Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Frankenstein

Frankenstein is Mary Shelley’s famous, fictional work in which a man unravels the secret to creating life. The main character in this story is Victor Frankenstein. Throughout the novel he grows from a young, innocent boy into a vindictive, vengeful man. He oversteps the bounds of science by becoming the creator of a being that never should have lived. In the poem The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, written by Samuel Coleridge, a man, much like Victor, takes the role of the main character. The ancient mariner, by killing the albatross, violates the laws of nature and has to repent for his crime. These two characters are very similar but they also vary in several key ways.

Like all natural things, the Albatross is intimately tied to the spiritual world, and thus begins the Ancient Mariner's punishment by the spiritual world through means of the natural world. Rather than direct confrontation; the supernatural communicates through the natural. The ocean, sun, and lack of wind and rain brutalize the Ancient Mariner and his shipmates. When the dead men come back to the physical world to curse the Ancient Mariner with their eyes. Men (like Adam) feel the urge to define things, and the Ancient Mariner seems to feel this urge when he suddenly and inexplicably destroys the Albatross, shooting it from the sky as if he needs to bring it into the physical realm, to explain to himself. It is mortal, but closely tied to the metaphysical, spiritual world, it even flies like a spirit because it is a bird. This use of nature to teach in Rime of the Ancient Mariner is alternatively seen in Frankenstein to heal. The use of a mountain river to describe Frankensteins feelings is the beginning of a theme that is continued throughout the story. The introduction of an association of nature and human feeling, shows how Shelley prefers to use metaphor of a natural setting rather than openly discussing Frankensteins inside conflits. Instead of relating Frankenstein feelings and experience in rational discourse, intellectual description or by dialogue with other characters, she chooses the image of a

In the late eighteenth century arose in literature a period of social, political and religious confusion, the Romantic Movement, a movement that emphasized the emotional and the personal in reaction to classical values of order and objectivity. English poets like William Blake or Percy Bysshe Shelley seen themselves with the capacity of not only write about usual life, but also of man’s ultimate fate in an uncertain world. Furthermore, they all declared their belief in the natural goodness of man and his future. Mary Shelley is a good example, since she questioned the redemption through the union of the human consciousness with the supernatural. Even though this movement was well known, none of the British writers in fact acknowledged

In Frankenstein by Mary Shelly, Robert Walton is comparable to Frankenstein's monster. Neither are able to find any sense of belonging, and have a craving for the companionship of someone similar to themselves.

In the Rime of the Ancient Mariner, it has similarities to Frankenstein with structure. In Frankenstein, through careful reading, it is shown how The Rime of the Ancient Mariner has influenced Mary Shelley’s novel. The structure of both the novel and the poem are situated similarly. As well as the end of the novel is similar to the poem. The structure of Frankenstein is laid out to follow The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. Also the poem has significance to each character in the novel, Walton his love for exploration and voyaging. For Victor it is his ambitions and wisdom. For the Creature, it is his wisdom as well and telling of his tale. The poem gives the reader a better understanding of the creature and allows the reader to see where the

Victor had an obligation to care for his creation, but chooses at first glance of his construction to abscond from its presence. The comparison of Victor as God-like highlights Enlightenment philosophers who have gone beyond the limits of humanity in order to attain knowledge. Victor is characterized then as a savant manipulating nature. The Creature acts as a balance for philosophers to stop and reflect upon their own enterprise and determine the fine line between acceptable and unacceptable knowledge as it pertains to nature. To this end, Shelley enforces that humanity must pay due respect to the limits placed in front of them by avoiding the Enlightenment philosophy that man is to find a definite definition for every phenomenon he encounters.

Victor Frankenstein and the ancient mariner, both deal with the guilt of knowing that they're responsible for the death of innocent lives. They both instantly realized the consequences of disrespecting nature. Victor tells Walton about how he never thought about the repercussions of creating the monster, "You seek for knowledge and wisdom, as I once did; and I ardently hope that the gratification of your wishes may not be a serpent to sting you, as mine has been” (Shelley 21). Victor used his knowledge to challenge the laws of nature which led him to face negative consequences. He has himself to blame because he could have chosen to act differently and never created or isolated the monster. The ancient mariner similarly tells his regret of killing the Albatross to the wedding-guests,

Both Frankenstein and Mariner are two men who seem to be cursed and submerged in pity and guilt by the deaths they think they have caused to happen; due to their own selfishness. In “Rime of the Ancient Mariner” the mariner feels guilty for killing the

Anticlimactic Connections The most apparent connection between Ozymandias by Percy Shelley, Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, and The Rime of the Ancient Mariner by Samuel Coleridge, and Frankenstein is the relationships between the authors. The authors are related, Mary Shelley is Married to Percy Shelley, and Samuel Coleridge is a long time family friend. They are all writing in the romantic gothic period. Their stories are intertwined. Between Frankenstein and The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, the main characters are burdened by their own undoing.

The Rime Of The Ancient Mariner written by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, is about a Mariner who was the author of his own ruins and salvation. Throughout this poem, the Mariner faced many adversities that he created and simultaneously found freedom to his mistakes. To begin, the Mariner’s biggest mistake that he did was killing the albatross. An albatross is defined as an “ very large, chiefly white oceanic bird with long, narrow wings, found mainly in the southern oceans.” (dictionary.com) This was evident when he said “Why look'st thou so?'—With my cross-bow I shot the ALBATROSS”(part1, 20). The albatross helped him and his crew members navigate through the sea, created wind so the boat can sail, and was referred to as Jesus. The Mariner even remarked “At length did cross an Albatross, Thorough the fog it came; As if it had been a Christian soul, We hailed it in

In the poem The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, by Samuel Coleridge, the Mariner shoots an albatross with his crossbow. The crew had praised this albatross as it was the only thing they could relate to. Consequently, its death inflicted grief and anger among the crew.

“Her long shadow fell to the water’s edge. Her face had a tragic and fierce aspect of wild sorrow and of dumb pain mingled with the fear of some struggling, half-shaped resolve. She stood looking at us without a stir, and like the wilderness itself, with an air of brooding over an inscrutable purpose…”

The story the rime of the ancient mariner is a poem written by Samuel Taylor Coleridge and is his longest poem he ever wrote and in many people’s opinions, the best he ever wrote. The poem is famous for its religious symbols. Even the theme or moral of the story is that everyone should love god 's creatures, no matter how ugly or disgusting they might be they should be loved, which is a lesson the mariner needs to learn. The creature the mariner kills is a bird that is called the albatross, it helps the mariner and his crew escape the frozen icy antarctic, but for some reason the mariner kills the albatross, which still confuses some readers still. Iron Maiden the popular heavy metal group from England wrote a song about the poem, with their own Musical twist. For these reasons I am going to find out why the mariner killed the bird of good omen the albatross, and why and how the group Iron Maiden turned this poem into a 14 minute epic song. To begin an analysis of this scale and magnitude I need to first introduce you to some key points, which includes the life and death of coleridge, What exactly an albatross is, a analysis and background

Samuel Taylor Coleridge based his narrative poem, “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner,” around the sanctity of nature, especially that of the albatross, a large sea bird who was a sign of good luck to the sailors aboard the mariner’s ship. After the ancient mariner inhospitably kills their good omen, everything starts to fall apart. The mariner eventually is trapped in a solitary, never-ending penance, telling certain people his story. The people he tells however, do not appreciate the story because it points out their lack of spirituality, especially in the case of the wedding-guest. Coleridge, like Blake in “The Lamb,” relates animals and nature to Godliness.