“The processes of the poet’s own mind, its mobility and alteration of mood, become the subject matter of all manner of feelings are available to exploration.” To what extent do you find this view useful in your reading of Coleridge’s
Charlotte Phillips 05/11/01
“The processes of the poet’s own mind, its mobility and alteration of mood, become the subject matter of all manner of feelings are available to exploration.” To what extent do you find this view useful in your reading of Coleridge’s conversational poems?
The view expressed in the above title is helpful in understanding the way in which Coleridge wrote his poems, allowing the reader be privy to his most private thoughts and feelings. The conversational style allows the poet to connect with his readers and makes them feel included in his poem, as do his descriptive images of the landscape, simple yet effective language and the “spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings”. Coleridge’s conversational poems generally display usage of Blank verse in Coleridge’s attempts to “Cultivate simplicity…banish elaborateness.” Coleridge’s personal thoughts are also expressed in his poetry: he was intent on the spiritual workings of the heart and how it related to God, hence the ‘systole and diastole’ structure, the progressive movement in and out which can be found in his poems. Coleridge also believed deeply in the benefits of nature on achieving a greater understanding of spirituality, as did William and Dorothy Wordsworth who shared Coleridge’s walks with him - “they were intent on exploring the idea that exposure to nature might be one of the most beneficent moral resources available to man.”
Reflections on Having Left a Place of Retirement and This Lime Tree Bower my Prison can easily be identified to contain a pattern within their structure. The first stanza of each poem sees the poet in a mood of reflection; and the reader is privy to Coleridge’s pensive thoughts, using language to convey his feelings. In This Lime Tree Bower My Prison the tone is sad and melancholy because “they are gone and here I must remain” rather than going on a walk with his friends. The mood is sombre and dejected as Coleridge thinks on his inability to recall the beauties of nature that his friends are currently experiencing. Even as early as the first stanza the reader can identify the “mobility” within the poem as Coleridge expands his thoughts to the wider landscape and is able to convey this diastolic movement to the reader. Using memory and his powers of imagination Coleridge eventually recalls the scenic dell, in which we see the “alteration of mood” as the feelings of past happiness allow Coleridge to find beauty in other, more untamed, sights of nature – “Behold the dark green file of long lank weeds, That all at once (a most fantastic sight!)” the use of alliteration serves to enforce the change of mood and tone within the poem and poet himself.
