Sibylline Leaves 1817

by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work.

This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work.

As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

Genres: Poetry

Hardcover

First published January 1, 1817

About the author

Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834) was an English poet, critic, and philosopher who was, along with his friend William Wordsworth, one of the founders of the Romantic Movement in England and one of the Lake Poets. He is probably best known for his poems The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Kubla Khan, as well as his major prose work Biographia Literaria.

Reviews

[Leslie Wexler · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's so interesting to think of The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, not necessarily as a Christian allegory for the soul, or grace, redemption/salvation etc., but to think about what it might mean to read it as a true narrative. A person is on a boat and near death and in that near death experience explore the images and content that the brain produces: ancient archetypes and folkloric motifs. The guys thinks himself on a ghost ship - a recurring (even currently) motif in literature/culture. The sea grows primordial, gooey, wine-dark if you will, and the life in it glows phosphorecently as it passes into death before he is granted a vision of beauty of water snakes in slanting sunlight. These are really bizarre images - is this what death is potentially like? To see some kind of interstitial female being on another boat who inhabits both material and supernatural reality play a game of chance with a figure that is perceived as Death? And when she wins, you think - well, he's SOL, but in reality she has won and his next rescue is by beings of light. The visions of death in life companions, clearly, has left the mariner so perceptually shifted beyond single reality that a need begins every once and a while to tell someone else who has "a look in their eye" (meaning: someone that could understand beyond themselves). I wonder why the kinsman of the bridegroom leaves "sad and wise" because of that? Is perception shift just too difficult to live with?

I read a first edition copy of Sibylline Leaves - poems by Coleridge. The copy was owned by Alfric Watt and he made extensive handwritten notes of his thoughts about the poems. It was so charming - first, in that Watt writes with a calligraphic pen and ink so you can perceive in his flow of thoughts when he wishes his pen wasn't running out of ink. Second, he's no great fan of Wordsworth and clearly thinks Coleridge is the superior poet based on the "Rime of the Ancient Mariner" alone. There are many other points like his handwritten table of contents, snide remarks about Coleridge's apostrophes to God (which he refers to as "silly" like Wordsworth), the extensive notes in the margins about literary influences and quotes, and then most charming of all was to come to the end of the book and see that it was signed by Coleridge himself - to Watt, "a friend".

It was an amazing way to read the poems in the collection, I feel as though I know both Coleridge and Watt better.

(Recalled in the Coleridge collection at E.J. Pratt Library - Toronto)

I came home layer that night and read the Rime to Erik as we sat in the last of the twilight on the patio. We debated most interesting readings/ interpretations of the poem (according to us) - and settled on the one mentioned at the start of this review.