Page:The Earliest English Translations of Bürger's Lenore - A Study in English and German Romanticism - Emerson (1915).djvu/74

 also belongs to all the poems of this brief period of Coleridge's development.

Beyond this the Ancient Mariner bears a close relation in essential character to Bürger's Lenore. A sin against the divine ruler, the one in blasphemy, the other in killing one of God's innocent creatures, the punishment attended by wondrous and supernatural circumstances, the moral and the suggestion of mercy from the divine judge,—these make up both poems. The main difference is that in the Mariner the suggestion of mercy is carried one step further, to penitence for sin, the saving of the sinner's life, and expiation in his wandering over the earth to tell his story and emphasize the moral—both notable additions to the Bürger theme. In this one may see the specific English modification of the Bürger conception, for it may be noted here again that Stanley carried out the same idea in his second version of Bürger's poem, even if in a much less artistic way.

The influence of the German ballad upon Coleridge was at once recognized at the time, especially by Southey. In the Critical Review article on the Lyrical Ballads in the October number of 1798, he says of the Ancient Mariner: "It is a Dutch attempt at German sublimity. Genius has here been employed in producing a poem of little merit." To this Lamb rightly expresses strong disapproval in a letter of Nov. 8, but it should be noted that Lamb makes no denial of German influence. His characterization of the poem as "an English attempt" "to dethrone German sublimity" implies that he recognized the German inspiration, while strongly deprecating anything like mere imitation. The letter is as follows:

If you wrote that review in the "Crit. Rev." I am sorry you are so sparing of praise to the "Ancient Mariner";—so far from calling it, as you do with some wit but more severity, "A Dutch attempt," etc., I call it a right English attempt, and a successful one to dethrone German sublimity. You have selected a passage fertile in unmeaning miracles, but have passed by fifty passages as miraculous in the miracles they celebrate. I never so deeply felt the pathetic as in that part.

It stung me into high pleasure through sufferings. Lloyd does not like it; his head is too metaphysical, and your taste too correct; at least I must allege something against you both, to excuse my own dotage —