S.T. Coleridge’s ‘The Rime of the
Ancient Mariner’, being a multi-meaningful poem, has now become one of the most
famous poems in English literature. In general, it is a story of a mariner’s
interesting voyage or journey on the sea, but, at the same time, includes many
supernatural elements. Actually, there is a story of a spiritual journey under
the inner fold of the poem showing three stages of human soul – innocence,
experience, and super or greater innocence through self- realization. Again, it
is also a poem of guilt and redemption, sin and suffering, crime and
punishment. Now, we will evaluate both of the journeys and other ideas of the
poem and the similar examples of journey in other great pieces of English
literature.
Physically the ship of the ancient Mariner leaves the harbour
for southward with a good wind and fair weather till it reaches the Equator.
Then it is driven by a storm towards the South Pole where huge ice-burgs
dangerously float in the sea and no living creature is visible. With the coming
of an Albatross, a favorable south-wind begins to blow and the ship sails
northwards. But by the killing of the Albatross, the Mariner experiences many
extremely horrible and mysterious incidents. At last the ship sails swiftly
over the sea and the Mariner sees his native harbour. So the Mariner’s physical
journey may be marked in this way-
Harbour è South ward è Equator èSouth Pole è Northward è Native Harbour.
Besides the
physical journey of the Mariner, the main significance lies in the spiritual journey where there is a
development of a soul from the stage of innocence to the stage of experience,
and from stage of experience to the stage of super innocence where one can know
one’s own self. In order to show this, the poet uses some symbols and some
horrible and mysterious incidents that intensify the mode of the journey.
At the innocent stage of this journey, we
observe that all are favourable for innocent joy, natural atmosphere. The
Mariner says-
“The ship was cheered the harbour cleared
Merrily did we drop’’
He starts his
journey with the cheerful faces of all people at the harbour including the
ship, with no mark of disorder. This reminds us of the merry-time of birth when
we generally begin our journey in this world. Again, there appears an Albatross bearing good omen and
happenings. Here the Albatross is not a simple bird but it represents
innocence, nature and God Himself. The Mariner says-
“As if it had been a Christian soul
We hailed it in God’s name.’’
In our world, similarly, Christ bearing
good things for us came to save humanity. Moreover, the bird is an innocent
creation of nature making a relation between God and our innocent world.
But the stage of
innocence does not last long. It comes to an end with the killing of Albatross by the Mariner, as Christ was killed. Then the
stage of experience begins. We should mention a stanza now-
God save thee, ancient Mariner
From the fiends that plague thee thus!-
Why look’st thou so? – With my
cross-bow
I shot the Albatross.
Here a question may generally be raised
that why the Mariner suddenly kills the bird. The answer may- from the
indication of ‘fiends’ in the stanza above – be that something ‘evil’ prompted
the Mariner to shoot the ‘Albatross’
Indeed, this
killing is not an ordinary one, rather it is symbolically the killing of God’s representative, breaking of the relation
between man and nature as well as man and God. Thus in the spiritual world, he commits a great sin.
In addition, in every religion we see a
system of punishment for one’s sin.
So, here the Mariner must be punished --either
physically or spiritually or both.
In the meantime,
his physical punishment has already
begun. The previous ‘glorious Sun’ has now become ‘bloody Sun’ just above them.
They become as lifeless as painted picture and cannot do anything. The poet
expresses it exactly in the stanza below-
Day after day, day after day,
We stuck, nor breath nor motion,
As idle as a painted ship
Upon a painted ocean.
#
Water,
water, every where,
And
all the boards did shrink
Even,
Water, water, every where
Nor any drop to drink.
Additionally their spiritual punishment also begins -
The very deep did rot : O Christ
That ever this should be!
Yea, slimy things did crawl with legs
Upon the slimy sea.
…..
The death fires danced at night
The water, like a witch’s oils.
Here extremely spiritual horror, from
where the Mariner wants to be released by God, has been expressed. But as he
feels hatred to the lower creation of nature created by God, his punishment is later
increased with the Albatross which is hung about his neck, as the symbol of his
sin.
In this way both
of their mental and physical punishments
gradually increase. Suddenly a skeleton-
ship appears between them and the Sun, as if an executioner between the
criminal and the justice. There are in the ship, Death and life-in-Death
playing at dice and their stake being the Mariner. The result is as follows-
The game is done! I’ve won! I’ve won!
Quoth she, and whistles thrice.
#
The sun’s rim dips; the stars rush
out:
That is the Mariner is won by Death in
life, and with this, the court of the Sun is closed. Consequently all the
sailors become dead, and only the Mariner remains ‘alive but in death’ to
suffer lifelong agony.
However the cause of the sailors’ punishment is
that they shared some of the Mariner’s crime by supporting him to kill the bird.
But Mariner will suffer a lot. So he becomes ‘alone on a wide wide sea’ and no
saint takes pity on his ‘soul in agony’.
Moreover, he discriminates between the upper creation
and lower creation. He thinks that there are so many beautiful men but in
death, while –
‘A thousand thousand slimy things
Lived on and so did I
Consequently, he cannot say any prayer,
rather his heart becomes ‘as dry as dust’,
and yet the stage of experience continues.
Next, there
happens a self- realization in the
Mariners spirit or mind; he loves and blesses the lower creatures and can pray;
and becomes free from his sin, Albatross, and reaches the stage of greater innocence
O happy living things! No tongue
Their beauty might declare:
A spring of love gushed from my heart.
And I blessed them unaware:
Sure my kind saint took pity on me,
And I blessed them unaware.
#
The self- same moment I could pray;
From my neck so free
The Albatross fell of, and sank
Like lead into the sea.
At the end of
the part V, from the second one of the two voices, we know the condition of the Mariner in the stage of
greater innocence-
‘The man hath penance done
And penance more will do’
Then he sees his native harbour and is
rescued by the Pilot of the boat carrying a Hermit, after his boat has been
sunk into the sea; he feels relief from his agony only when he has related the
story of his journey to the Hermit. Since then, the Mariner occasionally
experiences the same agony, and relates his journey to the men whom he chooses
and thus gets relief. Actually, this indicates us the Christian term,
‘Confession of saints’.
Then, what is
the result of this spiritual journey?
– the Mariner prefers walking to the church to worldly merriment. Moreover, the
wedding guest, having heard the whole story of the Mariner, does not go to the
feast- as he has also become experienced like the Mariner through this journey
and next becomes ‘A sadder and a wise
man.’
In the Riders
to Sea, Maurya also passed
the stage of experience and reaches greater innocence through the realization
that
“No man at all can be living for ever, and we must
be satisfied.”
Her realization may be very simple to us
but she herself realized it through a bitter experience and at last becomes
very calm.
In spite of his
having an innocent stage of joy and merriment in his kingship, Gautama Buddha experiences the
sufferings of the people. Then having realized the truth of life, he becomes
very tranquil and grave.
Again, there is
same spiritual journey in Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness. Marlow, the speaker of the story, being mostly
like the Mariner, relates his journey to the dark part of the world, Congo. But
the significance lies elsewhere-both Marlow and Curtze pass many phases of dark
side of human soul and at last self-realization happens in them--for Curtze
before his death, and for Marlow coming back from the girl’s house.
William Blake’s Songs
of Innocence and of Experience reveals how the innocent ‘Lamb’ turns
into experienced ‘Tyger,’ and how there is a possibility of getting
regeneration for it.
To sum up the
discussion, we can say that journey does not prevail only in the ‘Rime of the
Ancient Mariner.’ Rather in every step of our life, we are always making
journey – either physical or mental. However, the experienced stage of our soul
is more important than the innocent. Because innocence is governed by God or
natural intuition; but in the stage of experience there happens an experiment
through which we may overcome the stage of experience and may reach the stage
of greater innocence.