The Poem Kubla Khan

‘Kubla Khan’ by Samuel Taylor Coleridge is a world-famous poem that many believe has romantic influence. Written in the summer of 1797, Coleridge, then in ill health, decided to retire to a farm house in the middle of Linton and Porlock, by himself. He had a profound sleep for several hours, to which came to him the lines that would turn in Kubla Khan’. Although due to some questioning by a person, he had a dim recollection of the images and lines, the still managed to write the poem from such inspiration. Because imagination, freedom, and feeling are focal points of Romanticism, it is something of note the origins of the poem because they help explain why ‘Kubla Khan’ has romantic elements. ‘Kubla Khan’ is a dream of a poet and uses Gothic and Romantic elements to provide the reader with a series of carnal and decadent delights that are best described through interpretation of perspective and show how romantic elements (feeling, freedom, and imagination) can be used to give an already surreal experience that much more individuality and surreal atmosphere.
The poem stars with the fancifully described capital of Kublai Khan’s capital, Xanadu, near the Alph river. This river is sacred, natural and exists amidst a human-made ‘pleasure’ land. The way Coleridge describes the river is important because this kind of description is unique compared to the rest of the poem. Specifically, there is a different rhythm.
· In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
· A stately pleasure-dome decree:
· Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
· Through caverns measureless to man
· Down to a sunless sea. (lines 1–5) (Coleridge)
Although Xanadu is best interpreted as a ‘walled Eden’, Coleridge tries to represent the same walled aspect to the caves where the river runs. Adding a layer of symmetry. The phrase ‘sinuous rills’ and ‘sunny spots of greenery’, allow the reader to feel the through the imagined senses what the place would be like if one were to visit it. As was said about Romanticism, the focus is on freedom, imagination, and emotion. While the walled aspect is confining, by using it with the caves and then having a river flow through these caves it gives a feeling of emotion, of freedom because of the water running through everything.
Water in Romanticism (Claude Monet Water Lillies) served as an expression of perspective. Instead of describing what is seen, one describes something based on what is felt and imagined. Because the poem came from this dream like state, the river running through the cave served as a depiction of imagination, rather than what Coleridge may have seen in nature. That is why it is so important to begin with these first lines as they set the stage for the Romanticism experienced by the reader through the rest of the poem.
Interestingly, Romanticism and Gothic went hand in hand. A good example of this would be, Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein. The novel managed to evoke horror, but through interpretation of perspective, also masterfully combined elements of Romanticism like imagination and emotion. This is seen in the line 12 of ‘Kubla Khan’, ‘But oh! that deep romantic chasm which slanted’. Chasm automatically evokes darkness, death, doom. To look down a chasm is a frightening experience. Yet, the word before chasm is romantic, showing a literal description that helps marry Gothic and Romanticism like so many writers and painters did during this era.
The other lines severed to also provide that intermix of elements like ‘A savage place! As holy and enchanted’ to ‘waning moon’. If one recalls what a waning moon looks like it is pretty dark. It is a crescent moon just beginning to show light. Again, the Gothic with the Romantic aspects. If these lines do not show Romanticism, then line 16, ‘By woman wailing for her demon-lover!’ will truly convince even the most sceptic person. Love is romantic, this is natural and a demon-lover, is horrific, evil. To combine these two images shows the complexity of the narrative and effectively combining horror with romance.
As was said, Romanticism is imagination, emotion, and freedom. The chasm later in the poem is described as ‘with ceaseless turmoil seething’. This can be imagined as this angry, villainous ghoul, seething at the mouth with steam emitting from its eyes. At least this is the of imagery that is evoked from the line. When a line evokes such a resounding emotion from the reader, this can be seen as romantic element as it is not experienced as reality, but as interpretation of perspective. Because the events in the dream were from one perspective and not reality, these descriptions go along not only with the theme of the overall poem, which seems like has Gothic and Romanticism elements, but it also shows the surreal feeling of it all as most dreams often feel like.
Now the river, which cuts through the cave is described as a ‘sacred’ river that sinks into a ‘lifeless ocean’. Lifeless, this is a visceral emotional word. The river that is teaming with motion and can be interpreted as ‘alive’ is going into a ‘lifeless’ ocean, meaning this is where it goes to die. How could something so sacred go into something so lifeless? How could something as pure as the river, go to its death? This line serves to show the interpretation of water and the river as human life and how it dies. By going into this lifeless ocean, the water from the river dies and transforms into something else entirely.




Such descriptions of the river are important because it reinforces the Romantic element meaning, there is a unique interpretation of what the river naturally does. Rivers naturally often dump into the ocean. And so, to make something as ordinary as a river going into an ocean a grand symbol of death, it is very powerful. This is perhaps the most powerful line of the poem, and a true Romantic element.
Moving deeper into the lines of the poem, the ‘shadow of the dome of pleasure’ all of a sudden in line 36 becomes, ‘a sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice’. While Coleridge merely wrote shadow, it almost feels like a play on words because first there is shadow, then there is sunny, then there is ice. All these things intermingle together to bring some opposites feeling within the reader. When one thinks of sunny, one imagines being warm on a beach. But Coleridge uses in that same line: ice! Using (!) to show ‘wow its cold’ is a play on expectations similar to line 31 when describing there to be a show on the pleasure dome.
Line 47 also uses that line: ‘That sunny dome! Those caves of ice!’. Why repeat it? Before that in the other lines, there is use of sound. ‘Her symphony and song’. This line is repetitious because symphony and song both evoke the image of sound, of music. However, perhaps by repeating these images, the author is continuing that Romantic element of freedom by playing with the words in a way he feels best, repetition. This is often how people sometimes want to evoke emotion and also express freedom. Martin Luther King wrote in his famous ‘I have a dream’ speech, constant repetition. It evoked feelings in the people that heard him and allowed him to express his desire for freedom.
The last few lines, lines 48-54 are perhaps the best way to understand the Romantic elements of the poem.

· And all who heard should see them there,
· And all should cry, Beware! Beware!
· His flashing eyes, his floating hair!
· Weave a circle round him thrice,
· And close your eyes with holy dread,
· For he on honey-dew hath fed,
· And drunk the milk of Paradise (lines 48–54) (Coleridge)
These lines show first, again the use of interpretation of perspective. Coleridge is using sight and sound in the first line and then feeling of fear in the second line. This is imaginative and emotional at the same time. Then there is another visual representation of flash and circle, combining Gothic horror when he says, ‘holy dread’. If one remembers again the sacred river and the lifeless ocean, this is sort of what he is trying to do here by combining such contrasting images together to evoke a reaction from the reader. He ends the line with ‘milk of Paradise’ which seems like the best way to end a poem because the debauchery of the images needed something pleasant, yet carnal to close it.
In conclusion, ‘Kubla Khan’ is a poem influenced by Romanticism because of the continued pursuit and focus of using Romantic elements like freedom, feeling, and imagination. The lines were also influenced by Gothic style, which was common in that era as Romantic and Gothic elements paired well, and served to give the reader a more visceral perspective. The poem ends with perhaps the best line of all ‘milk of Paradise’ that further reinforces the whimsical and debauched nature of the place and shows how Coleridge managed to balance both unpleasant with the pleasant in this unique interpretation of a vivid dream.

Works Cited
Coleridge, S. Kubla Khan. HarperPerennial Classics, 2015.