By TTM
Q1. Discuss Christabel as ‘tale of terror’.
OR (2), Discuss Coleridge’s treatment of the supernatural elements in Christabel.
OR (3), Discuss how Coleridge’s treatment of medievalism within the Romantic framework.
OR (4), Christabel has been called an allegory of Good and Evil. Do you agree? Give reasons for your answer.
OR (5), Crtical Appreciation.
It has been suggested, for instance, by Charles Tomlinson that Christabel belongs to the genre of “tale of terror”, a convention most renounced in the 18th century novels of Horace Walpole and others. The genre was a European phenomenon, in which a story on the plane of fantasy was handled to study mind’s reactions to profound social changes, and these changes were represented through symbols and figures that evoked the sensation of terror. The terror was often dealt with philosophical significance. But in Christabel the pattern of ideas embodied especially in the conflict between Good and Evil is not traditional and the conclusion of the poem is typically Coleridgian. That is to say, the Coleridge’s treatment of supernaturalism is not simply for the sake of terror and mystery: he has employed his subtle sense of psychology and morality of Christian theology within the medieval framework of the story to take the poem to a life-like conclusion so as to arouse “willing suspension of disbelief”. (In fact, in Coleridge’s hands medievalism reaches its new height. For Q no.3 only)
From the very beginning the reader is transported to the world of Gothic castles, barons, knights, enchantress, distressed damsels and the medieval rituals, ordeals and superstitions. In the first symbolical passage of the poem we have the sense of ominous detail, an anticipation of the evil that is to come:
“The thin grey cloud is spread on high
It covers but not hides the sky.”
Again,
“The moon is behind and at the full
Yet it looks both small and dull.”
In this type of condition every thing hangs in a state of precarious uncertainty and of incipient disease. The cloud has threatened the sky, but the sky still shows through and to counterpart this, the moon has reached its most fruitful phase, yet remains without the bright appearance of a full moon. Even before Geraldine’s appearance, it is forecast that in this type of world the evil will prevail over good,
“ ’Tis the month before the month of May
And the Spring comes slowly up this way.”
Similarly the night is cold, and the moonbeam, where it falls, illuminates a further sense of death and decay, “the toothless mastiff bitch.”
In this type of a strange medieval world Christabel is seen alone under a huge oak tree to pray for her betrothed night. It is important for Coleridge to establish the loneliness and vulnerability of Christabel, as she is defenceless with a mother dead, with a father sick and with a lover far away. Her state is intensified by its juxtaposition with the fine image of “the one red leaf, the last of its clan.” In this condition Christabel finds the lady Geraldine, who, according to her own story was abducted and then abandoned. Her appearance – white neck, blue-veined unsandled feet, robe of silken white, the dazzling jewels in her hair—betrays the impression that the lady is not of this world. Christabel takes her to castle, but as if in a nightmare their feet “strove to be and were not fast.”
Coleridge conveys Geraldine’s character of a fatal woman with an accumulation of startling touches. She cannot cross the iron-gate unassisted, nor join Christabel’s prayer. With Christabel the first disquiet occurs when Geraldine and she entered the castle and passed the mastiff bitch. The bitch “did not awake/ Yet angry moan she did make.” The next stroke is more direct—as they pass the half extinguished fire, there issues from it a sudden tongue of fire. On seeing the lady’s eyes Christabel becomes mesmerised:
“And nothing else saw she thereby.”
Slowly and surely when Christabel is going to be captured, her inmost soul anticipates the necessity of protection from evil. She wishes,
“Oh! Mother dear! Thou wert near!”
It is Geraldine’s real strife at the sudden appearance of Christabel’s mother’s spirit. Geraldine burst out in tirade against its presence:
“Off, woman off! this hour is mine.”
Coleridge gives the situation an added uncertainty by withdrawing from the reader Geraldine’s exact intention, but he makes it clear that she is possessed by some evil target. When she bows under the lamp, rolls her eyes, produces a hissing sound and unrobes herself revealing her bosom and half her side, the poet exclaims,
“O shield her! shield sweet Christabel.”
Surely Christabel sees something horrible there as it was in the original version:
“Hideous, deformed and pale of hue.”
When Geraldine takes her in her arm, there is a frightening piece of thought control. In close contact with the demon woman Christabel dreams awful dreams. What she dreams of is not told, but the effects of the dreams are seen in the expression of her face.
“The Conclusion to Part I” describes the state of Christabel during and after the trance imposed upon her by Geraldine. During the trance she has been removed from all reassuring experiences, to a point, where the movement of her blood has almost ceased. But the final account is of a reassurance subsequently:
“…the blood so free
Comes back and tingles in her feet.”
The final conjecture, the “vision sweet”, suggests that final link with the Good is assertive in itself in the depth of our consciousness. The section ends with the declaration of faith that,
“The saints will aid if men call
For the blue sky bends over all.”
The fact that human beings naturally see the blue sky bending over them, despite the fact that it does nothing of the sort—was for Coleridge a supreme example of the benevolent operations of the divine power of Nature. And finally with this understanding Coleridge concludes the part one of Christabel.