An Explication of Samuel Taylor Coleridge's Kubla Kahn
Explication n°4 : “Kubla Khan »
Kubla Khan, one of the most famous poem of English literature, is written by Samuel Taylor Coleridge in 1797 and was published in Christabel, Kubla Khan, and the Pains of Sleep in 1816. Kubla Khan is one of the most important poem of Coleridge and, according to the preface of the book, he wrote it during the time that he passed in a farm house between Porlock and Linton in England. Because of the opium that he had taken - prescribed to him to cure dysentery, Coleridge felt asleep when he was reading a story about Kubla Khan, which led to his dream and his poem. Coleridge said that, while he was asleep, “images rose up before him as things, with a parallel production of the correspondent expressions”. When he woke up, he kept the clear and accurate memories of what he had just seen in his dream and immediately started writing a poem from it. Unfortunately, he was interrupted by an inhabitant of the town, “A person from Porlock” who interfered with his process of writing. No one knows who he was or why he had disturbed Coleridge but the person from Porlock became an expression which is now used to refer to an unwanted person who interrupts the process of inspiration. Because of this visit, Coleridge forgot almost everything of the dream he had as the preface says “all the rest had passed away like the images on the surface of a stream into which a stone has been cast, but, alas! Without the after restoration of the latter”.
At the first reading, we understand that the poem talks about the mongol emperor Kubilaï Khan, creator of the Yuan dynasty, and his summer palace in Shangdu - Coleridge calls it Xanadu. Then, we get the impression that the poem presents the theme of the powerless and fragility of writing. Through the dream, we notice the problem of imagination and the result on the paper, the problem of the gap between what he dreamed of and what he wrote. Coleridge, in this poem, exploits the theme of the fantastic, strange
Kubla Khan, one of the most famous poem of English literature, is written by Samuel Taylor Coleridge in 1797 and was published in Christabel, Kubla Khan, and the Pains of Sleep in 1816. Kubla Khan is one of the most important poem of Coleridge and, according to the preface of the book, he wrote it during the time that he passed in a farm house between Porlock and Linton in England. Because of the opium that he had taken - prescribed to him to cure dysentery, Coleridge felt asleep when he was reading a story about Kubla Khan, which led to his dream and his poem. Coleridge said that, while he was asleep, “images rose up before him as things, with a parallel production of the correspondent expressions”. When he woke up, he kept the clear and accurate memories of what he had just seen in his dream and immediately started writing a poem from it. Unfortunately, he was interrupted by an inhabitant of the town, “A person from Porlock” who interfered with his process of writing. No one knows who he was or why he had disturbed Coleridge but the person from Porlock became an expression which is now used to refer to an unwanted person who interrupts the process of inspiration. Because of this visit, Coleridge forgot almost everything of the dream he had as the preface says “all the rest had passed away like the images on the surface of a stream into which a stone has been cast, but, alas! Without the after restoration of the latter”.
At the first reading, we understand that the poem talks about the mongol emperor Kubilaï Khan, creator of the Yuan dynasty, and his summer palace in Shangdu - Coleridge calls it Xanadu. Then, we get the impression that the poem presents the theme of the powerless and fragility of writing. Through the dream, we notice the problem of imagination and the result on the paper, the problem of the gap between what he dreamed of and what he wrote. Coleridge, in this poem, exploits the theme of the fantastic, strange