Mariner is caught in an endless cycle of sin and redemption, of
penance and absolution. The Mariner has lost his innocent
state (another belief held by the Romantics) by killing the
Albatross, mimicking a moral fall that he must strive to
overcome.
The Mariner finally leaves the Wedding Guest with the moral of
this tale (as Coleridge leaves his readers with it): that the best
way to connect with the Divine is through the sublime. The
Mariner believes that the best way to connect with God is
through the appreciation and love of nature. Coleridge is
driving home one of the basic tenets of the Romantic Period
here, arguing for an almost spiritual relationship with the
natural world.
The poem's final lines leave us with the Wedding Guest. The
power of the Mariner's story has deeply affected him, and he
wakes to find himself changed in fundamental ways. The
Mariner, as storyteller, is capable of transformation; likewise,
so is Coleridge in his role as poet.
g Quotes
"It is an ancient Mariner, / And he
stoppeth one of three."
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Study Guide Quotes 18

— Narrator, Part 1 This is the inciting incident of the Mariner's poem. Everything
that happens stems from this point: his decision to kill the
Albatross without a reason. Even after telling the tale for
This sets up the frame story within the poem. The narrator
however long he has been, the Mariner is still horrified by his
describes what the Mariner does before the Mariner himself
own actions.
takes over the tale. It also foreshadows a bit of the Mariner's
curse—there were three people he could have chosen to listen
to his tale, but he chose this specific person for some reason.
"And I had done a hellish thing, /
And it would work 'em woe: / For
"And now there came both mist
all averred, I had killed the bird /
and snow, / And it grew wondrous
That made the breeze to blow."
cold: / And ice, mast-high, came
floating by, / As green as emerald." — Mariner, Part 2

— Mariner, Part 1 The crew first believes the Mariner was wrong to kill the bird
that brought the wind that powered the ship, believing the
maritime superstition. They are worried that the ship and crew
This stanza is an example of the sublime beauty and
will suffer for the Mariner's rash decision. With the word hellish
awesomeness of nature. The ice is as high as the mast, the
the Mariner is linked to the idea of punishment and damnation.
color of it like a jewel. It is beautiful and terrible at the same
His actions were wrong, and he deserves punishment.
time. The description of "wondrous cold" functions in the same
way.

"'Twas right, said they, such birds

"At length did cross an Albatross: / to slay, / That bring the fog and
Thorough the fog it came; / As if it mist."
had been a Christian soul, / We
— Mariner, Part 2
hailed it in God's name."
When it appears that nothing bad will happen, the crew change
— Mariner, Part 1
their opinion and argue that the Mariner did the right thing by
killing the bird. It is another maritime superstition that makes
The Albatross appears through the fog like a messenger from the Albatross bad luck.
beyond, already being tied to the supernatural. The bird is also
linked to Christ with a reference to "Christian soul" and "hailed
it in God's name." This imagery is deliberately tying the bird's "Water, water every where, / And
innocence to Christ.
all the boards did shrink; / Water,
water every where, / Nor any drop
"With my cross-bow / I shot the
to drink."
Albatross."
— Mariner, Part 2
— Mariner, Part 1

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The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Study Guide
This is one of the most famous lines of the poem. The irony of
being surrounded by water yet unable to drink it and thus
suffer from thirst is often quoted. The ship is calmed, and the
sailors are suffering from dehydration, a common fear among
ships' crews.
"The many men, so beautiful! / And
they all dead did lie: / And a
thousand thousand slimy things /
Lived on; and so did I."
— Mariner, Part 4
The Mariner bemoans the death of his crew after he meets
Life-in-Death, still unaware of what his penance will be. He
feels the guilt for the death of his shipmates and compares
himself to the sea serpents that surround the ship. He only
sees them as disgusting, hideous creatures and thinks them
undeserving of life, like himself, when all of his shipmates lie
dead on the deck.
"The moving Moon went up the
sky, / And no where did abide: /
Softly she was going up, / And a
star or two beside."
— Mariner, Part 4
Throughout the poem, the Moon is a symbol of peace and rest
from the penance journey the Mariner must make. The Moon
guides him home, and this stanza is a swift switch in tone from
the harsh language and imagery used to describe the Sun. It is
soothing, foreshadowing the Mariner's mood and his
acceptance of what he still has left to do.
"Within the shadow of the ship / I
watched their rich attire: / Blue,
glossy green, and velvet black, /
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Quotes 19
They coiled and swam; and every
track / Was a flash of golden fire."
— Mariner, Part 4
The Mariner finally accepts the beauty of the sea snakes,
realizing that they are one of God's creatures just like he is and
the rest of the crewmen. He accepts the power of the sublime
and realizes the relationships between all living things. The
imagery is beautiful, especially since Coleridge uses some of
the same words to describe the snakes as lovely as he did
when he had the Mariner first encounter them unfavorably.
"The self same moment I could
pray; / And from my neck so free /
The Albatross fell off, and sank /
Like lead into the sea."
— Mariner, Part 4
By accepting and experiencing the power of the sublime, the
Mariner takes the first step on his journey toward absolution.
This is symbolized by the physical manifestation of his
guilt—the Albatross—falling from his body and sinking into the
sea. His crime has been washed away—for the time being.
"The other was a softer voice, / As
soft as honey-dew: / Quoth he,
'The man hath penance done, /
And penance more will do.'"
— Mariner, Part 5
The cycle of penance and absolution continues. The Mariner
may have thought he'd earned his forgiveness, but this
passage informs both the Mariner and the reader that this is
not the case. He may have released some of the sin of killing
the Albatross, but he is not done yet.
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Study Guide
"Since then, at an uncertain hour, /
That agony returns; / And till my
ghastly tale is told, / This heart
within me burns."
— Mariner, Part 7
This is the nature of his redemption: he must tell his tale when
the pain informs him it is time. He is forced to confess or suffer
physical pain. The confession of his sins—whether coerced or
voluntary—drives him.
"He prayeth best, who loveth best
/ All things both great and small; /
For the dear God who loveth us /
He made and loveth all."
— Mariner, Part 7
The Mariner offers this moral to the Wedding Guest to explain
his tale and why it is important. He must love others, especially
the natural world, the way we love God. God created
everything, so to deny something natural (like the Mariner did
with the sea snakes) means he is denying his own creator.
"A sadder and a wiser man, / He
rose the morrow morn."
— Narrator, Part 7
The narrator closes the frame story, giving the reader closure
on what became of the Wedding Guest after the Mariner's tale.
He has been profoundly affected by the Mariner's story, and it
has changed his worldview.
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Symbols 20
l Symbols
Albatross
The Albatross symbolizes many things in Coleridge's poem. In
maritime lore these birds were seen by sailors both as a sign of
good luck and as a bad omen. Sailors often thought the
albatross carried the souls of dead sailors that would protect
the ship or bring good winds, but just as often they thought the
bird to be a death omen—a sign that a sailor would soon die. It
is this conflicted belief in what the albatross represents that
causes the crewmen to be angry with the Mariner, then be
happy that he killed it.
The Albatross represents the sublime. It is a natural creature
with a spiritual connection (the spirit that loved the bird and
seeks penance for the wrong done to the both of them). It links
the two worlds since its death is the inciting incident that sets
the Mariner on his path to both Romantic enlightenment and
hopeful absolution. Because the Mariner did not appreciate the
sublime (the Albatross), he was punished by being unable to
connect to the spiritual world through prayer. When he finally
recognizes the power and beauty of the sublime in the form of
the sea snakes, the Mariner regains the power of prayer and
the Albatross drops from around his neck to sink into the sea.
Because the Mariner learned to appreciate the sublime—which
he didn't with his senseless killing of the bird—the Albatross's
job is done.
The Albatross also functions as a Christlike figure in the poem.
It is innocent of any wrongdoing; in fact it came when the
Mariner called for it. Based on the text we are led to believe
the bird broke the ice that had trapped the ship. Having saved
the crewmen and befriending the Mariner, it is all the more
shocking when the Mariner kills it for no apparent reason. The
Albatross is the innocent Christ, having committed no crime to
deserve death, and the Mariner is his betrayer, Judas. The
Albatross is usually mentioned in conjunction with Christian
references: "At length did cross an Albatross: / Thorough the
fog it came; / As if it had been a Christian soul, / We hailed it in
God's name," and "Instead of the cross, the Albatross / About
my neck was hung." The Mariner's story also dovetails nicely
with the tale of the Wandering Jew. The man was punished to
live until Christ's second coming for striking Jesus; the Mariner
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Study Guide
is punished for striking and killing the Albatross, reinforcing the
Christlike imagery for the bird.
The Gaze
Eyes and stares play an important part of the narrative. The
Wedding Guest notices the Mariner's "glittering eye" as the
sailor first stops him. The Wedding Guest is held by the power
of his stare, unable to break away. The Mariner's stare seems
almost supernatural in the way it affects the Wedding Guest.
Not only is the story compelling the young man to listen, but
the Mariner's gaze also compels him to listen as well.
The eyes become the only means of communication when
speech is denied. When the Mariner's crew suffers from thirst
and can't speak, they shoot him "evil looks" as they blame him
for their circumstances. In addition, the Mariner mentions how
glazed the crew's eyes are to convey their weariness even
when they can't talk. After they encounter the ghostly ship of
Life-in-Death, the crew turns to the Mariner and "Each turned
his face with a ghastly pang, / And cursed me with his eye."
The silent communication continues even after the death of
the crew. The curse never fades from their eyes, and for seven
days and nights their stares are now a supernatural
manifestation after their death. It continues when they rise and
begin to sail the Mariner home: "All fixed on me their stony
eyes, / That in the Moon did glitter. / The pang, the curse, with
which they died, / Had never passed away: / I could not draw
my eyes from theirs, / Nor turn them up to pray." The Mariner
realizes that he is still laboring under the effects of the curse
through the gazes of the dead crew, even though he seems to
be on his way to forgiveness. It is a foreshadowing that he still
has more penance to perform.
The Sun and Moon
The Sun and Moon are symbols for the forces opposing the
Mariner's journey. The Sun and Moon clash, the symbols of the
supernatural and the natural world. When the Mariner and his
crew are in trouble after he has shot the Albatross, the imagery
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Themes 21
is entirely of the Sun and sunlight. The sailors fear deadly
circumstances such as heat, thirst, and drought. The Sun is a
part of the natural world, something awesome and terrifying,
an instance of the sublime. When Life-in-Death's mystery ship
appears, the images associated with that scene are replete
with mentions of the Sun.
The Moon is often associated with the supernatural and the
mysterious bond between it and the oceans. The Moon
controls the tides, and its influence helps the Mariner get back
home. When the Mariner's penance truly begins, the Moon has
risen and the language changes from harsh imagery to almost
soothing passages. When the Mariner swoons and hears the
two Voices, one makes mention of the Moon looking down on
him, almost like it is watching out for the Mariner as it helps to
guide him home. He arrives in the harbor beneath the shadow
of the Moon, fitting since the journey began under the light of
the Sun. The cycle is complete.
If the Sun shows what is obvious, the Moon shows what is
hidden. The Sun and the Moon are opposing forces, but they
must coexist. They rise and fall in a daily cycle, in unity if not
necessarily in harmony. The Mariner's cycle of sin and penance
mirror this cycle as well.
m Themes
Sin, Punishment, and Penance
The Mariner's penance is what drives the story—if he wasn't
compelled to share his experience and what he's learned, he
would never have stopped the Wedding Guest in the first
place. When he shoots the Albatross, the Mariner sins against
both nature and God. He did not appreciate the innocent
beauty found in the Albatross so he kills it without even
knowing why he did so. This act leads to his punishment—thirst
and starvation, the death of his crew members, deprivation and
isolation—until he realizes and appreciates the grandeur of the
natural and supernatural world that the Albatross embodied.
He is not fully absolved of his crime though, as he is still called
upon to do penance by relating his story to a person who
seems to be magically chosen as needing to hear his tale. His
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Study Guide
deprivations and torment may be ended temporarily while on
the ship, but his drive to confess is compelled by some
otherworldly urge (spiritual or supernatural is up to
interpretation). With Life-in-Death having won his soul, we can
assume that the Mariner is doomed to live forever telling his
story without respite or face unbearable agony.
In addition, the idea of never-ending penance is not a new one.
There are many stories that deal with punishment and
absolution, including that of the Wandering Jew, who
reportedly taunts Jesus on the way to his crucifixion and then
must wander Earth until the second coming, and the Flying
Dutchman, a ghost ship that sails forever and is never able to
dock in a port. Coleridge draws upon the common theme to
lend his Ancient Mariner the pain and gravitas present in
literary and folklore history. The Mariner's sin was the work of
a moment, but his penance is eternal.
The Sublime
The idea of the sublime is one of the tenets of the Romantic
Period. When we think of a thing as sublime, we believe it to be
of great excellence or beauty, but the Romantics had a
different definition. To Coleridge and his contemporaries, the
sublime represents something both magnificent and terrible,
something awe-inspiring and majestic usually associated with
nature. Coleridge possessed an even narrower view of what
constituted sublime spaces, believing that the limitlessness of
the sea and sky and desert to be the only natural landscapes
to truly fit this ideal.
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner is full of these instances. The
storm that drives the ship to the South Pole, and the glaciers,
ice, and mist that surround the ship once they get there, are
described as being beautiful, powerful, dangerous, and
terrifying. They inspire awe as much as they inspire fear. The
sea serpents they view when the ship is calmed are all
described negatively. The Mariner and his crew only seem to
see the storms, ice, and creatures of the deep in negative
ways, forgetting that they too are created by God and are part
of the natural world. These things may be awful, but they are
also awe-full. By only focusing on the one and not the other,
the Mariner detaches himself from the natural world and God's
creation, leaving him open to the sin of unnecessarily killing the
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Themes 22
Albatross.
When the Mariner finally does see and accept the beauty of
the sea snakes that surround the ship, he is accepting the
sublime. It is in that moment of clarity that he both accepts the
beauty of nature and God's hand in creating them. He
understands his place in the natural and spiritual order,
beginning to understand the connections between. The
Mariner is suddenly able to pray and, for a time, the curse is
broken. When he next feels unable to pray after seeing the
dead men once again staring at him, he remembers the
sublime beauty of God's hand in nature, and the feeling passes.
As long as he remembers to accept the presence of the
sublime, the Mariner reaffirms his connection to both nature
and God.
Nature and Spirit
The Romantic period is defined by an appreciation and
glorification of nature, something we see in Coleridge's poem.
But The Rime of the Ancient Mariner walks a balanced line
between the natural world and the spiritual one. The Wedding
Guest is supposed to attend the marriage of his kinsman, a
spiritual bonding beneath the eyes of God, but he's interrupted
by the Mariner, a seafarer with a closer bond with the natural
world.
The story the Mariner tells blends aspects of the natural world
and the spiritual. The power of the storms, the eerie beauty of
the ice, and the physical presence of the serpents are all
dangers of the natural world. The elements that buffet the ship,
the lack of wind that strands it, and the lack of water that
threatens their lives are all natural in their origin. But the spirit
that follows them from the South Pole, the dead men rising to
pilot the ship, and the ghostly ship are elements of the spiritual
and supernatural worlds. The Albatross flies between them,
linking the Mariner's natural world with the supernatural.
The Mariner shooting and killing the Albatross is the inciting
incident of the poem. For whatever reason (the Mariner never
gives one for why he killed the bird), the Mariner's actions bring
about the spiritual consequences of his actions. He could have
been demonstrating man's power over nature, and as such,
God's own creations. Regardless of why, the Mariner illustrates
that this is not the proper way to engage the natural world.
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Study Guide Suggested Reading 23

He loses the ability to pray and to interact with the spiritual

world on his own behalf. Instead he and the crew are at the
mercy of the spirit of the South Pole and Death and Life-in-
Death. He cannot communicate with these beings or with God
because he's lost the power of speech and prayer. It is only
when he begins to value the natural world that he regains his
ability to communicate and to confess, and this manifests in
the help of the Moon and the angelic possession of the crew to
sail him home. Even the spirit of the South Pole, so angry at the
death of the Albatross, is helping guide the ship. The natural
world and the spiritual work in harmony because the Mariner
realizes his ties to both and that they are never truly separate.

The Mariner's first audience is the Hermit, a holy man who sits,
prays, and thinks on God. The Mariner is confessing his sin, not
just to God but to appease the natural order that he upset
when he killed the Albatross. The spiritual and the natural
world combine in the character of the Hermit: "He kneels at
morn and noon and eve— / He hath a cushion plump: / It is the
moss that wholly hides / The rotted old oak stump." He prays
to God, but he is removed from mankind, choosing to do so in a
natural setting. He is the man that the Mariner believes can
give him absolution, being in touch with both worlds.

The Mariner leaves the Wedding Guest with a moral and a

warning for how to behave in order to avoid the Mariner's fate.
He counsels to both love God and His creatures, to be one with
the sublime and the Divine, and to accept the power of both for
greater happiness. Coleridge's belief that these two ideas are
bound together, that one can reach a deeper spiritual feeling
through the interaction and appreciation of the natural world, is
expressed to us as much as to the Wedding Guest via the
Mariner's story.

e Suggested Reading
Abrams, M.H. The Mirror and the Lamp: Romantic Theory and
the Critical Tradition. Oxford UP, 1971.

Abrams, M.H. Natural Supernaturalism: Tradition and Revolution

in Romantic Literature. Norton, 1973.

Dyck, Sarah. "Perspective in 'The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.'"

Studies in English Literature, 1500–1900, vol. 13, no. 4, 1973, pp.
591–604.

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