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INTRODUCTION
The poem Dejection An Ode is written in 1802. It gives expression to a poignant mood of pessimism and disillusionment. Coleridge's "sense of failure and sterility" found expression in a number of poems, for instance, Youth and Age, Work without Hope and Dejection: An Ode. The last is the greatest of his poems of despair and depression. In it the poet laments the loss of his poetic faculty, "my shaping spirit of imagination." In a letter Coleridge explained his dejection as due to a feeling of the loss of his poetic and imaginative faculties, and complains that sickness and some other worse afflictions has forced him into downright metaphysics while he felt that by nature he has more of the poet in him.
The Ode in its original form is addressed to his friend Wordsworth, but during a personal quarrel, references pertaining to Wordsworth are taken Out and Sara is substituted in place of Wordsworth. It is, however clear, that the poet has Wordsworth in mind when he wrote this poem. The fourth stanza of this Ode makes a point reference to Wordsworth's habit of attributing emotions and feelings to inanimate nature. Coleridge contradicts Wordsworth when he says:
O Lady we receive but what we give
In some of his earlier poems, notably, Frost at Midnight (1798) and Eolian Harp (1795), Coleridge like Wordsworth has maintained that Nature is pervaded by the Divine Spirit and that it is possible for human mind to commune with in. In Dejection: An Ode Coleridge accuses Wordsworth as well as himself of what Ruskin term as the Pathetic fallacy (i,e., attributing feelings and emotions to inanimate objects of Nature).
The poem is in some respect similar to and in others different from Immortality Ode by Wordsworth. Like Wordsworth, Coleridge laments in Dejection the loss of his ability to experience the enthusiasm and power which he uses to when he uses to rejoice in nature, when hope grew round him like the twining vine and laments that Nature cannot move and inspire him now. But in many respects this poem presents a sharp contrast to the Immortality Ode. As in the Eolian Harp, Coleridge blends philosophical opinions with tender lyricism in this poem.
CRITICAL SUMMARY
Stanza 1. Coleridge, on seeing the old moon in the arms of the new, fears that it portends stormy weather. As he is contemplating on the superstition associated with the phenomenon, the storm begins to blow. Coleridge feels that the sounds of the wind and storm which uses to inspire him in the past, might give their usual impetus to his soul on that night, and might stir up his sense of frustration and even intensify it
Stanza 2. Coleridge gives expression to the grief from which he is suffering. It is such a dark and dismal sorrow that it finds no expression in words, tears or sighs. He feels that nature cannot cure him of his pessimism and melancholy as he is no longer stirred to his depths by nature.
Stanza 3. Coleridge believes that the sources of poetic inspiration lie within the human mind or the human soul. Thus when the mind is paralysed nature cannot inspire the poet.
Stanza 4. Coleridge challenges the popular notion of Wordsworthian philosophy. He says that it is we ourselves who invest nature with life, soul beauty or gloominess. It is we who attribute feelings and emotions to inanimate nature. Nature is lifeless — it has neither intellect nor soul. Further, he believes that the poetic inspiration is an echo of the poet's soul.
Stanza 5. He defines poetic inspiration as a 'light, a glory, a fair luminous mist' which is not only beautiful in itself but which enables the poets to create beauty. It is joy exultation. From it flows all fine arts like music, poetry and painting, which captivate the ear or the eye.
Stanza 6. Referring to his past, Coleridge says that he used to feel inspire and hopeful then, inspire of difficulties and hardships. Now, however, misfortunes overpower him. He, however, does not lament so much the loss of mirth and joy as the loss of his poetic faculty. He feels that he is drifting more and more towards the study of 'Metaphysics' and fears that by and by this new interest will 'kill' the poet in him, though by nature he is a poet rather than a philosopher.
Stanza 7. He finds escape from torturing and tormenting thoughts of despair by turning to the wind that is raving outside. The wind, so it appears to him, is imitating tragic human sounds. At times it seems to imitate the sound of a defeated army, retreating in a disorderly manner. Like an actor the wind imitates perfectly the sounds of trampled, wounded and shivering soldiers of the defeated army. After a pause, the wind seems to be imitating the cries of a small child who has lost her way in a lonely forest situated near her home.
Stanza 8. Though it is midnight, Coleridge has little inclination to go to bed. He, however, prays that his beloved may never have to keep awake, at night. Likewise, he prays that she may enjoy eternal happiness and that thoughts of sorrow or dejection may never invade her heart.
The poet describes the outburst of a storm after a calm evening and laments his own torpor and inability to be moves by the awful grandeur of the night. His own mood is wan and heartless. The fountains of life fail within him; he lacks that emanation from soul necessary for the appreciation of Nature.
He looks back upon the imaginative days of his youth, when joy and hope has arisen naturally in his heart. But pain and grief have taken all these away; abstruse research has superseded the imaginative faculty. The wind's expression of human cries only re-echoes his afflictions. His one comfort is to pray that those whom he loves may not share such unrest.
DEVELOPMENT OF THOUGHT AND CRITICAL ANALYSIS
Background. The subject of Coleridge's poem is depressing. Yet this ode is one of his triumphs. It is one of Coleridge's chief glories that he found expression of some unheard of pains and agonies of the mind. When he write this poem he is already estranged from his friend Wordsworth who use to exercise a very healthy influence on him. The genial spirits of the poet are failing. Life has nothing to offer him and Nature has no joy for him. But the poet has not yet lost his gift of expression. He fitted that gift to his depressed and bleak state of mind and produced a great poem.
Development of Thought. In a letter Coleridge explained his dejection as due to a feeling of the loss of his poetic and imaginative faculties, and complained that sickness and some other adverse afflictions has forced him into 'downright metaphysics', while he felt that by nature he has more of the poet in him. The original poem is addressed to Wordsworth, but, during an estrangement, the personal references were taken out by Coleridge.
The poet describes the outburst of a storm after a calm evening, and laments his own torpor and inability to be moved by the awful grandeur of the night. His own mood is wan and heartless. The fountains of life fail within him; he lacks that emanation from the soul necessary for the appreciation of Nature. He looks back upon the imaginative days of his youth, when joy and hope has arisen naturally in his heart. But pain and grief have taken all these away; abstruse research has superseded the imaginative faculty. The wind's expression of human cries only re-echoes his afflictions. His one comfort is to pray that those whom he loves may not share such unrest.
Dejection: Throws a Flood of Light on Coleridge's Inner Character. He is given to self-dissection and introspection. Having lost the simple joy of living, he take to the fatal pleasure of abstruse and futile thinking. He regrets this habit of his in verse that rings with moving pathos. He looks back upon his past and see it as only a poet can see it, when:
Hope grew round me, like the twining vineAnd fruits and foliage, not my own, seemed mine
The Poem States a Crisis in the Poet's Life. But now his shaping spirit of imagination has gone. Now he is only wrestling with his 'viper thoughts' reality's dark dream. The poem is thus a clear-eyed statement by a poet of a crisis in his life when he felt that he is about to part forever with his poetic faculties. Indeed, after this poem is composed, Coleridge, the poet is practically dead but Coleridge the subtle logician survived.
Coleridge's Attitude to Nature. The poem has another point of interest - it presents a view of Nature which challenges Wordsworth's view, Wordsworth believes in a joyous life of Nature independent of man, a life man could take part in by giving up his artificial existence. Coleridge however says -
O lady I We receive but what we giveAnd in our life alone does Nature live,Ours is her wedding-garment, ours her shroud I
In the first edition, these lines are addressed to Wordsworth. Coleridge is no longer a follower of Wordsworth. He believe that one can win from outward forms the passion and the life, whose fountains are within man.
Pictorial Artist. But whatever be the biographical interest of the poem, the art of the poet does not show any sign of decay here. Coleridge, the colourist and the poet of atmosphere appears at his best in the first stanza where he describes the swimming phantom light spread over the moon which is rimmed and circled with a silver thread and notices the peculiar tint of yellow green on the western sky, and gazes upon the thin clouds above in flakes and bars giving their motion away to the stars. The stormy atmosphere describe in the last stanza shows the same artistry of touch. The moaning of the wind render in various keys is wonderful.
Music. Coleridge the musician is no less evident in this ode. His skill is best seen in the weaving together of long lines with short lines.
A Comparison with the Immortality Ode of Wordsworth. "Dejection.....should be read in conjunction with Wordsworth's Intimation Ode. Both poems mourn the passing of a glory from life: for Wordsworth, this passing is one of time's casualties: Coleridge, more modestly, finds the cause in personal failure. Wordsworth ends on a note that is strong but forced; Nature that takes away delight will bring wisdom Coleridge, downcast still, invokes a blessing as he makes his farewell, but the storm which has arisen during the course of the poem is still raging.
It is indeed impossible to avoid the idea that there is an intimate connection between the two poems. Originally the poem is addressed to Wordsworth, perhaps in answer to the opening stanzas of the great Ode or vice versa. The first four stanzas of the 'Immortality Ode' are written in March 27, 1802; Coleridge write his on April 4. It is known from Dorothy Wordsworth's Journal that during this fateful week, the two poets met very frequently, and if we read the two poems side by side, we must note the similarity, not only in the metre, but in the problem posed. For both the poets are disturbed that something has passed away from their vision which they can not recapture. The reader shall read carefully lines 1-18 of the Immortality Ode and lines 21-37 of Coleridge's poem. In both the passages, the poets speak of the change that had come over them so far as their feeling for Nature was concerned. But where is the difference? In the first place, Wordsworth has not yet lost the capacity for feeling. Listening to the sound of the cataract and the song of the birds and the shout of the shepherd boy, he can yet say "No more shall grief of mine the season wrong". Coleridge, on the other hand is suffering from a more oppressive burden which nothing can lift. He also wishes:
Those sounds which oft have raised me, whilst they awed,And sent my soul abroad,Might now perhaps their wonted impulse giveMight startle this dull pain, and make it move and live....
But he finds with feelings of the utmost bitterness that it is not to be. To him the winds do not come from the friends of sleep, but they speak to him of:
The rushing of an host in rout,With groans of trampled men and smarting wounds
The reason for this difference is that Wordsworth's domestic circumstances helps him to retain his serenity which is quite beyond Coleridge's reach. Further Coleridge found his own mind reflect in Nature with all its fears and agonies and wild despair, whereas Wordsworth hark back to the past, to memory instead of to the imagination or which Coleridge depend so entirely. For imagination creates out of material supplied by personal experience, but memory handles with things remote and seen through a haze of idealization.
One other fact has to be noted the fact that Wordsworth who usually kept hammering at a poem until he complete it to his satisfaction (as we know from Dorothy) gave up this poem at lines 56-57. He resume it again some two years later and completed it in 1806. It seems clear that Wordsworth did wish to be able to solve Coleridge's spiritual doubles on the high poetic level, but he found himself incapable of doing so after listening to the Dejection Ode. Hence, he held over his answer to Coleridge's problems, and later, taking a hint from Coleridge's Neo-platonic doctrines, modifies it in terms of his own theory of memory and the part it play in his life. It is thus that the poem is completed for his own satisfaction. Hence, the two poems must be read together to get the full human significance behind it.
Conclusion. Dejection is one of the most exquisite lyrics by Coleridge. The poem gives expression to a poignant mood of pessimism and disillusionment and is of a piece with his Youth and Age and Work without Hope. It successfully challenges comparison with Shelley's stanzas written in Dejection, Near Naples. In both we hear that piercing note of sadness which is known as lyric-cry.