/lit/ - Literature

>>19032263

The Ancient Mariner's burden of guilt even after he's earned forgiveness:

I woke, and we were sailing on
As in a gentle weather:
'Twas night, calm night, the moon was high;
The dead men stood together.

All stood together on the deck,
For a charnel-dungeon fitter:
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.

And now this spell was snapt: once more
I viewed the ocean green,
And looked far forth, yet little saw
Of what had else been seen—

Like one, that on a lonesome road
Doth walk in fear and dread,
And having once turned round walks on,
And turns no more his head;
Because he knows, a frightful fiend
Doth close behind him tread.

But soon there breathed a wind on me,
Nor sound nor motion made:
Its path was not upon the sea,
In ripple or in shade.

It raised my hair, it fanned my cheek
Like a meadow-gale of spring—
It mingled strangely with my fears,
Yet it felt like a welcoming.

I just read this great poem, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, and it flooded my mind with images and colours:

>The moving Moon went up the sky,
>And no where did abide:
>Softly she was going up,
>And a star or two beside—

>Her beams bemocked the sultry main,
>Like April hoar-frost spread;
>But where the ship's huge shadow lay,
>The charméd water burnt alway
>A still and awful red.

>Beyond the shadow of the ship,
>I watched the water-snakes:
>They moved in tracks of shining white,
>And when they reared, the elfish light
>Fell off in hoary flakes.

>Within the shadow of the ship
>I watched their rich attire:
>Blue, glossy green, and velvet black,
>They coiled and swam; and every track
>Was a flash of golden fire.

I'd been wanting to read this poem of Coleridge for years since reading a cathartic line in Joyce, "He prophets most who bilks the best," which an academic said could be a light allusion to the conclusion of Coleridge's poem, "He prayeth best, who loveth best".

After reading it, in a cold and thoughtful state, I opened Les Fleurs du mal by Baudelaire where I read the poem L'albatros, the albatross being a central symbol in the poem by Coleridge. Here's a translation I found online to share out of my joy of reading it immediately afterwards:

Often, to amuse themselves the men of the crew
Lay hold of the albatross, vast birds of the seas—
Who follow, sluggish companions of the voyage,
The ship gliding on the bitter gulfs.

Hardly have they placed them on the planks,
Than these kings of the azure, clumsy and shameful,
Let, piteously, their great wings in white,
Like oars, drag at their sides.

This winged traveler, how he is awkward and weak!
He, lately so handsome, how comic he is and uncomely!
Someone bothers his beak with a short pipe,
Another imitates, limping, the ill thing that flew!

The poet resembles the prince of the clouds
Who is friendly to the tempest and laughs at the bowman;
Banished to ground in the midst of hootings,
His wings, those of a giant, hinder him from walking.

And for those who argue against translation's pitfalls who want to see the rhyming original:

Souvent, pour s'amuser, les hommes d'équipage
Prennent des albatros, vastes oiseaux des mers,
Qui suivent, indolents compagnons de voyage,
Le navire glissant sur les gouffres amers.

À peine les ont-ils déposés sur les planches,
Que ces rois de l'azur, maladroits et honteux,
Laissent piteusement leurs grandes ailes blanches
Comme des avirons traîner à côté d'eux.

Ce voyageur ailé, comme il est gauche et veule !
Lui, naguère si beau, qu'il est comique et laid !
L'un agace son bec avec un brûle-gueule,
L'autre mime, en boitant, l'infirme qui volait !

Le Poète est semblable au prince des nuées
Qui hante la tempête et se rit de l'archer ;
Exilé sur le sol au milieu des huées,
Ses ailes de géant l'empêchent de marcher.

Anybody else here enjoyed any of these authors for the perfection of harmony between symbols and storytelling?