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Literary narratives ballads grew in the Romantic movement from the later 18th century among social elites and intellectuals. William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge produced a collection of Lyrical Ballads in 1798 that included Coleridge's The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.

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How would you end this poem based on the title and other images/symbols? Use evidence to back up your claim.

Once more it was the middle of the night, the moon out in full but shrouded by dark misty clouds. The bells had not rang for some time, for a long time. The owl stood in wait as a young girl came out to pray. By an old oak tree, she fell to her knees. then she heard a voice, one that lured her towards it, against her own will.. There stood a woman looking young in age ringlets flowing down her back. The woman turned her eyes blue but something was wrong, with her eyes. They looked as though they were that of snakes.

"My name is Christabel, I was brought here against my will, please help me"

and so it continued the old oak tree collecting the souls that were lost.

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Using the following websites, write down some of the most important traits of Romantic poetry. Then, go back to Christabel, and locate evidence from the poem showing how this is an example of Romanticism.

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In spite of difference of soil and climate, of language and manners, of laws and customs, in spite of things silently gone out of mind and things violently destroyed, the Poet binds together by passion and knowledge the vast empire of human society, as it is spread over the whole earth, and over all time. The objects of the Poet's thoughts are everywhere; though the eyes and senses of man are, it is true, his favorite guides, yet he will follow wheresoever he can find an atmosphere of sensation in which to move his wings. Poetry is the first and last of all knowledge-it is as immortal as the heart of man.
-William Wordsworth, "Preface to Lyrical Ballads"

Romanticism was arguably the largest artistic movement of the late 1700s. Its influence was felt across continents and through every artistic discipline into the mid-nineteenth century, and many of its values and beliefs can still be seen in contemporary poetry.

It is difficult to pinpoint the exact start of the Romantic movement, as its beginnings can be traced to many events of the time: a surge of interest in folklore in the early to mid-nineteenth century with the work of the brothers Grimm, reactions against Neoclassicism and the Augustan poets in England, and political events and uprisings that fostered nationalistic pride.

Romantic poets cultivated individualism, reverence for the natural world, idealism, physical and emotional passion, and an interest in the mystic and supernatural. Romantics set themselves in opposition to the order and rationality of classical and neoclassical artistic precepts to embrace freedom and revolution in their art and politics. German Romantic poets included Friedrich Schiller and Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, and British poets, such as Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Percy Bysshe Shelley, George Gordon Lord Byron, and John Keats propelled the English Romantic movement. Victor Hugo was a noted French Romantic poet as well, and Romanticism crossed the Atlantic through the work of American poets like Walt Whitman and Edgar Allan Poe. The Romantic era produced many of the stereotypes of poets and poetry that exist to this day (i.e., the poet as a tortured and melancholy visionary).

Romantic ideals never died out in poetry, but were largely absorbed into the precepts of many other movements. Traces of romanticism lived on in French S ymbolism and S urrealism and in the work of prominent poets, such as Charles Baudelaire and Rainer Maria Rilke.
browse poets from this movement

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In spite of difference of soil and climate, of language and manners, of laws and customs, in spite of things silently gone out of mind and things violently destroyed, the Poet binds together by passion and knowledge the vast empire of human society, as it is spread over the whole earth, and over all time.

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How is the setting used to create an ominous mood in the first half of Part I? List 5-7 examples.

"'Tis the middle of night by the castle clock,"

"The thin gray cloud is spread on high,"

"The moon is behind, and at the full; "

"The night is chill, the cloud is gray:"

"Is it the wind that moaneth bleak?"

Specifically what is the significance of it being "middle of the night"?

the middle of the night is the height of a womens power ("midnight represents the zenith of the feminine principle.")

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Druids Cutting the Mistletoe on the Sixth Day of the Moon ~ Henri Paul Motte

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How does Coleridge incorporate ancient Druid and Christian symbolism of an Oak tree in order to make the symbolism of the tree complex?

How does this complex symbolism add to the ambiguity of both Christabel and Geraldine?

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Look at the pdf discussing the meaning of owls in folklore and mythology. In addition, look up owls and Bohemian Grove. Write down a list of the symbolism of the owl.

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In the context of Christabel, what do you think the owl tells the reader about Geraldine and the situation Christabel is about to encounter? Use evidence from the poem.

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Using evidence from stanza 9, analyze how the men and their horses are important symbols that reveal the character of Geraldine to the reader.

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Look through the first half of Part I. What symbols, images, and/or detail do you see that help the reader characterize Geraldine as a vampire of sorts? Find at least three examples.

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Christabel is an ambiguous (has more than one interpretation, not clear) character. Is she still "innocent" at the end of this poem? Was she solely a victim? Is there evidence to show her willingness to succumb to Geraldine? Find me four pieces of evidence showing the ambiguity of Christabel's character relating to these questions. Analyze how the evidence you chose shows the ambiguity of her character.

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Geraldine is an ambiguous character. We have found a lot of evidence showing that she is vampiric and evil, but now I want you to find me an example that shows she might not be all evil. Use evidence from the text and analyze how this evidence shows the ambiguity of her character.

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Find at least two pieces of evidence from the poem relating to the story of the Garden of Eden. Analyze their meaning in relation to Geraldine's character.

" I saw a bright green snake

Coiled around its wings and neck." ---> The devil disguised itself as a snake in the Garden of eden to trick Eve, Geraldine disguised herself as well and trick Christabel into letting her into her home in order to take her place

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foreshadowing that something very bad is going to happen.

Evidence:

"'Tis the middle of night by the castle clock,

And the owls have awakened the crowing cock"

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1. "'Off, woman, off! this hour is mine—

Though thou her guardian spirit be,

Off, woman, off! 'tis given to me.'"

Geraldine is talking to the dead, and casting off Christabel last line of defense (taking youth from her mother)

2. "Again the wild-flower wine she drank:

Her fair large eyes 'gan glitter bright,

And from the floor whereon she sank,

The lofty lady stood upright:

She was most beautiful to see,

Like a lady of a far countrèe."---> feeding on something that is important to Christabel

3. "Behold! her bosom and half her side—

A sight to dream of, not to tell!

O shield her! shield sweet Christabel!"---> taking away her innocence

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"To lift some weight with sick assay,

And eyes the maid and seeks delay;

Then suddenly, as one defied,

Collects herself in scorn and pride," ---> she delayed, Geraldine hesitated before tainting Christabel proving that she does have some good in her but she still "collects herself in scorn and pride" aka collects herself in sin giving into her evil nature

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"Modelled after the horsemen that will announce the Apocalypse, the Five Horsemen are a common symbol for the thresholds and of death itself in its manifold aspects within Sin-Eater society."

in this case I don't believe that Geraldine is a symbol of literal death but death of innocence and a life that once was. Geraldine taeks both of these thing from Christabel.