The Beauty of Nature

Beckett Hanna

  Nature may seem as though it is just full of dirt and bugs, as well as other unpleasant things, but if you begin to look closely you can begin to see the true beauty it holds. In the epic poem, Rime of the Ancient Mariner by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, an ancient mariner tells a wedding-guest the tale of a sea voyage he embarked on years ago. During the mariner’s story, the wedding-guest learns of a tale of spirits, curses, and the power of nature. Through different incidents, the mariner begins to realize the beauty of nature.  

At the beginning of his voyage, the mariner sees nature as his for the taking. While sailing in the land of mist and snow, the mariner shoots an albatross that has been following them. The wedding-guest to whom the mariner is telling his story exclaims, “‘God save thee ancient Mariner!/ From the fiends, that plague thee thus!-/ Why look’st thou so?’ -With my cross-bow/ I shot the ALBATROSS.” (p. 7). This is a very clear sign that the mariner does not care about nature and that he feels that he may do with it as he pleases. He has no reason for shooting the albatross, and it is a very unexpected twist to the story. The albatross even befriends the crew and comes when the mariner calls for him. They had basically taken the bird as their pet. This incident brought a curse upon the mariner. A curse that the crew represented by hanging the albatross around the mariner’s neck, and a curse that will get worse as time goes on.

The mariner begins to realize that nature needs to be respected and that it is a very powerful force when death wins all of his shipmates lives in a gamble with life-in-death. After death and life-in-death gamble for the lives of the crew, death wins all of the lives except for the mariners, and the crew slumps to the ground. Coleridge writes,  “Four times fifty living men,/ (And I hear nor sigh nor groan)/ With a heavy thump, a lifeless lump,/ They dropped down one by one.” (p. 11). At this point, the mariner watches all of his crewmates drop dead after death wins all of their souls. Death is an extremely powerful force of nature, and the mariner begins to realize that with respect comes good fortune and vice versa. The mariner realizes this and begins to see the creatures that he used to think of as ugly, as beautiful.

The mariner realizes the beauty of nature as the curse begins to break. The mariner blesses the very creatures who he previously believed to be disgusting and he realizes that they are beautiful. The mariner tells us, “The self-same moment I could pray;/ And from my neck so free/ The Albatross fell off, and sank/ Like lead into the sea.” (p. 13). As the mariner finally realizes that nature is beautiful, the curse that has entangled the mariner since shooting the albatross breaks, and the bird that was hung around his neck by his crew falls off and sinks into the water. When reading near the beginning of the poem and then reading near the end, the mariners growth is very visible. At the beginning of the poem, the mariner just shoots a bird for no reason. In the end, you can really see him beginning to see nature as beautiful.

Through the mariner’s adventures, he sees the aspects of nature and then begins to see them more in-depth and realize that it is beautiful. The mariner really seems to recognize how wrong he was in the past during his time of reflection while he was stranded at sea after his run-in with death. He’s completely trapped and he probably could have avoided it if he had respected the albatross and not shot it. At the end of the story, you realize that he finally understands as the curse begins to break. If the mariner was able to change his attitude, why can’t we? With everything happening with climate change currently, we need to reflect on the beauty of nature ourselves and ask how far we will go to protect it.