Coleridge's Poem in "Conversation"Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay Nothing in Samuel Coleridge's "conversation" poems is conventionally colloquial. These poems do not create a dialogue between two characters, but instead focus on an internal dialogue that Coleridge's characters have with themselves. For Coleridge, conversation is a personal and individual action. In “Sonnet to the River Otter” and “Frost at Midnight” the characters philosophize to each other about themselves, but their physically present human counterparts are not necessary for the thoughtful commentary. Since the river and the child exist in these poems, they are simply objects that initiate the person's internal dialogues. Both poems feature an evocation of the object that soon gives way to personal reflections: "Dear native stream! Wild West stream!" (Coleridge, "Sonnet to the River Otter", 1), and "My child is so beautiful! it makes my heart quiver / With tender joy, to look at you thus", ("Frost at Midnight", 48-49). The following lines mark a turning point within the character towards his thoughts which have nothing to do with the topic mentioned. In "Frost at Midnight", the character considers his own cloistered childhood, and in "River Otter", the focus becomes the character's experiences at the river and his own loss of childhood innocence and its ramifications. None of these "conversations" deviates completely from a conversational form, nor does it maintain a conventional, back-and-forth, person-to-subject quality that leaves the reader in the position of listening to the speaker's thoughts. We become part of the poem, an aspect of Coleridge's thought process, and thus are immersed in the worlds he laments. As the speaker uses the word “your” (lines 4, 8, 9, 11), four times in the short “River Otter,” the reader becomes the second person the speaker refers to. Coleridge asks us to become the river and listen to the person's thoughts as the river would if it could hear. The river then becomes the substitute for a human subject, which forces us to do its part. Once the reader becomes the river, Coleridge is able to “converse” with us as if we were the counterparts in the conversation. He is therefore able to have an ongoing debate with the reader that is timeless and outside the confines of conventional conversation. He broke the rules of interpersonal communication to make it something mystical. And with the freedom to speak face-to-face with all readers, he contemplates lost childhood, aging, and emotion. This contemplation appears in the following passage: What happy and painful hours, since I last touched the smooth, thin stone along your chest, Counting its light leaps! yet such a profound imprint sinks the sweet scenes of childhood... (3-6). Once again, the “your” in the fourth line invites the reader to be the river, placing us in the position of direct listener to the character's lament. Once in this position, the reader receives lines five and six in which the speaker views the loss of childhood innocence as a payment for growing up. The diction connotes this payment through the word “advance,” which is defined as “to advance or lend” (Oxford English Dictionary). This definition would have been current in Coleridge's time, as references to the 1780s and 1810s appear in the Oxford English Dictionary. Viewing childhood as a loan raises the question that innocence must be returned to nature in some sort of transaction. All losses of innocence are therefore something contractual thatwe must expect and honor as we age. These last two lines become advice from the speaker to the reader, warning us that we will lose our innocence and that we should expect it as we would expect to repay a loan. Despite this colloquial warning to the reader, the speaker then laments this loss, seemingly in spite of himself: "Visions of childhood! Oft have you deceived / The solitary man's cares, yet waking the fondest sighs:" (12-13). This sad consideration of loss affirms the colloquial quality of the poem by humanizing the speaker. This makes him not only an expert advisor to the reader, but also a living, sensitive human being who understands the complexity of letting go of innocence for the responsibilities of adulthood. “The Concerns of the Lonely Man” particularly affirms his humanity by recalling the use of “borrowing.” The speaker recognizes that not only does a man have to pay for his childhood to acquire age and responsibility; he must also continue to pay with his life for everything he earns, whether in work or finance. Coleridge's personal financial situation comes directly into play here: he wandered around Europe living in hostels, earning very little from the sale of his poems, and living in poverty, which made his early adulthood feel the best. He speaks to readers through the character about a personal aspect of his life, which breaks the boundary between poet and reader constructed by previous poets. There is a face-to-face conversation between Coleridge and his reader, an emotional outburst. For Coleridge, the conversation within the poem extends beyond the words on the page. Instead, it flows towards the reader even further, creating a conversation with its content. “Frost at Midnight” opens with a similar conversational quality that inadvertently invites the reader once again to be the external listener to the speaker’s thoughts: The Frost carries out his secret ministry, unaided by any wind. The owl's cry came loud and listen, again! as strong as before. The inhabitants of my cottage, all at rest, left me to that solitude, which fits Abtruser's reflections: ("Frost at Midnight", 1-6). As the speaker states in the third line, “and listen, again,” seems to draw the attention of someone not present to hear the hooting of the owls outside. He also clearly says that all the "inhabitants of my little house, all at rest" (3), asking the question of why he tries to attract someone's attention to the call of owls. The speaker asks the reader, rather than the cottagers, to listen to the owl with him. The “hark” is an invitation to the reader to participate in the conversation that takes place in the following lines as “abtrusor muusings” (6). Other dialect phrases arise in the first two sections of the poem that indicate the speaker's attempt to connect with the reader in conversation. In line 17, “Methinks” calls specific attention to the person's thinking, which would not be necessary if he did not expect the reader to also think independently of himself. "But oh!" (24, pause) also draws readers' attention to the character's voice. It would be superfluous to call one's attention to one's own thought, and with no other listener indicated at this opening point of "Frost", it must be an evocation of the reader to enter the poetic discourse. Coleridge wants to once again break the rule that the reader and the poet must be separate entities on two sides of the writing process, and instead intends to incorporate the audience into his theories of magic in the fluttering piece of soot. The "film" (15), is not the focus of the poem, but serves as a catalyst for the character's childhood dreams and memories. As childhood becomes prevalent,, 2003. 522.