{"id":303,"date":"2023-03-04T01:26:10","date_gmt":"2023-03-04T01:26:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/britishpoetry\/?p=303"},"modified":"2023-03-04T01:26:10","modified_gmt":"2023-03-04T01:26:10","slug":"imagining-the-sublime-in-kubla-khan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/britishpoetry\/2023\/03\/04\/imagining-the-sublime-in-kubla-khan\/","title":{"rendered":"Imagining the Sublime in ‘Kubla Khan’"},"content":{"rendered":"

Samuel Taylor Coleridge\u2019s poem \u201cKubla Khan\u201d is deeply infused with Romantic themes of the sublime, imagination, and creation. The content of the poem, as well as its form, both seemingly work to explore the importance of imagination and creativity. The narrator writes about a vision of a woman singing about Kubla Khan\u2019s pleasure-dome having the ability to inspire \u201csuch a deep delight… I would build that dome in air \u2013 That sunny dome, those caves of ice!\u201d (lines 44, 46-47). This theme of art inspiring imagination of the sublime is also seen in William Wordsworth\u2019s poem \u201cTintern Abbey.\u201d Wordsworth\u2019s poem describes how the narrator\u2019s imagination of the sublime is inspired by a painting. This exploration of imagination and creativity is also seen in the structure of Coleridge\u2019s poem. Each stanza of the poem is written with a different form and rhyme scheme, which\u00a0seemingly works to explore the creative potential of poetry. <\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Additional meaning is added to the poem when it is viewed through the lens of English colonialism and travel. It\u2019s worth noting that Coleridge\u2019s inspiration for this poem came from a travel book about the East. He draws from the book\u2019s descriptions to detail a location that is paradoxically beautiful and frightening. The poem describes \u201cfertile\u201d grounds that are full of \u201cgardens bright,\u201d \u201csinuous rills,\u201d many \u201cblossomed\u201d trees, \u201cforests ancient,\u201d and \u201csunny spots of greenery\u201d (lines 6, 8, 9, 10, 11). This beautiful setting contrasts with the \u201cdeep romantic chasm,\u201d which is also contradictorily described as \u201ca savage place… holy and enchanted\u201d (lines 12, 14). Coleridge\u2019s descriptions do not seem to be rooted in fact so much as a desire to craft a beautifully mysterious setting for his poem; the juxtaposition of the beautiful and the frightening create an image of the sublime. Coleridge also emphasizes the stunning, unknowable beauty of this location, referring multiple times to the \u201ccaverns measureless to man\u201d (lines 4, 27). These descriptions are consistent with the Romantic fascination with nature and the sublime. However, they also create an image of a foreign, strange land that is consistent with European orientalist beliefs. While Coleridge\u2019s exploration of imagination and the sublime fits within the Romantic literary tradition, his depiction of the East as an unknowable and mysterious place also reflects European imagination of foreign countries, which came as a result of the English empire\u2019s colonial pursuits. <\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Samuel Taylor Coleridge\u2019s poem \u201cKubla Khan\u201d is deeply infused with Romantic themes of the sublime, imagination, and creation. The content of the poem, as well as its form, both seemingly work to explore the importance of imagination and creativity. The narrator writes about a vision of a woman singing about Kubla Khan\u2019s pleasure-dome having the … Continue reading Imagining the Sublime in ‘Kubla Khan’<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4998,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-303","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-spring-2023"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/britishpoetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/303","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/britishpoetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/britishpoetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/britishpoetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4998"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/britishpoetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=303"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/britishpoetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/303\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/britishpoetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=303"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/britishpoetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=303"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/britishpoetry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=303"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}