Page "Kubla Khan" Paragraph 123

Positive analysis of the poem came from Leigh Hunt, in the 21 October 1821 Examiner when Hunt wrote a piece on Coleridge as part of his " Sketches of the Living Poets " series.

When coming to Kubla Khan, he pointed out: " instead of being content to have written finely under the influence of laudanum, recommends ' Kubla-Khan ' to his readers, not as a poem, but as ' a psychological curiosity ' ... Every lover of books, scholar or not, who knows what it is to have his quarto open against a loaf at his tea ... ought to be in possession of Mr. Coleridge's poems, if it is only for ' Christabel ', ' Kubla Khan ', and the ' Ancient Mariner '.

" When talking about the poem on its own, Hunt claimed it " is a voice and a vision, an everlasting tune in our mouths, a dream fit for Cambuscan and all his poets, a dance of pictures such as Giotto or Cimabue, revived and re-inspired, would have made for a Storie of Old Tartarie, a piece of the invisible world made visible by a sun at midnight and sliding before our eyes ...

Justly is it thought that to be able to present such images as these to the mind, is to realise the world they speak of.

We could repeat such verses as the following down a green glade, a whole summer's morning ".

The work went without major notice until John Bowring reviewed Coleridge's Poetical Works for the January 1830 Westminster Review.

When discussing the work along with the origins of the poem, Bowring stated, " The tale is extraordinary, but ' Kubla Khan ' is much more valuable on another account, which is, that of its melodious versification.

It is perfect music.

The effect could scarcely have been more satisfactory to the ear had every syllable been selected merely for the sake of its sound.

And yet there is throughout a close correspondence between the metre, the march of the verse, and the imagery which the words describe.

" When concluding about the work, he declared, " The elements of this melody are only the common and well-known ones of English versification ; our author is always felicitous in their management, but no where has he blended them in so perfect a combination as in this instance.

" Another emphasis on the musicality of the poem came in August 1834, with Henry Nelson Coleridge analysis in the Quarterly Review: " In some of the smaller pieces, as the conclusion of the ' Kubla Khan ', for example, not only the lines by themselves are musical, but the whole passage sounds all at once as an outburst or crash of harps in the still air of autumn.

The verses seem as if played to the ear upon some unseen instrument.

And the poet's manner of reciting verse is similar.