Psychedelic Regrets in “Rime of the Ancient Mariner” (Part 2)

Wes & Erin continue their discussion of Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s classic poem, “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.” Pre-order Erin’s forthcoming book “Avail” here: http://subtextpodcast.com/avail For bonus content, become a paid subscriber at Patreon or directly on the Apple Podcasts app. Patreon subscribers also get early access to ad-free regular episodes. This podcast is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Visit AirwaveMedia.com to listen and subscribe to other Airwave shows like Good Job, Brain and Big Picture Science. Email [email protected] to enquire about advertising on the podcast. Follow: Twitter | Facebook | Website Transcript 0:00 Erin: work. Em woe for all averred, I had killed the bird that made the breeze to blow Nor dim nor red, like God's own head, the glorious sun uprist. Then Oliverd I had killed the bird that brought the fog and mist. Twas right, said they, such birds to slay that bring the fog and mist. The breezes blew, the white foam flew, the furrow followed free. We were the first that ever burst into that silent sea. 0:25 Wes: Okay, the sun came up upon the right, I think, at the very beginning of his account. It comes up on the left, right. And then comes out of the sea, shines bright, goes right back down into the sea. It's almost like the poem has started again. As if there's some parallel between the shooting of the albatross and the arresting of the wedding guest singling out, right, an attack on the wedding guest. I'm not making anything. I haven't dug into that to think if there's something significant about that. But that does seem, at least formally, to be a parallel. And. Okay, so instead of. In this case, where we get the stanza, which is evocative of the beginning of the account, the sun doesn't just. Well, it goes back down into the sea, but. And broad as a weft upon the left. What does that mean? Comes up on the right. Out of the sea came he, and broad as a weft upon the left. 1:18 Erin: Yeah, this is a. This is a controversial line. So this is glossed in my edition as a thin line of cloud or mist or a broad flag on a ship. In 1800, the internal rhyme was sacrificed for the sake of the sense. So he revised this to say, still hid in mist. And on the left, perhaps in response to remarks in the negative review noted above. So there was a negative review in the British critic. This critic dismissed noises in a swound as nonsense. And he also took. He also took issue with broad as a weft upon the left, you know. 1:56 Wes: Okay, interesting. All right, well, I'm glad I. My critical instincts were. 2:01 Erin: Yeah. 2:03 Wes: Were spot on there, actually. No, I was just confused by what that meant. But. So it's going down into the. So I take it that the meaning is supposed to be that it's going down into the. Into the mist. Okay, so they get a good south wind, no bird anymore following. 2:17 Erin: Yeah, well, just before we do that, though, I'm thinking about. Okay, so the sun is coming up in a different direction because now they're reoriented. 2:26 Wes: Right. 2:27 Erin: So they were going from north to south, and now they're going from south to north. So that means that the sun is coming out of their. Out of now the right hand side. So in other words, the reorientation, the change in direction occurs right at the moment of shooting the albatross as well. And I like this weft. To me it makes sense because it's warp and weft, right. Like, like they're, they were stitching down and now they're stitching back up right there, there's, there's something logical to me in, in the, in the, the use of that word around a reorientation or a change in direction. Like they're gonna weave back up again. But anyway, I think it's lovely that this, the reorientation which is, which is normal, relatively speaking. Like they've now rounded and are coming back up the other side. Like it's logical, but at the same time what it, what it creates is this idea of like a topsy turvy world, you know, that everything after the albatross being killed is now kind of. Everything is kind of on the wrong side. It's still the correct side. The sun is still rising in the east and setting in the west. But because of the reorientation, again in relation to the body of the ship and the bodies of the crew members, which is the ultimate, the ultimate yardstick, which is what's getting them into trouble. It seems to be coming out of a different side for them. 3:54 Wes: Yeah, it's a very sailor type of thing to do. There's port and there's starboard. 3:58 Erin: Exactly. 3:59 Wes: Could have said the sun came up out of the east and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, but. 4:05 Erin: And went down into the west. Yeah. 4:06 Wes: And it would be less confusing because I did think, wait, wait, the sun is coming up on the right. Is that right? 4:12 Erin: Yeah. 4:13 Wes: Thinking, of course of myself as facing north or south or. But no, I think normally we would think of ourselves as facing north. And then we think of the east as our right and the west as our left. Right. I think that's how as a kid you were kind of taught to do it. So. Yeah, so by giving these relatives directions, it becomes confusing and it might take a minute to say, wait, wait, right, left. And it's different than it was before. You kind of have to figure out, oh, the boat is turned around. And he didn't tell us that. 4:43 Erin: Right. 4:43 Wes: He didn't tell us that the boat turned around. He didn't tell us that it turned around right after he killed the albatross. So. All right, so now we get the good south wind still Blowing behind, but without the bird. So now we learn something new about the albatross, which is that I don't think we knew that they thought that the albatross was bringing the good breeze. Right. Did we know that before? 5:05 Erin: Right. 5:06 Wes: So now we learn that, and we learn that the other sailors think that he's cursed them, or at least cursed their journey by killing the bird that was bringing the breeze. Except the breeze is still there. 5:19 Erin: Yes. The punishment, in a way, comes before the crime. Right. Because the crime isn't necessarily. Necessarily killing the bird. It's killing the thing that brought the breeze. So. Or it's killing the breeze, in other words. Right. By proxy. So he's. He gets punished. He's told he's done a hellish thing before, the repercussions actually happen, and they. Only after the breeze stops. 5:40 Wes: Yeah, he says I had done a hellish thing. He doesn't put that in their mouths. They aver that he's killed the bird that made the breeze blow. 5:49 Erin: Yes. 5:49 Wes: So in a way, their. Their criticism is more practical and his is more in the domain of the. Of the normative and the moral. 5:57 Erin: Well, I mean, I think you're right, of course, but. But this reads to me almost as though he's parroting what other people have said to him. 6:03 Wes: He's concluding he did a hellish thing. There's what he was said that he was told, and then there's his internal self evaluation based on that I had done a hellish thing and all averred that he killed him. But, yeah, I think you're right. We could also just read this as. As a paraphrase of something that they also. They also said to him. It's hard to say. 6:24 Erin: Well, I think this. Yeah, this internal self evaluation, too, is really interesting because the conception of it being hellish does predate, you know, as we're already saying, any kind of repercussions. So I suppose there's the further complication of the fact that this could be the mariners, you know, the present day mariners, editorializing about the thing that was done, which the mariner inside the story, the young mariner, would perhaps not know at that point. You know, the layers of storytelling are a little complicated by that story within a story idea. 6:58 Wes: You know, the other interesting part of this is the other sailors are ambivalent. On the one hand, he's killed the bird that made the breeze blow. On the other, he killed the bird that brought the fog in the mist, and it was the right thing to do. You don't want to kill the Bird or am I miss. Am I misreading that? 7:14 Erin: I think that. So there is another sunrise, right. The sunrise, it seems, shows that there is no longer any fog and mist. And so then. So I think it's a change. These two things, they change the mind at the same time. Right. And so it's entirely based on whether or not they're having a good or a bad day, is whether or not it was good or bad to kill the bird. And I think this is the marks. 7:38 Wes: Except that they, they haven't lost the breeze yet. Right. Or they never lost the breeze. The good south wind still blew behind, but he had killed the bird that made the. 7:49 Erin: That's right. Because then at 99, the breezes blew, they're still blowing. 7:54 Wes: It's a really interesting, you know, what you would expect here is that the wind stops blowing, he gets cursed for killing the bird, you know, and then the, the sun comes up, the breeze is back, the fog and mist is gone, and then he gets praised and then. Oh yeah, right. But it's a much weirder juxtaposition. 8:12 Erin: That's true. Yeah. So the significance of they're ascribing a power to the bird that we don't know that they've ascribed to it until after the bird is dead, expecting that things are going to go bad. So they're expecting that the breeze is going to stop because the bird was killed. 8:32 Wes: Right. 8:33 Erin: Only in death do they actually come out and attribute the fair weather to this bird. So there's something here about the changed circumstance. They want to ascribe a sort of like post mortem causality to the bird's existence. And when they can't blame the death of the bird on the winds dying because the winds continue, they then have to see the. When things improve even more, they then have to see the bird as bad luck that was rightfully done away with. 9:05 Wes: So they make a negative prediction, it doesn't come true, and then something positive also happens. And so they change their mind about the significance of the bird. 9:16 Erin: It's as though their relationship to the bird has actually been a distraction from their own magical thinking. Until the bird dies and then they're right back into. Right. This seems to pull them out of their, the whole ship's solipsism by engaging with this bird. So now it's kind of like in hindsight, now we do see that this was redemptive for them. Then once the bird is dead, they're immediately going back to this superstition, magical thinking, trying to, trying to like influence the outside world in this more deterministic fashion. So it seems to me that the bird again was a positive thing to draw them out of themselves and then they just slam right back into their former orientation to the world when the bird is gone. 10:01 Wes: Yeah, good point. I talked about a hypothetical imperative relationship to nature versus categorical seeing it as something to be used versus seeing it as something of value in itself. And then there's the domain of superstition, which is a kind of pseudo scientific or quasi scientific scientific because it's still in the domain of the causal. It's just magical, as you said. It's causes that aren't really there. If the bird is with us, we'll have a fair breeze. If it's not, we won't, that that sort of thing. And it turns out that their relationship to the bird is not one of mere utility, like I'm, we're going to eat it. It's not one of the, oh, it's a nice pet or it's a soul, it's a Christian soul. We're gonna treat it well, it's more that it, that it's an object of superstition. So the tendency in the, in the beginning to treat it as a spirit or as a Christian soul turns out to be just part and parcel of their superstitious relationship to the world. It's not really about some profound connection to organic things and the value of life. And it's not something about their Christian religious belief. It's really just a subdomain of their superstitious relationship to nature, which is an odd relationship to have. I mean, it, you know, it's, of course, that's the stereotype, right. Superstitious sailors who, of course, as I said before, there's a lot of technology and art and know how that goes into navigation, especially at that time. Right. It's an enormous technological accomplishment, but it's imperfect and requires a lot of courage because things go, things that go, you know, much more likely to go wrong back then. And you're much more likely to get killed or have your ship sunk or to go to the wrong place. And so superstition is the surplus. In other words, navigation is about science. Superstition is the surplus that's there because of the imperfectness of that. If you had a GPS and a motor, you wouldn't need to worry about giving super, you know, superstitious significance to nature or to events, to natural events. What I'm trying to say is that the, you know, this has me thinking that the albatross is in. Yeah. Is in this third position of having merely superstitious or symbolic significance for the sailors. So that shooting it is not a practical question or an ethical question or utilitarian question. In a way, it's a symbolic question. 12:44 Erin: Yeah. I mean, I love what you're saying. And also, isn't this idea of superstition, isn't it about control, you know, maybe beyond what you're saying or a step beyond what you're saying? Like, what did you. What did you say about. About technology? That there. That the superstition is like the surplus of this kind of technology. 13:05 Wes: Yeah. Because it's in the. Just to be clear, it's in the domain of the causal. Right. So normally I think, okay, I'm going to use my knowledge of cause and effect to use technology to control the world and to do whatever in this case, the cause and effect is about. It's not real causes, it's these fantasized, magical causes. But go ahead. 13:24 Erin: Right. But wouldn't that be. A sailor at this time knows that their technology, I mean, what they deeply know, maybe more than they can admit, is that their technology can't stand up to nature often in practice. Right. They may feel in the 1800s, mariner culture has a certain mastery over nature. But what they know better than anybody from experience is that this mastery can never be complete because nature is so overwhelming. And so to me, this idea of superstition is like a fear response. It's a way of exerting more control over something that they know ultimately they can't control. It's this idea that they could, like, determine their fate, that they can, in other words, like, provide a stopgap where their technology actually fails. Right. 14:10 Wes: Yeah, exactly. Yeah. 14:12 Erin: Okay, so, you know, in this way, you're making me think that there. This is actually further evidence for the. The killing of the albatross to be completely unmotivated from this perspective of technology and the supremacy of nature. In other words, it doesn't matter. I mean, it does deeply matter in the poem, what killed the albatross. But the killing of the albatross or the, say, the death of it could have been by any number of means. What if the albatross had just dropped dead onto. Onto the deck of the ship? Right. They would have come up with a superstition for that, of course. Right. You know, so in a way, like the mariner. What am I trying to say about this? The mariner is kind of being used as an impetus for an event which could have been natural in A way he's. He's being punished in the way that the mariners want to punish nature for its cruelty. Do you know what I'm trying to say? Like, so. So he then becomes almost, if you will, the mariner. Okay? The mariner is like the scapegoat for all of the crimes of nature against these ships. Is that going too far? 15:28 Wes: Let me. Let me think about that. Well, you had me thinking before about the mechanism of the superstition. Is it. Is it important that the bird is there, or is it important that they be good to the bird? You know, if the bird just died of natural causes, had a heart attack on the deck, would that be a reason for the breeze to go away? Or does it have to be that one of them affected it? You know, one of them made it happen and. And did a bad thing? Is it, you know, is. Does the breeze stop? Is the breeze going to stop because you did a bad thing, or is the breeze stopping the bad thing? Something like that. Okay, but now. Now you're asking the question of. So if I understand you correctly, you're associating all the bad things that happen of their own accord, like the natural causes, like dying of natural causes of a heart attack on the deck. The. The albatross has eaten too many biscuit worms and, well, that would still implicate them. They would still be complicit in that scenario. But in any case, dying of natural causes and all the. All the act of God. So I want to say act of God here, not just natural causes. All the stuff that, you know, when there's a shipwreck, it's a. Or a storm capsizes a ship for insurance purposes, at least that's an act of God, right? Unless the crew did something wrong, but unless they killed the albatross first or steered it into a rock negligently, but in any case. So, yes, it's all these bad things that happen according to natural causes. And you could try to control that with superstition. But beyond that, I think your suggestion is beyond wanting to control it through one's magical thinking. One might want to take vengeance on it. And this, I think, is really spot on because this really does give us some insight into a motivation for shooting the albatross. In a way, it's a kind of envy. It's envy in the. Sorry to name drop this, but the Melanie Klein psychoanalytic sense of not wanting the control to be outside, not wanting the good thing to be outside of oneself, not wanting to depend on others, not having to Want to depend on the albatross and feed it and do whatever it takes, keep it around, and then you can have a good trip. No, I just want to be able to have a good trip of my own accord. So how dare you be the thing that I need to control or to relate to in order to get what I need, whether that's physical or social, whatever. And so people do this in their lives all the time, and this implicates death drive as well. So they kill off relationships. They avoid having relationships because it's too painful to acknowledge that the good thing that they might get from the outside, from the relationship is not already inside them, that they're not just complete in and of themselves, that they need people. So the mariner might be trying to say, I don't need you, albatross. Screw you, we don't need you. We're just good all by ourselves. We can do it on our own. I don't know. Am I capturing anything of what you're getting at? 18:45 Erin: Yeah, yeah, exactly. So it's. So the albatross, in other words, is, like, representative of the mariner's relationship to the sea itself. Right. In which it's like. I don't know if I want to say this on the podcast, but, like, I don't want to be the sea's bitch. Right. Like, I don't want to. 18:59 Wes: Yeah, yeah, exactly. 19:01 Erin: Then the Mariner, oddly, like, then would trade places with the albatross in a way, as being like the locus, like the tangible locus now for the mariners, or for the. For the crew members, rather, for their, like, desire for vengeance. Yeah. So then the. The mariner, in a way, trades places with the albatross after having killed it, because now we can just. It's like he symbolically transports. So now the crew members have a direction for their ire, a locus for their ire, which. Which then would rest with the mariner, who is. In killing. The albatross then becomes like the albatross was a tangible symbol of a kind of act of God on which they can then exert a kind of revenge by making him again, making him the scapegoat, making him have to expiate for, you know, the sins of nature against the crew. Is that. 20:00 Wes: Yeah. 20:01 Erin: Does that make sense or am I going. 20:03 Wes: Yeah, no. Yeah. You're getting back to the. This idea that you had about his identification with the albatross and their identification of him with the albatross and the negative component of their ambivalence coming out, meaning that. Right. So the Albatross is good fortune. In a way, it's a good omen. But why should we have to depend on such omens? And why in general, should we have to be at nature's mercy or rely on the causal framework of the world in order to have them to navigate the world? Why shouldn't the world work according to the rules of the normative. The rules of morality. Right. This is a famous kind of opposition that Kant makes, which is that there are ethical laws that are analogous to the laws of nature, but the laws of nature just are what they are. And nothing that exists can violate the laws of nature. Everything is bound to the laws of nature. But normative laws are violated all the time. There are still laws, but they don't have the element of necessity in the world. In the same way we're bound to them, but we can violate them. I think there's always an underlying wish that. So that the ethical were more like the natural. And we weren't just at the mercy of a uncaring natural world. That things would unfold as they should unfold. No one would. Would murder and no one would gratuitously kill a bird. And none of these things would. None of these things would actually happen. So to kill off the bird is to kill off this dependency on nature. In a way, it's almost like a. It's like an attempt at. It's almost like an ethical. It's an attempt at the vindication of the ethical, the vindication of the normative over and against the natural. Okay. So that's the first part of that. Right. So then he's. I'm just trying to get to where you are with the identification with the albatross. And so. Right. The breeze is about to stop. I forget what happens here. But in any case, I think you were saying he's gonna. He's going to become a scapegoat. Yeah. 22:13 Erin: And this is, in a sense. 22:14 Wes: So he may come to represent the very same things that the albatross that we take the albatross to be representing. By the way, I think we have a very original reading of this poem here. 22:27 Erin: I think we do. 22:28 Wes: I haven't found this in the secondary literature, but go ahead. 22:32 Erin: Shall I read? Because the breeze is about to drop. And then we'll get to that. So stands if I read straight through. 22:37 Wes: I think we're running out of time. Okay. So let's end it there. And we will continue on in part three, where down drops the breeze. Okay, thank you. 22:50 Erin: Thank you. And thanks to everyone who listened. For an easy way to do that, go to subtextpodcast.com patreon.com subtextpodcast please send your questions, feedback and episode requests to [email protected] if we get enough questions, we'll do some bonus Q and A shows for subscribers. You can also find us on Facebook subtextpodcast and on Twitter enjoysubtext. You're listening to an Airwave Media podcast. or patreon.com/subtextpodcast. All right, welcome to part three of our discussion of Coleridge's Rime of the Ancient Mariner. We are a bit of the way into section two of the poem. I think we're going to start today's discussion from down dropped the breeze, which is 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 stanzas into section 2. Okay, I think I'll. I'll go ahead and read it. Down dropped the breeze, the sails dropped down. Twas sad as sad could be and we did speak only to break the silence of the sea all in a hot and copper sky, the bloody sun at noon right up above the mast did stand no bigger than the moon. Day after day, day after day we stuck no breath, no motion as idle as a painted ship upon a painted ocean. Water, water everywhere. And all the boards did shrink. Water, water everywhere. Not any drop to drink. The very deeps did rot. O Christ, that ever this should be. Yea, slimy things did crawl with legs upon the slimy sea. About, about, in reel and rout the death fires danced at night, the water like a witch's oils, burnt green and blue and white. And some in dreams assured were of the spirit that plagued us so. Nine fathom deep. He had followed us from the land of mist and snow, and every tongue through utter drouth was withered at the root. We could not speak no more than if we had been choked with soot. Ah, well, a day. What evil looks had I from old and young, Instead of the cross the albatross about my neck was hung. 25:43 Wes: Oo. 25:44 Erin: Oo. 25:45 Wes: I think that's pronounced suit to rhyme with rude. Just kidding. 25:49 Erin: Yeah, I know some of these rhymes are a little. I'm also trying to swallow the. You know that. Nay. Any drop to drink or no. Or. I don't know how to say that, but I'm trying to gloss over it so that it doesn't. It doesn't sound like I can't be accused of anything. 26:06 Wes: Is it the schwa sound? 26:08 Erin: Yeah, exactly. 26:10 Wes: I think I was reading it ne, but. Yeah, I don't know for sure. 26:14 Erin: Yeah, I think it's ne. I think it's ne, but it just, you know, like everyone thinks of it as nor. You know what I mean? I think there's a more modern day. I suppose I don't have the. Did he edit that in the re. 26:28 Wes: Yeah, he might have modernized that maybe. 26:31 Erin: Yeah, right. 26:32 Wes: He modernized a bunch of them. All right, so he's killed. We have to try to remember where we left off our last recording, which was two weeks ago. I remember that he killed the albatross already, the bird that had brought the fog and mist. All right, so there's some ambivalence about whether it was a good thing or a bad thing to do that killed the bird that made the breeze blow, but he had also killed the bird that brought the fog and mist. We talked a little bit about what the albatross represented. And I think there was some talk of its representation. Of what? Of nature and natural forces. Do you remember? What did we conclude there? 27:12 Erin: Yeah, we talked about the albatrosses as a representation of nature, as a representation of obviously as a scapegoat kind of figure. Most of our conversation was about the albatross, perhaps as a reflection of the Mariner himself or a kind of double for the Mariner. So that the act of shooting him was like, the Mariner just really doesn't like himself and he needs to work on his self esteem. I think that's what we. 27:40 Wes: So, yeah, so there's an identification with the albatross. 27:43 Erin: Right. 27:43 Wes: So the thing I think I had been emphasizing was the sense in which they are at the mercy of these natural forces like the breeze. And the killing of the albatross, in a way represents a rebellion against that dependency. It's not merely motivationless. It's not merely just a casual crime of sadism or cruelty. In a way. It's unconsciously an objection to the natural world, maybe. And then you were getting at several times at his identification with the albatross, partly Is it because of the albatross's isolation? And by the way, the reason we had gotten to the albatross as a representative of natural forces is in part because of the role of the albatross is a sort of object of superstition. And is it good luck? Is it bad luck? And we talked a little bit about the way actual sailors at the time viewed albatrosses, whether they eat them or protect them as symbols of good luck or whatever. But we made the transition from a superstitious conception of the effect of the albatross on their fate to a less. Well, it's still somewhat superstitious, but it's related to natural causes. And then the identification with the albatross had something to do with the mariners isolation and maybe alienation from other members of the crew? 29:07 Erin: I think so, yeah. And we also talked about the. The albatross, I think as being a perfect example, or rather an example of living successfully in isolation. Right. So he's someone who's. Or he. The albatross is. Is someone whose body is, you know, a perfect ship, if you will, and far more self determined and, you know, capable of dealing with the elements. Right. Someone who lives in an extreme environment or a thing. I keep making the albatross a person, but an animal that is. Yeah. Just. Just better able to weather the concerns that so kind of torment the people on the ship and thereby an object maybe of aspiration or even envy on the part of the mariner. 29:51 Wes: Right, we did talk about the envy. Yeah. So everyone wants to be the albatross. The albatross is the thing to be. 29:58 Erin: Yeah. The thing I have written in my notes that I think the one thing I wrote down from last time is sailors are the sea's bitches. So I don't know if we actually said that or if it was something you said that I thought was funny. 30:15 Wes: Yeah. So, okay, so a symbol of independence and being able to navigate this natural world without depending upon the whims of the winds and other forces. So object of envy, of identification and symbolic of a certain sort of independence. Okay. 30:36 Erin: You know, this independence is. Is funny considering of course, that just prior to the section that I read, we were talking about last time, the symbolic dependence or the superstitious dependence between the albatross and the elements. Right. That the albatross brings something with him and you know, with his loss, causes the weather to change. But of course, one of the things we pointed out last time, I think was the fact that they actually say that the sailors when they when they get mad at the mariner for killing the bird, say that they killed the bird that made the breeze blow before the breeze even stops blowing, then they think it's a good thing because the fog and mist clears up. Right. So. So it was a good thing to kill the bird because the bird actually brought the fog and mist, not the breezes. And then finally, now at 1:03, finally, the breeze does stop blowing. So. 31:25 Wes: So they were right. 31:26 Erin: They were right. The albatross did make the breeze blow. And we have this, you know, one of the really famous images from the poem, the ship being still as idle as a painted ship upon a painted ocean. I love this image. I've just started, and I don't know, I have a tremendous amount to say about this, but I'm wondering about the interplay here, perhaps, between artistry and inactivity or stillness. And I'm wondering if Coleridge. I mean, this is just a nice image. I haven't really interrogated it, you know, but I'm thinking about the sort of. The contrast between the image that Coleridge is invoking here of probably a very serene, lovely kind of painting that you might have in a study or, God forbid, in your bathroom or something like that. Right. And the actual desperation of their. Of their situation, which is submerged in this image of imagery, of artistry. And I just wonder about that contrast here. 32:22 Wes: Yeah, I think we might have mentioned that this is a very Apollonian thing. This. You know, when you get to something that's static, something that's like a painting or a statue, something that's not dynamic, like music. If you're thinking esthetically, you're thinking about the Apollonian as opposed to the Dionysian and Romantic poetry, as opposed to. I think Coleridge described it. We were reading some quotations, is very focused on the Dionysian element. So that's something to keep in mind here, as he maybe is engaged in this reflection on the. On the static. But it's interesting because there's the worry that he killed the bird that makes the breezes blow, the relief that he killed the bird that brings the fog and mist. And then before the breeze drops down, the breezes blew, the white foam flew. So they have a period of being in motion, and then they burst into that silent sea. And they're the first ever to burst into that silent sea. It's as if this burst of activity sends them hurtling into this unknown, heretofore undiscovered place, space that turns out to be a very static Silent space in which there is no motion. So they burst into that. It's like being like, maybe sent out of the airlock from a spaceship, and suddenly you're in this very silent, empty place. But the nature of communication changes. They speak only to break the silence of the sea. So they're no longer speaking primarily to communicate with each other and we can imagine to communicate about in ways that are typical of sailors, which is in the running of the ship or whatever, hoist the so and such and such. Or now it's purely because they can't stand the silence that they would speak. So when there is activity, it's a rebellion against silence and stasis. And then you have the image of the bloody sun at noon, which is an odd image, right, because we would think of a bloody sun as being something normally at sunset, standing above the mast. Later on, we're going to get an image. I mentioned it in our last recording, about where it seems like the sun is coming down like a pin and pinning the ship in place. I think that's coming. I'm not sure, maybe that's the way I read this image. But I think it's a different one that's coming later in the poem. So you get also an idea that light has this arresting effect, that it's by shedding light on something that you would make it stop and make it stand still. 34:53 Erin: Yeah, I really like the way you're reading this. Stands around line 100. Something you said about the fact that they're bursting into this sea, the first to burst into it, and that it's unknown. You're highlighting another. 35:07 Wes: These are the voyages of the starship. 35:11 Erin: Well, but really, though, I mean, I think you're right. 35:14 Wes: The sea ship Enterprise. Do you know the name of the ship? 35:18 Erin: I don't think so. Maybe it is the Enterprise. The connection you're drawing to being sent out of an airlock or something like that is really an apt one. And I think this is another instance of having these two opposites kind of sit on top of each other, because we have this idea that they're the first to burst into the sea. So they have a knowledge now that nobody else has. And it puts me in mind, of course, of being maybe cast out of the Garden of Eden or having eaten the apple of the tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Right. So they now have a knowledge that they didn't have before. They're explorers. That also involves being thrust into the unknown. So they're seeing kind of behind the curtain, if you will. But this contrast between being the first ones to have the knowledge and being in the unknown place, it's highlighting a contrast for me in the same way that I think we were talking about the reorientation that happens in part two from part one. So when they're. I think we made a little bit of this when they are going from traveling from north to south on the globe, go down towards Antarctica, and then around the beginning of. Or just at the beginning of section two, they start to travel south to north. So they round the cape and start traveling northward again. So now they're roughly. They've already been over the equator. Now they seem to be back around the parallel to the point where they were before, but now in a very different location. So in certain ways it's extremely familiar. It would be familiar perhaps to anyone who's traveled over the equator. I don't know enough about seafaring knowledge to know if things are calmer at the equator or what the case may be. Yeah, Right. So this is a place that's familiar and unfamiliar. Right. That they know and yet they don't know. And it's truly like, you know, because they're parallel to where they've been before, but also in a different place. It's truly like a parallel universe kind of situation. So it does put me in mind of like a Star Trek episode, you know, where everything is familiar and unfamiliar at the same time. Known and unknown. 37:26 Wes: Right. And then they're about to be pursued by the Klingons. 37:30 Erin: Right? 37:30 Wes: In a sense. Well, yeah. I like this idea of them discovering something and having a new sort of knowledge. I mean, ultimately, they were looking for Australia. Right. Or being. It's based on a story of people who expedition to discover Australia. And they didn't get that. Instead they get this place of nothingness in a way neither land nor wind, nor so idle as a painted ship upon a painted ocean. So in a sense, they've become like a aesthetic object and perhaps become something representative of the arts or. Or of the poetic. I don't know. We should be on, as usual, on a lookout for any meta commentary here on the nature of the arts, of the aesthetic or the poetic. 38:17 Erin: Yeah. In light of this, it's funny that. Yeah. That this aesthetic image punctures this moment, considering these are not people really in a position to appreciate art in this particular situation, nor are they near any kind of culture or shoreline or people who could paint them. Right. So this is like a strange infusion of culture in a completely cultureless place, completely bereft of any kind of art and away from any kind of human civilization. And yet here we have this aestheticized image. So it's again, just kind of calling to mind these contrasts. Living on top of each other here. 38:52 Wes: Yeah. So when he says water, water everywhere, nor any drop to drink. On one level, it's salt water. So that's one irony. Can't drink the saltwater. But then you ask the question, well, how is that exactly relevant? And then if you look right, that follows the stanza about the painted ship. And so you can think of it also as being painted water, undrinkable, which says something about our relation to the art object, which is the classic description of what it means. To be related to an art object is to be in a quote, unquote indifferent relationship, something that Kant made an idea that Kant made famous. Where our appreciation of the art object is not about our desire for what's