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Samuel Taylor Coleridges Rime of the Ancient Mariner tells the story of a long sea voyage fraught with danger, mystery, horror and ultimately redemption. This longest of Coleridges poems, remains one of the most often referenced works in English literature, and in this dramatic program voice artist Bob McGraw brings Coleridges classic poem of the sea to life using a haunting voice and the famous illustrations of Gustav Dore to tell the epic story of the Ancient Mariner. The Poem was first published in 1798 (with a later 1817 edition adding a Gloss) in Coleridges First Edition of Lyrical Ballads. It relates the experiences of the Ancient Mariner as he goes on an extended sea voyage. He uses the device of stopping a young man on the way to attend a wedding to tell a story steeped in the lore of the sea, mythology and the superstitions and religious traditions of the times. The poet communicates the various moods of the mariner through narrative techniques such as repetition and personification to alternately invoke feelings of supernatural dread, horror, fear, awe and ultimately redemption.
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