According to Sigmund Fraud in his work “Interpretation of Dreams,” unconscious mind examined as desires which seeking gratification or fulfillment in relation to the pleasure principles of imagination and dreaming where the natural instincts take part in development of imagination. The origin of Freud’s wish fulfillment is initial phase of imagination where the reality is frustrating, and the human mind starts fantasizing (Freud 921). Relying on Freudian theory of poet’s work as unconscious wish fulfillment, we can examine the relationship between the unconscious mind of the poet to the nature in ”Kubla Khan,” by Samuel Taylor Coleridge. Inspired by a dream, Coleridge establishes the connection between unconscious representation of the nature as seen to an eye of the poet, and subconscious interpretation of unknown supernatural.
Generally speaking, an unattainable nature to a human eye often triggers human perception of Mother Nature. In this perspective, Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s “Kubla Khan” perfectly portrays poet’s creative mind in a search of the relationship between unconscious and subconscious minds through unconventional mix of meter and rhyme along with strong imagery of nature. Inspired by “a profound sleep” Coleridge sensed that he composed a poem in a vivid response to a vision seen during a dream. As Fred Milne stated in South Atlantic Review “In other words, not only the content (“all the images”), but also the form (“the correspondent expressions”) for the extended poem were simultaneously given during the vision. Together they presented themselves as a fully realized creation in the mind of the sleeping or entranced Coleridge”(17). He presents Coleridge’s vision in connection to the poem as creative process of the poet where human mind can reveal supernatural cycles only through his imagination of the “the sacred rivers” and “caverns” hidden to a human eye. Through examining the writing of the mixed tetrameter and pentameter along with rhyme schemes, the poem creates a sense of fragmentation of unconscious voice of the speaker. The fragmentation leading to further examining of extraordinary set of human perception clearly revealed in lines 1-7 with 8 syllables each, and lines 8-11 with 10 syllables each. The speaker vividly connects the man-made nature to unattained supernatural forces through representation of organic cycles of “sunless sea,” “sunny spots,” “bright “gardens” with “blossomed” trees. In the first two stanzas the speaker associates the pleasure of Oriental peace of Xanadu with “savage” (Line 14) nature that is in his imagination “holy and inchanted.” Similarly Fred Milne examines poet’s extraordinary perception of nature as, “the act of transferring the “composition” from mind to paper been completed, it would have represented the final but all-important step in the creating process…” (Milne 18).
In addition to the imaginative voice of the speaker, the poem depicts unattained nature in connection to the supernatural metaphors associated with God and Devil. In his vision the supernatural has religious connotations to “holy and enchanted” world of God fighting with a human search for Devil, “woman waling for her demon-lover” (Line 15). Further, the “sacred river” (Line 3) that expresses holy life, as multiple repetitions of “river” references to the sacred water as a major symbol of life. In first stanza, the speaker explains his exploration of pleasure in, “sacred river” (Line 3) of uncivilized Asian World, “Through caverns measureless to man” (Line 4), the speaker finds, “sacred river” and “Enfolding sunny spots of greenery” (Line 11) which evoke sensory emotions in human minds of natural beauty in connection to unknown holiness. Further, the speaker examines the world near “Xanadu” of “Kubla Khan,” the world of Asian uncivilized and untouched by civilization nature which connects nature to the supernatural. Fred Milne explicates speaker’s vision of Xanadu: “As the basic structure pattern of the Xanadu mind-landscape…” (Milne 20), which allows the depiction of “the conscious and unconscious, the measured and measureless aspects co-existing in the mind’s process”(Milne 20). The speaker develops Milne’s connection of the landscape to the imagination of conscious and unconscious holiness of the East in the stanza followed by a reference to a pleasure world of “savage place”(Line 14) being trapped by “fountain” which symbolizes the work of Devil associated with “Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail”(Line 21). Relying on speaker’s imaginative “vision” of “caverns measureless to man” (Line 4) the supernatural is only within human imagination. The pleasure world of nature refers to the holiness of supernatural while “deep romantic chasm” (Line 12) connects with human perception of the Hell as “lifeless ocean” of “chasm” in the broken world of “fragments.”
The constant shift within “pleasure-dome” of “Xanadu” and “chasm” of “shadow” of the “pleasure-dome” of the unconventional style of writing connects “savage” Orientalism to nature. The speaker depicts chaotic part of supernatural through his perception of female sexual desires to the work of demon, “By woman wailing for her demon-lover”(Line 16) The speaker addresses “demon-lover” not only to the patriarchic dominance of our reality, but also as religious perception of female sexual desires as Devil’s supernatural force. Towards the end of the poem, the speaker creates a “vision” of self-realization the peaceful mind for himself hidden in unconscious representation of pure female object, “Abyssinian maid” as supernatural force of associated with the beauty of a music where “her symphony and song” (Line 43) pleasing to “such deep delight” (Line 44) that the speaker can find his own pleasure, “I would build that dome on air,” (Line 46) The speaker presents a gradual move between heaven and supernatural places of Oriental ”sacred rivers” of Xanadu towards his own peace where he concludes his unconscious vision of the pure female beauty and her singing as the symbol of the peace. The last stanza represents another fragment of the speaker’s reference to the pleasure of Paradise near the Mount of Abora with “Abyssinian maid” who connects the speaker’s understanding of sacred pleasure place of supernatural heaven. The speaker portrays a human perception of concurring the pleasure dome of “Paradise” through the voice of untouched nature of the East “Ancestral voices prophesying war!” (Line 30) Through the speaker’s vision on a future prediction of upcoming chaos in nature, “In a vision once I saw:”(Line 38) Coleridge perfectly examined human unconscious perception of the beauty and peace in connection to a deeply delightful nature of female portrayal of “Abyssinian maid.”
In “Kubla Khan” the speaker expresses the human imagination that connects the nature to the supernatural. The speaker’s abstract vision and powerful imagination gives a room for examination of a human psychology associated with a powerful subconscious and unconscious mind. Coleridge perfectly portrays his creative writing where the power of nature and human mind play a key role throughout the poem as two vital and cooperating processes of interpreting supernatural.
Works Cited
Coleridge, “Kubla Khan,” 100 Best-Loved Poems, Dover Publications, Inc., New York, 30-31
Freud Sigmund, “The Interpretation of Dreams,” The Norton Anthology of Theory Criticism, New York, 2001, 919-929
Milne L. Fred, Coleridge's "Kubla Khan": A Metaphor for the Creative Process, South Atlantic Review, Vol. 51, No. 4 (Nov., 1986), pp. 17-29.
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