Romanticism

Question 1

Which were the main romantic themes?

Answer 1

• Instinct, feeling and intuition were essential for the poets of the romantic age.
• imagination connected the mind of the individual with the universe
• nature was crucial
• dreams, nightmares and visions were cultivated by the Romantics
• isolation from society

Question 2

What’s Lyrical Ballads?

Answer 2

Lyrical ballads is a collection of poems jointly written by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Wordsworth contributed with poems about everyday life whereas Coleridge wrote poems of a fantastic nature. It contains Wordsworth’s famous Preface, which is considered the Romantic Manifesto

Question 3

What’s the rime of the ancient mariner?

Answer 3

The rime of the ancient mariner is a ballad, it belongs to Lyrical ballads, can be defined as a mixture of Gothic romance, travel literature and traditional ballad. Coleridge mixes the supernatural with the real, the old mariner has a glittering eye, the ship is driven by mysterious forces, the albatross is a sacred bird in many religions.

Question 4

The rime of the ancient mariner’s plot?

Answer 4

And old mariner meets three guests going to a wedding and stops one to tell his story. The guest is fascinated by the old man’s glittering eye. One day while sailing an albatross came by his ship, the crew captured it and killed it for no reason. This casts a spell upon the ship, the mariners start to die of thirst and then a ghost ship appear and the spirits play with dices with the lives of the those still alive. The spell begins to break when the mariner realizes the beauty of sea snakes, the albatross falls into the sea and the ship starts to sail at an unhearthly speed. The ship finally reaches the the Mariner’s native land, who still feels guilty and must wonder throughout the earth telling his story about loving and respecting God’s creatures.

Question 5

Which is the artistic reading?

Answer 5

According to the artistic reading, the mariner is an artist who leaves the habitual world in search for truth and knowledge, through imagination

Question 6

Which is the religious reading?

Answer 6

According to the religious reading killing the albatross is a sin against nature therefore the mariner has sinned against god