Coleridge's "Kubla Khan"

"There is a peculiar ambivalence in Kubla Khan allowing the widest divergencies of critical interpretation," says T.S. Eliot. Samuel Taylor Coleridge's Kubla Khan; or, A Vision in a Dream: A Fragment takes its title from the Mongol and Chinese emperor Kublai Khan of the Yuan Dynasty. The tale of its composition is the most celebrated and enigmatic in the history of English poetry.Coleridge himself, in the 1816 Preface to the prescribed poem ,terms it "a psychological curiosity." The poet who was addicted to opium, fell asleep under the spell of the addictive when he envisaged the vision he embodies in his poetry. Before falling asleep, he had been reading an account of Purchas his Pilgrimage in which Kubla Khan commanded the building of a new palace; Coleridge asserts that while he slept, he had an exotic vision in a trance-like state, and composed simultaneously while sleeping, some three hundred lines of poetry, "if that indeed can be called composition in which all the images rose up before him as things, with a parallel production of the correspondent expressions, without any sensation or conscious effort."

As he tried to recreate the poem, he was successful in reconstructing the first three stanzas. Subsequently, the composition of the poem was interrupted by a "person on business from Porlock". As an hour elapsed, he was unable to revive the rest of the dream under the influence of opium. The final stanza is said to be written after this intruding and thwarting interval. The poem is a metapoem. It at once reflects its own process of creation, and stands out as the ideal of the creative self. The pleasure dome envisaged by the emperor ,at once transforms itself to the poem that Coleridge reconstructs vividly through the adumbration of his dream.

Cleanth Brooks claims that the language of poetry is the language of paradox. Likewise, the opening stanza represents the poetic paradigm as the conjunction of opposites. The historical Kubla Khan is placed adjacent to the mythical Alpheus. The individual aspiration of Coleridge to resurrect his poetic vision, is set against the stately inclination of Kubla Khan to build his pleasure dome. The oriental ideal is juxtaposed against the Western exemplar of Coleridge. The mathematical precision of the pleasure dome is set against the infinity of 'caverns measureless to man'. The 'pleasure' embodied by the dome is in antithesis to the sacredness of the river. Fertile (natural) ground is enclosed by (artificial) walls. Nature is girdled by artificiality. It is devoid of natural inspiration echoed in terms such as "the sunless sea". Inspiration manifests itself gradually: "Enfolding sunny spots of greenery," where greenery 'stand for 'fertility' and 'productivity'.

Simultaneous to the construction of each of the stanza, the muse of the creative faculty bursts forth. In the first stanza,the sunlight embodies the impetus. In the second, it assumes the form of the a "deep romantic chasm" that slanted down a green hill, occasionally spewing forth a violent and powerful burst of water, so immense that it flung boulders up with it "like rebounding hail." The passion is inherent in the metaphor: "As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted / By woman wailing to her demon-lover," The moon has always been a an emblem of declining powers of the creative faculty for Coleridge; it has been utilized in his "Dejection: An Ode". The pleasure-dome's shadow floated on the waves, where the mingled sounds of the fountain and the caves could be heard. Passion and instinct reign in the second stanza, in Gothic overtones, in the form of the Lady under the moon craving for her demon lover. It is also implicit in the phrase 'A savage place! As holy and enchanted'. The passion of impulse is not only dreaded, but is also revered as it 'holy'. It is enchanting and captivating as brought forth by a wizard of black magic. Sorcery is in total opposition to the word 'holy', with religious connotations; as the two are enjoined. The poet creates a Gothic atmosphere of awe, as is his nature to render the supernatural natural. The powers of reminiscence began to subside as the 'mighty fountain' settles to a "to a lifeless ocean".

And 'mid this tumult Kubla heard from far
Ancestral voices prophesying war !

These voices may be the lost vision of the poem, that lies not outside but in his genetic faculties symbolized by 'ancestral voices'. They may also allude to the shadows of the poetic predecessors that challenge him to overshadow 'the anxiety of influence' as stated by Harold Bloom in his essay. "In The Anxiety of Influence (1973), he formulated a controversial theory of literary creation called revisionism. Influenced strongly by Freudian theory, Bloom believes that all poets are subject to the influence of earlier poets and that, to develop their own voices, they attempt to overcome this influence through a process of misreading. By misreading, Bloom means a deliberate, personal revision of what has been said by another so that it conforms to one's own vision. In this way the poet creates a singular voice, overcoming the fear of being inferior to poetic predecessors."Coleridge ,here,endeavours to look to his unconscious rendering of the poem, as it more original than conscious rendering of the the same.

Here Coleridge strives to search for his lost voice that had been lost in the midst of composition,with the intrusion of the guest. This guest may at once typify his writer's block.His composition, with regards to "Kubla Khan" is ,therefore also a quest for the original identity of the poem. The theme of quest is reiterated through the symbol of the 'caverns'.The cave has always been a sign of ' the search for truth' or 'the quest for self' in masterpieces of literature like E.M.Forester's "Passage to India".

The shadow of the dome of pleasure
Floated midway on the waves ;
Where was heard the mingled measure
From the fountain and the caves

The thwarted vision now only remains as a visual shadow: "The shadow of the dome of pleasure /Floated midway on the waves;" or it manifests itself as remote audible resonances : "Where was heard the mingled measure/From the fountain and the caves."Coleridge, eventually, immortalizes his vision, though it is not fully realized in his imagination:

It was a miracle of rare device,
A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice !

When this ideal is finally verbally concretized in terms of structure, it conglomerates the various metaphors that have hitherto functioned as the signs of poetic inspiration: the water is crystallized as 'caves of ice'. Also the pleasure dome is "sunny': abundant with adequate sunlight. 'Caves of ice' exemplify that it is primarily through inspiration, that the quest is ultimately fulfilled. Note, that the pleasure dome is entirely Coleridge's and not acknowledged in his source material. Also the two primary raw materials of the dome,the 'sunny' rays and caves of 'ice' complementary entities, yet again, as in the dialectic pair Heat/Ice.

The fourth stanza embodies the crux of the poem. The poet affirms that he once had the enthralling vision of the damsel singing of Mount Abora. This apparition is at once is the painted metaphor of 300-hundred-line magnum opus he failed to fully realize. Coleridge would then recreate the pleasure-dome in air. As to how he would create it in air: it is out of lyric and music. The marriage of lyric and music is indubitably 'song'. However, the poet is not only satisfied with 'song', he wants 'symphony' to accompany it, to craft an aura of awe. The poet seeks to generate an atmosphere that captivates his audience, as though he has cast a spell on them. As people visualize his 'flashing eyes" and "floating hair, his magnificent wizard-like powers will then not only be dreaded as they "cry, Beware ! Beware !".They will also be venerated with 'holy' trepidation as "he on honey-dew hath fed, / And drunk the milk of Paradise." A circle will be weaved around him thrice. The number 'three' has its own significance as it symbolizes the Christian Trinity ,the Hindu Trinity .etc. Further, this threeness or triad, has always been considered a sacred-like oneness. Again, the number three also emblematizes the unity of body, mind and spirit. At that point,the poem itself is above all other considerations of the mind,body and spirit; but it is also surrounded by these. As a circle is woven around him thrice-fold; a three-dimensional halo will be conferred upon him, that is not only divine, but also real.