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The ancient Mariner's Journey Under the Moon
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The Ancient Mariner¡¯s Journey Under the Moon The Sea is traditionally a man¡¯s domain. Virtually no women appear alongside the seafaring explorers and sailors in history of fiction. Outwardly, Samuel Taylor Coleridge¡¯s The rime of the Ancient Mariner proves no exception. However, a feminine sensibility is far from absent as best seen in the case of the moon whose significant presence sets the tone through much of the dramatic progression int the poem. While the albatross¡¯s curse befalls the ancient mariner under the harsh glare of the ¡°bloody sun¡±, the more merciful events take place under the auspices of the moon. The soft rays of the moon allow the ancient mariner to first break away from the curse. She continues to watch over the mariner on his lonely journey and finally delivers him to his native land and the Hermit. The moon may not directly affect the action of the poem, but her presence prepares the mariner¡¯s heart-mind so that he is able to accept the beauty of the water-snakes in part 4. She continues to illuminate the scene throughout the doomed man¡¯s blessing and release from the corpse of the albatross. In the beginning of part 4 of The Ancient Mariner the mariner regrets that he cannot pray because ¡°[his] heart was dry as dust¡±. The presence of the dead sailors constantly torments him to the degree where the mariner must keep his eyes closed. Then he sees that ¡°the moving moon went up the sky¡± and immediately associates the gentle movement with something feminine for he says ¡°softly she was going up¡±.
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