The Rime of the Ancient Mariner

Day after day day after dayWe stuck nor breath nor motion;As idle as a painted shipUpon a painted ocean.The longest important poem by English poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge The Rime of the Ancient Mariner (originally The Rime of the Ancyent Marinere) was composed around 1797 and initially appeared in the first edition of Lyrical Ballads in 1798. The version used in modern publications is a later revision printed in 1817 with a gloss. It was a significant transition to contemporary poetry and the start of British Romantic literature along with other works in Lyrical Ballads.It describes what a mariner who has just returned from a protracted sea expedition went through. On his way to a wedding the Mariner stops a man and starts telling him a story. As the Mariner's tale develops the Wedding-reaction Guest's shifts from amusement to impatience fear and fascination as evidenced by the language style: for instance the use of narrative devices like personification and repetition to conjure up a sense of peril the paranormal or serenity depending on the mood of each different section of the poem.