Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834) was one of the most well known poets of the First generation Romantic Age. He is known for his collaboration with William Wordsworth on their work “Lyrical ballads” which led to the Romantic movement. He was very much imaginative since childhood and developed his own theories on imagination in his famous essay “Biographia Literaria”. The most important aspect of his treatment was the supernatural elements which has a significant role in his poems.
The poem is structured with supernatural elements. The implication is to grant human qualities and characteristics in the poem through secondary imagination. The figure of Kubla Khan represents the masculine force in the poem and the place he creates is filled with the brute strength of a man. The “tumultuous” and violent imagery adds a volume of masculine strength in the poem which is overall develop via secondary imagination of the poet who weave this trait in the creation of “Xanadu”. It also has a psychological implication where Freud’s concept of Oedipus complex manifests in a dream can be applied to the poem. “Kubla Khan” may be seen as a reflection of Coleridge’s own conflicts and desires, as he grapples with his own subconscious feelings and emotions. The portrayal of Kubla Khan as a powerful and majestic figure may symbolize Coleridge’s own feelings of inadequacy and inferiority, while the lush and fertile landscape may represent his own creative potential and desires.
In addition to this, “Kubla Khan” exhibits mysticism as another important characteristics. He magnifies into the realm of “Xanadu” inside the “cedarn cover” which is “savage” as “holy and enchanted”. It seems that the place inside has the mysterious underlying energy which is refined and amalgamated with the description of entity such as a “woman wailing for her demon-lover”along with the conscious construct of the landscape to be “a waning moon was haunted”.
Coleridge brings forth the element of organic form where the poem should be structured within by the materials used by the poet. The poem itself is constructed in an organic form where the interior landscape of the realm of “Xanadu” is organic within and the materials constructed the surface or the fancy was the dream of the poet. It seems that the poem came to him while he was asleep and he recollected the memory of the dream which becomes the subject and material for the entire structure of the poem.
However, He uses a creative symbols which are profound in his poem .”Kubla Khan” is a symbol of creative process and the opening lines “In Xanadu did Kubla Khan/ …… to a sunless sea/” is filled with creative imagination and the imagery are filled with symbols. The “Xanadu” is a symbol of mental landscape whereas the ” dome” is the symbol of creation or a symbol of human mind . The ” Alph” is the “scared river’ becomes the symbol of Romantic spontaneity or the materials perceived from primary imagination which spontaneously runs through the “caverns” which becomes the symbol of conscious mind. The perceived materials is then streamed down to the “sunless sea’ which is a symbol of unconscious mind or the secondary imagination which will alter and modify these materials. Furthermore, the symbol of “thick pants were breathing” could suggest repression of the dream which led to the fragments or shift to another ethereal world. The symbol of “mighty fountain” becomes the rational world or the conscious world.
“Kubla Khan” imbue Romantic imagination and as Coleridge divided it to primary and secondary imagination. The dream can be treated as a source of primary imagination and the creative process starts to work where the faculty of secondary imagination or poetic imagination modifies and alters the dream to create an organic form to the poem. It is highlighted in the poem that dreams are fragmented like “rebounding hail” and “reached the caverns measureless to man/ And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean”. The lines suggest that dreams are fragmented and a particular dream can shift and returns back or rebound and the creativity starts to process again through running into conscious mind to “lifeless ocean” or unconscious mind.
Lastly, hellenistic writing is also an important aspect of his writings. In “Kubla Khan”, he mentions the “Abyssinian Maid” who was playing her “dulcimer” and singing on “Mount Abora” reflects his creativity of imagination as well. It can be assume as the materials which has been amalgamated or altered by the secondary imagination suggest a meaning and hence becomes a symbol of foreseeing a future disaster.
Symbolism in Coleridge Kubla Khan
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