The Ancient Mariner experiences Heaven, Hell and Purgatory

                In the poem Rime of the Ancient Mariner a crazed man is telling a wedding guest about a time he was at sea and how all sorts of events happened to him that seem to have caused this man to go mad. Samuel Coleridge, the author, seems to know quite a bit of sea-life since he put so much detail into describing what life at sea is like. There aren’t specific facts about the ship he is on or the ocean; he tells what it’s like to be out in the middle of the ocean for such a long time and the way its written allows the reader to better understand what Coleridge is talking about. This entire poem is filled with words and phrases that add to the dark and also beautiful image that this crazed man saw out on the ocean. All of this makes it apparent that Coleridge loves the sea despite the dangers it holds mentally and physically because he put so much thought into the way he describes certain aspects of the sea that can be experienced.

                Also in this poem Coleridge seems to be telling the audience through subliminal messages that killing something innocent and just disgracing any animal in general is a terrible thing to do because it’ll slowly get to your conscience and become an internal curse. He does this with the Albatross. This sea bird comes to the boat he is on and just eats whatever leftovers it can find and basically does no harm to the man. This crazed man, the ancient mariner, then decides to kill the bird for no good reason. The killing of the Albatross I think causes the misfortune of the ancient mariner. Later in the poem after the curse the ancient mariner had goes away the Albatross falls off his neck “like lead into the sea”. I saw this as a figurative bird falling off and going back to where it came. Like a burden is lifted off his shoulders. It’s his demon that made him go mad. This imagery made me see the sky, the boat and the ocean as heaven, purgatory and hell. The sky is heaven because it is clear and easy to see what is truly there and also because all the beautiful things in the poem came from the sky. The boat would be purgatory because this ancient mariner is on it for such a long time with no food or drinkable water. How does he survive for such a long time without these resources? It must be purgatory. Then the ocean is hell because it reflects the good from the sky but deep down the final outcome for all that go under is death. When Coleridge describes the ocean it seems like nothing good comes from it. “Slimy things did crawl with legs upon the slimy sea” and “the water, like a witch’s oils” creates an ominous image in the mind of the reader that no good comes from the sea.

The Hamartia of Macbeth, Walter White, and Peter Pettigrew

If you know about Walter White, from the TV series Breaking Bad, and Macbeth then I'm sure you can notice similar characteristics in the two. I'm still in the process of reading Macbeth and haven't watched a single episode of Breaking Bad, but I've been told about the character development of Walter White and the two do seem the same. If you haven't watched or read either and know nothing about one or both it's no big deal, I'll explain how they're similar and give a popular example (Peter Pettigrew from the Harry Potter series). From what I've been told, Walter White starts off as an innocent man and becomes corrupt as he gets deeper into his drug business. Walter, when he commits his first murder, feels remorse for the man he is killing but after he's killed a few more people later on it's as if killing isn't as big of a deal as it once was for him. The same goes for Macbeth except without the drug part; Macbeth finds out he will be king and tries his hardest to not let anyone get in the way of that. Macbeth not only kills the current king but also kills others he thinks are a witness so he isn't caught in the act.

As my literature class was comparing these two characters I thought of Peter Pettigrew from Harry Potter. Peter, when he was younger, was close friends with Lily and James Potter, Remus Lupin, and Sirius Black. But as Peter grows older he turns against his friends and joins the side of the Dark Lord, Voldemort. The point where Peter turns against his friends is when he reveals the location of Lily, James and their new born son, Harry, to Lord Voldemort. When Voldemort is at Lily and James' home he kills them and even attempts to kill poor Harry. That point for Peter is his hamartia; his downfall as a character. Not only does he do that to Lily and James, but he also tries killing Sirius and Remus many years after the murder. Once he turns on his friends he only gets worse as a person and even becomes Voldemort's servant doing all his dirty work.

The way I see all three of these characters being in some way related is that they all become corrupt with some kind of power. They get a taste of what it's like and they let it get to them, change who they are and turn them into cold-hearted killers. 

iRain and Snow; Tiger and Lunatic

                Symbols are so manipulative and it seems like weather can have its meaning manipulated the most. I don’t remember if this was stated in the chapter, but in a way it shows the emotion of the scene. In Life of Pi towards the beginning of the story when the family is on the boat with all their zoo animals there is a terrible rain storm. With that rain storm a young boy, Piscine Patel, is stripped away of everyone he loves and is then left to face the hardest time of his life with a Bengal tiger…in the middle of the ocean. Once his family is taken away, Piscine must learn to live with the one animal he was told to stay away from. After I’ve thought about every story I’ve read, watched or been told that has a bad thunder storm while people are traveling by boat or plane, the people, or person, always has everything or almost everything taken from them. It’s a cleansing in a way, but it’s a harsh one to deal with. I doubt I could live happily for more than a week without my parents or any parent figure at that. I guess it does make them stronger as a person or, yah know, it could just make an interesting story to tell. But I think the latter is what pulls most people into reading or, most likely, watching the story.

                Then there’s Stephen King’s novel The Shining that uses snow as the weather since the book is about a family watching and taking care of a hotel during the winter months. At first the snow doesn’t affect the family, but once it gets worse and they’re basically forced to stay inside the hotel, they start to get a little restless and the spirits of past guests start to appear. This doesn’t have the biggest impact on the mother and son, but it does cause the father to go absolutely crazy and try to kill his wife and son. So this shows how snow can have a negative effect on the characters by basically giving the family cabin fever.  The snow acts like a straight jacket since it keeps the family locked in with nowhere to go.

                Finally there’s the iPhone 5 commercial about the facetime feature. In the commercial it shows multiple clips of people video chatting to someone else. The first time I watched it my inner typical teenage girl immediately noticed the girl crying while her friend on the other line asked “Did he at least apologize?” and the girl shakes her head. I figured that clip was about a girl getting her heart broken and her friend being there to comfort her. So one day when the commercial came back on I thought I’d guess which clip will be the one it comes after and so I picked the one where it is raining. Sure enough that was the clip it was after. Then that got me thinking about how the creator’s chose that raining video clip to be the one the girl goes after. And I figured it’s because it’s raining, she’s crying; the girl is heartbroken and the rain shows how she no longer has the person she cares for.

So a Hobbit, some Dwarves and a Wizard walk into a...hole?

                 What I gathered from this chapter is that almost every meal mentioned in a story is usually one of importance. Which makes sense because I don’t think I’ve ever read or watched a meal that didn’t have a deeper meaning or symbolize something else. Like in Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets when Harry has breakfast with the Weasley’s after escaping the hell-hole that is his aunt and uncle’s house. From what I can remember this is the first meal Harry shares with an all wizard family and they soon become the closest thing he has to one. This first meal symbolizes the start and entry of Harry becoming a part of their family. Harry also learns to travel by floo powder which later becomes a quick way to escape from any type of threat. So this one meal with Harry and the Weasley’s seems so be very important for Harry to become comfortable with the Weasley’s as well as becoming comfortable with other aspects of the magical world.

                Another great meal is the one in the beginning of The Hobbit at Bilbo Baggins’ home with a group of dwarves and a wizard, Gandalf the Grey. Originally, Bilbo did not expect these dwarves to come over but he couldn’t do much to try to make them leave. And as they all made their way to his home at different times they each would ask for something to eat, but the eating didn’t end until almost the night was coming to an end. Once they finished, the dwarves happily cleaned up their mess as well as leaving Bilbo’s pantry empty and, there again, Bilbo couldn’t do much about his home being with out food. So once that all ended, Gandalf announced why they were all there, except for Bilbo, he knew why he was there. The dwarves needed to take back their kingdom from the dragon, Smaug, but in order to sneak up on the dragon they needed a hobbit since they can pass by anyone or anything undetected. But since hobbits don’t like to stray too far from their home, this sounded like a terrible idea to Bilbo and of course he denied the request at first. Then once they all left onto their journey early the next morning Bilbo woke up and realized he made a mistake and quickly packed up his essentials and left. The leader and king of the dwarves, Thorin, has his doubts in Bilbo but has no other choice than to accept him. In that one meal Bilbo learns the terrible times these dwarves have gone through and he also overcomes his fear of the outside world by taking this huge step in his life. If Gandalf had not chosen Bilbo and marked his door, then he would still be living a boring life in a hole.

A Quest with Sarah and a Hobbit

After (and while) reading this chapter I realized how many movies, stories and books I’m familiar with are centered around a quest. Now I know that it should be obvious, but I’ve never paid much attention or thought about a story that in depth. And since I am so obsessed with this movie it was what first popped into my mind while reading: The Labyrinth (with David Bowie, of course). The whole movie is about a teenage girl going on a journey to take back her baby step-brother that the Goblin King has kidnapped.

To give a little more information about the movie, the teenage girl, Sarah, goes to take back her step-brother from the Goblin King, Jareth, before he turns him into a goblin. Despite the fact that Sarah did not like her step-mother or brother in the beginning, she still goes to get her step-brother because, well, you don’t know what yah got till it’s gone. So once Jareth takes the baby Sarah must travel through this labyrinth to find and take back her brother. Except Jareth makes the Labyrinth harder and harder as she gets closer to his kingdom. Finally, in the end she gets her baby step-brother back and she is sent home as if it all were a dream.

So that basically puts all the parts of a quest into one summary. The quester obviously being Sarah and her stated reason to go is take back her stolen step-brother who is held in the Goblin King’s castle (the place to go). Her challenges and trials are the ones that are put in place by Jareth to stall Sarah. Then at the end she in a way realizes her real reason to go on this journey; to see how important her family really is, especially her step-mother and brother.

Another quest that is quite famous is the one in The Hobbit. In this story Bilbo Baggins, a hobbit, is asked to go on this quest to help take back a dwarves’ kingdom from a dragon that has settled down and rested within the castle. At first Bilbo is definitely not comfortable with this idea. They came to Bilbo since he is a hobbit and hobbits have a knack for sneaking into places without being noticed and that is exactly what the dwarves were looking for. So at first Bilbo denies, but once he has rested and thought about it he agrees and tags along. Right there is the questers (Bilbo and the dwarves, but mainly Bilbo) as well as the stated reason, take back the kingdom, and the place, the kingdom. The challenges they face are battling Orcs and trolls and also actually facing the dragon. With all that happening Bilbo finds his true reason he’s on this journey; to overcome his fears. Bilbo never strayed too far from his home so going on this long journey with dwarves and a wizard he barely knows is a huge leap for him in gaining courage. Plus, he made an impact on quite a few people who had little faith in him.