The new elements in "The Ancient Mariner" were partly responsible for the unfavorable early reviews which vary much from the high praise the poem receives today. The purpose of this study is to record critical opinion of the poem from the contemporary reviews of 1798 to the intensive critical analysis of the 1960's.

This study attempts to discover in the early poetry of Coleridge anticipations of the poetic excellence exhibited in "The Ancient Mariner." It begins by explaining that the years from 1787, the date of his first recorded poem, to 1798, when he travelled to Germany, may be divided into three periods: 1787 to 1794, the years spent at school and university; 1794 to 1796, the years of his discipleship to two eighteenth-century rationalists, Godwin and Hartley; and 1797 to 1798, the years of his happy fellowship with the Wordsworths. The poetry has markedly different characteristics in each of these periods. The study proceeds by discussing the poetry under three headings: ideas, imagery and symbolism, and form. Noticeable progress towards the degree of achievement found in "The Ancient Mariner" appears in each of these areas. Chapter One, which discusses Coleridge's ideas, begins by establishing that from 1787 to 1798 the poetry is characterized by attempts to explain and offer a solution for evil and suffering. From 1787 to 1794 Coleridge advocated a simple and trite schoolroom morality, largely based on Church-of-England doctrine. Then he turned to the rationalism of Godwin and Hartley, accepting their concept of necessity, of the mind as a tabula rasa, of private property and institutionalism as the prime sources of evil, and of environment, reason and necessity as forces working toward the perfection of man. Rejecting Godwin's atheism, he subscribed to Hartley's system, in which these same concepts were placed in a Christian framework. However, disillusioned by the sterility of rationalism, and by the failure of the French Revolution to advance the morality of society, he retired to Nether Stowey in December, 1796, confused in mind and depressed in spirit. There he established a more meaningful concept of morality. It was based on faith in man's mind, as was Godwin's, and was focused on religion, as was Hartley's. But, unlike the system of either master, it found its motivation in will rather than reason. "The Ancient Mariner" embodies this concept of morality. In Chapter Two the study proceeds by categorizing the imagery and symbolism in "The Ancient Mariner" into three groups, or clusters, and showing that each appears, at least in nucleus, throughout the early poetry. The first cluster, which describes the Mariner, from 1787 to 1794 is associated with poet figures, from 1794 to 1796 is associated with political and social reformers and the spiritually regenerate. In 1797 and 1798 it is associated with individuals who, through an act of self-less will, have achieved a degree of moral and spiritual regeneracy, or who have a mission to enlighten other men. The second cluster is related to the murder of the Albatross. From 1787 to 1794 murder is treated as the inevitable consequence of living in an evil world, as an act committed consciously by men helpless to do otherwise. From 1794 to 1796 murder is treated as an act of self-interest, and of opposition to God, an act which violates the laws of reason and nature. During 1797 and 1798 murder is treated as the inevitable result of a purely sensual mind, in contrast to a spiritual mind. The final cluster, nature imagery and symbolism, is characterized by duality throughout the early poetry. From 1787 to 1794 the positive and negative aspects of nature describe happiness and unhappiness in Coleridge's personal life, and successes and failures of his poetic imagination. From 1794 to 1796 the duality contrasts the self-centered, ignorant mind to the enlightened, rational mind, which senses divine order in creation. During 1797 and 1798 the dualism contrasts the vision of the sensual man to that of the spiritual man. Chapter Three discusses the three kinds of form in poetry: external form, technique and internal form. Poetry is differentiated from prose by having pleasure as its immediate end. Pleasure is provided by an intuitive recognition of unity in multeity. Therefore form in poetry must be characterized by unity. External form is the relation of various thoughts and feelings to each other in the framework of a poem. Almost all Coleridge's poems have a well-unified external form. The success of this kind of form is most fully expressed in a poem such as "The Ancient Mariner," in which a unified symbolic level is super-imposed upon a unified narrative level. Technique is the way in which a poet expresses his thoughts and feelings. The various elements of technique - diction, imagery, metre, rhyme and stanza form - are well unified when they are the best and most natural expression of the poet's thoughts and feelings, and therefore mutually support and explain each other. The technique of the early poetry is noticeably weak; its mastery in "The Ancient Mariner" is the product of ten years of apprenticeship. Internal form is the proportion between the degree of thought and the degree of feeling in a poem. In all good poems thought and feeling give rise to and balance each other; they are unified. The greatest and best poems contain deep thought - a sense of spirituality in the midst of social and political reform - and deep feeling - a love which concerns itself with the changes in individual men. Deep thought and deep feeling can occur only with the achievement of the ultimate end of poetry: moral or intellectual truth. The poetry of 1787 to 1794 is characterized by an overbalance of feeling, that of 1794 to 1796, by an overbalance of thought. "The Ancient Mariner" contains a fusion of deep thought and deep feeling conveyed on the symbolic level. Enchanting the reader through the pleasure yielded by the perfect harmony of all the parts, and suggesting to him through symbolic patterns that it contains deep truths of human experience, the poem draws him back into itself, that he might discover these truths, find greater unity, and achieve more pleasure. / Arts, Faculty of / English, Department of / Graduate

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Submitted by Bruna Rodrigues (bruna92rodrigues@yahoo.com.br) on 2016-10-10T14:01:44Z No. of bitstreams: 1 DissWPN.pdf: 2541762 bytes, checksum: fb7aca97ea8f47499ab4aff1acef61d4 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Marina Freitas (marinapf@ufscar.br) on 2016-10-21T13:34:34Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 DissWPN.pdf: 2541762 bytes, checksum: fb7aca97ea8f47499ab4aff1acef61d4 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Marina Freitas (marinapf@ufscar.br) on 2016-10-21T13:34:43Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 DissWPN.pdf: 2541762 bytes, checksum: fb7aca97ea8f47499ab4aff1acef61d4 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2016-10-21T13:34:53Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 DissWPN.pdf: 2541762 bytes, checksum: fb7aca97ea8f47499ab4aff1acef61d4 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2016-04-04 / Não recebi financiamento / The main objective of this dissertation is to investigate the dialogue between the romantic poem The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, first published in 1798, and its transcreation – concept proposed by Haroldo de Campos – in the homonymous song released by the heavy-metal group Iron Maiden. Based on three levels of analysis of both texts, according to Fredric Jameson dialectical critic, this interpretation will make evident or clear, in the very first moment, which elements of the poem are approached or neglected in Steve Harris’ adaptation, leader, founder and main songwriter of the British group; simultaneously, a comparison between the form of the texts will be made to list important elements such as rime and meter, verses and stanzas, fable, “characters”, and others. In the second moment, the analysis must point out how nature and religion, illustrated in elements such as the sea, rain, snow, fog and mist, Sun and Moon, wind and breeze, beautiful or slimy living things, prayers, sin and “shrieve” made critics such as Franca Neto, John Lowes, Alexander Silva and Tania Asnes to interpret the poem as imaginative, subjective or religious, connected to what Fredric Jameson calls strategies of containment. The third level of reading will bring up the History hidden under the surface of the work of arts, or in other words, an social-aesthetical reading or an “political interpretation of the literary texts” (JAMESON, 1992, p. 15) supported specially in the concepts of mediation – “the establishment of relationships between, say, the formal analysis of a work of art and its social ground, or between the internal dynamics of the political state and its economic base” (ROBERTS, 2000, p. 78, 79), verifying acts socially symbolic revealed in a final analysis. / O objetivo desta dissertação é investigar o diálogo entre o poema romântico The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, de Samuel Taylor Coleridge, publicado originalmente em 1798, e sua transcriação – conceito proposto por Haroldo de Campos – na música homônima do grupo de heavy-metal Iron Maiden. A análise dos textos se dá em três níveis, de acordo com a crítica dialética de Fredric Jameson. Em primeira instância, a análise evidenciará quais elementos do primeiro são abordados ou negligenciados na releitura de Steve Harris, líder, fundador e principal compositor do grupo britânico; simultaneamente, caberá uma comparação entre a forma dos textos, elencando elementos fundamentais da estrutura como rima e métrica, versos e estrofes, fábula, “personagens”, entre outros. Num segundo momento, a análise deverá salientar como a natureza e a religião, a partir de elementos como mar, chuva, neve, névoa, Sol e Lua, ventos e brisas, criaturas divinas belas ou assustadoras, orações, pecado e absolvição levaram críticos como Franca Neto, John Lowes, Alexander Silva e Tania Asnes interpretaram o poema como imaginativo, subjetivo ou religioso, prendendo-se àquilo que Fredric Jameson denomina estratégias de contenção. Traremos à tona a História oculta por debaixo da superfície das obras a fim de ampliar nossa leitura ao plano estético-social ou, segundo proposto por Fredric Jameson em “O Inconsciente Político”, uma “interpretação política dos textos literários” (JAMESON, 1992, p. 15) apoiada especialmente nos conceitos de mediação – “relações entre a análise formal de uma obra de arte e seu chão social” (JAMESON, 1992, p. 35), verificando atos socialmente simbólicos a serem revelados à luz de uma análise final.

The Rime of the Ancient Mariner1 is essentially a poem of survival through transformation, one which, according to William Walsh, 'has to do equally with man's capacity for failure and with that which makes available to him resources for recovery."2 It is also. as Richard Haven recognizes, "the record of the evolution of self." 3 Even more specifically, however, The Ancient Mariner is s tale which reveals key elements of Carl Jung's thought: the process of individuation, the nature of shadow and anima forces, the power of dreams and symbolism. Given the myriad and divergent interpretations of the poem--I heartily agree with C.M. Bowra that "there" is no final or single approach" 4 to Coleridge's masterpiece--my purpose must be explorative, suggestive. A Jungian perspective fairly encourages an exploratory approach, as Carl Kepper contends: The very heart of the applicability of Jung to the problem of symbolism is that he requires of us not that we explain (in the sense of explaining away, reducing to something more familiar) the symbol but that we explore it, not that we we remove. the mystery but that we seek to know it in all the mysteriousness it presents.5 In this searching, delving spirit, then, I will discuss the way the Mariner's--and to a lesser extent, the Wedding-Guest's--experiences represent fundamental aspects of the individuation process, which Jung defines as " ' coming to selfhood' or 'self-realization.' " 6 I will concentrate on the roles of the shadow and anima, respectively, vital and necessary constructs of this process. In these sections and throughout the essay, I will emphasize the essential position both Coleridge and Jung attribute to the law of opposites and closely related rebirth motif. Finally, I will explore the ways dreams, color, and bird imagery are symbolic and develop transformation or individuation to reflect the Mariner's degree of awakening. Not only will the complementary of opposites be discussed in this context, but wat Coleridge terms "the principle of unity in multeity"10 --what mythologist Joseph Campbell calls "unity in multiplicity"11 --and its relation to individuation will be considered. The focus throughout this essay will be on that transformational energy which promotes individuation and rebirth: "The study of the symbols of transformation," explains Violet S. de Laszlo, . . . centers upon the basic demand which is imposed upon every individual, that it, the urge as well as the necessity to become self-conscious of himself. . . . For Jung, the path towards this awareness is identical with the process of individuation. Insofar as the transformation results in a new and deeper awareness, it is experienced as a rebirth. . . .12

The popularization of academic spaces that combine Buddhist philosophy with the literature of the Romantic period – a discipline I refer to as Buddhist Romantic Studies – have exposed the lack of scholarly attention Samuel Taylor Coleridge and The Rime of the Ancient Mariner have received within such studies. Validating Coleridge’s right to exist within Buddhist Romantic spheres, my thesis argues that Coleridge was cognizant of Buddhism through historical and textual encounters. To create a space for The Rime within Buddhist Romantic Studies, my thesis provides an interpretation of the poem that centers on the concept of prajna, or wisdom, as a vital tool for cultivating the mind. Focusing on prajna, I argue that the Mariner’s didactic story traces his cognitive voyage from ignorance to enlightenment. By examining The Rime within the framework of Buddhism, readers will also be able to grasp the importance of cultivating the mind and transcending ignorance.