For Tuesday: White, The Sword in the Stone (from The Once and Future King), Chs.1-7

For Tuesday: T.H. White, The Sword in the Stone, Chs. 1-7 (pp.10-72)

NOTE: As I will discuss on Tuesday, The Sword in the Stone was originally a stand-alone book that became part of a larger series of books which were eventually called The Once and Future King.  However, the final book was refused by the publisher, so White never felt that it was a complete work, which justifies us just reading the first installment. Also, the first book was actually re-written years after its publication, with parts of the final, fifth book, The Book of Merlyn, inserted bodily into the manuscript (since his publishers refused to release it).  So the work we read today comes from both ends of the Once and Future King series. 

Answer 2 of the 4 questions that follow:

1. While discussing The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, I suggested that one of the hallmarks of fantasy literature is anachronism, which the Oxford English Dictionary defines as, “Anything done or existing out of date; hence, anything which was proper to a former age, but is, or, if it existed, would be, out of harmony with the present; also called a practical anachronism.”  How does White consciously employ anachronism in his story, both in the narration and in the events of the story itself?  Why is this a useful technique in a fantasy novel?

2. How is White satirizing traditional romantic notions of knighthood in The Sword in the Stone?  What experiences/quests does Wart expect to undergo in his education, and how might characters such as Sir Pellinore poke fun at this notions?  In other words, what does White think knighthood and heroism is truly all about in the Medieval world of legend? 

3. In her biography of T.H. White, Sylvia Warner notes that “The Sword in the Stone has the impetus and recklessness of a beginner’s work.  It is full of poetry, farce, invention, iconoclasm, and, above all, the reverence due to youth in its portrayal of the young Arthur” (xii).  Why do you think White wrote a book about the myths of Arthur, Merlyn, and Camelot from a young boy’s perspective?  Why does he have such “reverence” to youth, and why might we not get the same story if told from an adult Arthur?

4. Based on our reading so far, what kind of education do you feel Merlyn is trying to give Wart?  Why is he transforming him into fish and having him consort with eccentric knights?  How does this contrast with what Wart wants to learn and thinks he ought to learn?  [you might also consider that Merlyn lives backwards, so he knows the tragic fate of Camelot...is he trying to teach Wart, in some way, to reverse this?]

For Tuesday: Coleridge, Cristabel (1797/1801)

For Tuesday: Coleridge, Cristabel (pp.24-41)

Answer 2 of the 4 questions that follow:

1. In many ways, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner is a poem about “experience,” since the Mariner is a man of the world who carries the darkness of society into the unsullied Arctic.  Cristabel, though unfinished, seems to explore the idea of “innocence” through the unformed, child-like character of Cristabel.  How might we read her character metaphorically, as a journey of childhood inexperience into the “dark woods” of adult sexuality?  (and yes, any knowledge of Freud is welcome here!) 

2. In Richard Holmes’ book, Coleridge: Early Visions (1989), he writes that Cristabel is “chant-like, trance-like.  Its power derives from a haunting suggestiveness of atmosphere, an incantation of psychological symbols and spells, which defy any normal narrative development” (287).  How does the poem achieve these “trance-like” effects?  What sounds, images, metaphors, or other features make it seem more like a spell or a dream than an actual story or poem? 

3. What is the difference between Part I and Part II of the poem?  Literally, Part I occurs during midnight, while Part II occurs the following morning.  Does this basic distinction change the general tone/focus of each part?  Why do you think Coleridge separated the poem into two parts when the entire poem was left incomplete?  Does something tangible change from one part to the next? 

4. Why might Geraldine the earliest form of a character that has since become extremely popular in fantasy and horror fiction?  What kind of character is she, and what about her description, actions, or motives might suggest other, more modern characters/types?  Consider lines such as, “Deep from within she seems half-way/To lift some weight with sick assay,/And eyes the maid and seeks delay;/Then suddenly, as one defied,/Collects herself in scorn and pride,/And lay down by the Maiden’s side!--/And in her arms the maid she took” (30).  

For Thursday: The Rime of the Ancient Mariner

For Thursday: The Rime of the Ancient Mariner

Answer ONE of the following questions for Thursday:

1. In Stanza III of Coleridge’s poem, “Dejection: An Ode” (the poem is on pages 63-67), he writes,

            My genial spirits fail;

            And what can these avail

To lift the smothering weight from off my breast?

            It were a vain endeavour,

            Though I should gaze for ever

On that green light that lingers in the west:

I may not hope from outward forms to win

The passion and the life, whose fountains are within. 

How might the ideas/metaphors in this poem help us understand the curse and the atonement of the Ancient Mariner?  What could the “smothering weight” be?  What might he stare at the “lingers in the west”?  What “fountains are within”?  

2. Many critics in Coleridge’s time and our own have taken exception to the moral that ends the poem: 

He prayeth well, who loveth well

Both man and bird and beast.

He prayeth best, who loveth best

All things both great and small;

For the dear God who loveth us,

He made and loveth all.  

Do you feel this is the true moral of the poem, which helps explain the nature of the Mariner’s curse?  Or is this an attempt to tack an easy moral onto a nightmarish poem, to help tuck readers into bed at night (and perhaps, to please Wordsworth, since this sounds  an awful lot like many of his poems)? 

For Tuesday: The Rime of the Ancient Mariner

For Tuesday: Coleridge, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner

NOTE: We’ll be reading the poem slowly, so I encourage you to read the entire poem, but feel free to read slowly, even if you don’t quite finish it.  In this poem, the details are more important than the overall story, so look at it less as an actual narrative than a series of short poems that cohere into a larger theme.  But most of all, read slowly and look for the metaphors, since poetry is all about how metaphors transform our perception/experience of the world (especially important in fantasy literature!). 

Answer 2 of the 4 questions that follow:

1. The Rime of the Ancient Mariner opens with a frame narrative, that of the Mariner stopping a Wedding Guest and putting him under a spell so he can tell his story: “He holds him with his glittering eye.”  Why do stories typically employ a frame narrative (think of ones you know from previous classes) and why might it be especially important in a work of fantasy?  Why not simply tell the Mariner’s tale without the artifice of telling it to someone else? 

2. Read the glosses on the left side of the poem carefully: are they really there to clarify the action of the poem?  While at times they seem to merely summarize the events, where do they do something else?  Do you find passages that seem to add unnecessary detail or comically deflate the narrative?  Consider particularly this gem: “Like vessel, like crew!”  (also consider, if the glosses are so important, then why not simply write prose instead of a poem?)

3. Why does the Mariner kill the Albatross?  How does the crew initially react to this death, and why does their reaction change over time?  In the fantasy logic of the poem, why does this seem to be a “sin”?  Is it a sin cosmically, or merely a sin in the minds of the men?  Or simply in the mind of the Mariner himself? 

4. The Oxford English Dictionary defines the term “sublime” as: “Of a feature of nature or art: that fills the mind with a sense of overwhelming grandeur or irresistible power; that inspires awe, great reverence, or other high emotion, by reason of its beauty, vastness, or grandeur.”  The Romantics were anxious to invoke the power of the sublime in art, often by evoking Nature in their art and poetry.  Where do we see this in The Rime of the Ancient Mariner?  Where does the poem trying to inspire awe, fear, and reverence in the metaphors and imagery?  How might this underline the theme or ideas in the poem itself?