Kubla Khan: Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Kubla Khan is the most famous work of Samuel Taylor Coleridge, for the very reason that he never finished composing it. Coleridge experienced the story arc of the poem within an opium-induced dream, which he vividly recalled in verse upon awakening. He originally intended for it to be an epic spanning almost 300 lines. But as Coleridge awoke and began to write his work, he was interrupted by the infamous "man from porlock"-- an unwelcome visitor who ended his train of thought. Coleridge was only able to write 54 lines from memory, but the poem still endures as one of his finest works. 

Here is the first stanza: 

"In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure-dome decree:
Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
Through caverns measureless to man
Down to a sunless sea."

The poem is based around Kublai Khan, a Mongol ruler who held power over Mongolia and China in the 1200's. The poem finds Kublai at Xanadu, the summer ruling capital of the emperor, where Kublai basks in his great palace and the glorious domain underneath his domination. 

The poems structure is highly compressed and even awkward at times. Heavy use of alliteration and assonance ("sunless sea", "measureless to man") is used to bind the poem together, but uneven distribution of syllables means certain words have to be stressed more than others ("decree" is an ideal example in the above stanza"). The poems structure is iambic tetrameter, although this is a loose definition due to the use of stress throughout the work. 

The theme of the poem and use of literary devices begins to complicate as it progresses. The first two stanzas are mostly descriptive, illustrating the extent and glory of Kublai's domain. There may be some biblical implications in regards to the description of the "sunless sea", and of the walled nature of Xanadu (The garden of Eden was also walled) as well as how forced Kublai's reign may be, but there are few unidentified themes. In the third stanza:

"But oh! that deep romantic chasm which slanted
Down the green hill athwart a cedarn cover!
A savage place! as holy and enchanted
As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted

....

And 'mid this tumult Kubla heard from far
Ancestral voices prophesying war!"

Xanadu is repainted as a strange and untempered place, ruled over perhaps by an unfit king, and concealing a great chasm and powers beyond the realm of men. The stanza also describes a mighty river exploding from the chasm, forming a river through Xanadu. Normally, in Coleridge's era, a fountain is need as a sign of life or creation- but since the fountain erupted through the ground and had to push its way to the light, it could be interpreted as forced creation. Kublai's empire is not held together by a strong government or system of law, but by military might and authoritarian rule. Kublai then hears the voices of the dead- he and his dynasty achieved power through violence. 

This is also supported by historical data. Kublai Khan was known as the only Mongol ruler to successfully conquer all of China, seizing power from the existing Southern Song Dynasty.



The poem once again shifts in the final stanza, as Coleridge transforms Kublai into a demon:

".......
That sunny dome! those caves of ice!
And all who heard should see them there,
And all should cry, Beware! Beware!
His flashing eyes, his floating hair!
Weave a circle round him thrice,
And close your eyes with holy dread,
For he on honey-dew hath fed
And drunk the milk of Paradise."

In this stanza Kublai is shown to be a murderous tyrant, a demon recalled from the pits of hell. The last line -"drunk the milk of Paradise" could be interpreted as how the Mongolian hordes, under leaders like Kublai, ransacked the riches and prosperities of China and other nations to increase their own military power. The poem, though unfinished, becomes a tale of how Kublai converts the once peaceful shrine of China into his personal breadbasket, erecting his summer palace and draining the life from the once powerful nation. The present-day perception of Kublai is mixed- he is remembered as being the only Mongol to actually govern and maintain control over all of China, but this governance is often seen as being parasitic in nature. It is unclear from here where the poem progresses- did Coleridge intend perhaps for an epic of a ransacked valley of nature, mirroring the pollution seen in his own society? Or a tale of the exploits of Kublai? Or perhaps a mix of the two, placing Kublai in a fictional tale of Coleridge's fancy?

While the poem will forever be unfinished, it is a haunting tale of ransacked Paradise that will forever endure as one of Coleridge's finest pieces of work.