"The Rime of the Old Mariner" is an exploration of the unconscious head. How do you respond to this reading of the poem?
"The Rime of the ancient Mariner" occurs in the natural physical world-the land and the ocean. But there's a huge link with the religious, metaphysical world. I think that the poem can be an exploration of the unconscious mind, because the poem has wish like characteristics. Things that are real come in contact with the superficial. Within the poem the Pilot and the marriage guest are in the world and the Mariner appears to be trapped in between both worlds.
Coleridge uses narrative techniques such as personification and repetition to build the sense of danger, of the supernatural or serenity, depending on mood of each of the various parts of the poem. Within the Ancient Mariner's story itself, the spiritual and temporal worlds are confounded the moment the sailors cross the equator. All of a sudden the natural world, which is carefully connected to the religious world, makes the sailors lose control of their course. The storm drives them into an icy world that is named "the land of mist and snow" throughout all of those other poem. An Albatross surfaced from the mist, and the sailors revered it as a sign of good luck, as if it were a "Christian spirit" dispatched by God to save them. The Old Mariner shoots the Albatross as though to prove that it's no airy spirit. The Albatross is intimately tied to the religious world, and so begins the Ancient Mariner's punishment by the spiritual world through the natural world. Rather than address him immediately; the supernatural communicates through the natural.
The ocean, sun, and insufficient wind and rainwater punish the Old Mariner and his shipmates. The blowing wind dies, the sun intensifies, and it will not weather. The sea becomes revolting, "rotting" and thrashing with "slimy" creatures and sizzling with strange fires. If the dead men come alive to curse the Ancient Mariner with their sight, things that are natural-their corpses-are inhabited by a robust soul. The Albatross is mortal, but closely linked with the metaphysical, spiritual world-it even flies such as a spirit since it is a parrot.
The Ancient Mariner detects spirits in their clean form many times in the poem. If the ghost ship carrying Death and Life-in-Death sails by, the Ancient Mariner overhears them gambling. When he is unconscious on the deck, he hears the First Tone and Second Tone discussing his fate. When angels show up within the sailors' corpses near to the shore, they don't speak to the Ancient Mariner, but only guide his dispatch. In every these occasions, it is unclear if the spirits are real or figments of his creativity. The Old Mariner-and we the reader-being mortal beings, require physical affirmation of the spiritual. Only once the Old Mariner expresses love for the natural world-the water-snakes-does his punishment abate even just a little. It rains, but the surprise is unusually amazing, with a thick stream of open fire pouring from one huge cloud.
On the poem's end, the Ancient Mariner preaches admiration for the natural world as a way to stay in good ranking with the religious world, because in order to value God, one must value all of his creations. This is why he valorizes the Hermit, who places the example of both prayer and surviving in harmony with aspect. So we can say that poem is approximately the connection between the metaphysical and the physical world. Therefore, I feel that this poem is an exploration of the unconscious mind.
