In ‘Kubla Khan’ how does Coleridge use language to bring his vision of the river and its environs to life?
Coleridge uses language in his poem ‘Kubla Khan’ as an aid to the reader, to help them understand the vision he saw in a dream he claims to have experienced while under the influence of Opium. Although, some people now believe that he lied by saying this. He probably just wrote it because he felt like it and disguised it in this way because he thought that otherwise it would not be accepted by critics or readers because it was too fantastical, which was not the style of the time. This dream starts at Xanadu, ’ described as ‘a stately pleasure dome’ where Coleridge saw ‘Kubla Khan, and then follows the route of the river ‘Alph,’ from the sunny, exotic garden surrounding Kubla Khan, to a geyser to the ‘sunless sea’. Although the poem is exotic in places and one might expect the language to be very heightened, it is not. Coleridge manages to keep the language simple, so everyone can understand it, through feeling it. He believed that his vision was sent to him from God; to be conveyed in a way that all other people could understand. Coleridge uses various methods to express his dream, most importantly the use of imagery such as personification, types of vocabulary such as the use of monosyllables and polysyllables and the use of different sound imagery such as enjambment and onomatopoeias.
One literary device Coleridge uses a lot in Kubla Khan is imagery. Throughout the poem Coleridge use imagery to build up the readers understanding of his dream. Imagery is necessary in Kubla Khan because it is a very imaginative and unusual dream, without it Coleridge would have trouble conveying its richness and originality. The first type of imagery in ‘Kubla Khan’ is the use of personification with the introduction of Alph, the sacred river. It is referred to by name, called sacred and given a character. Coleridge uses Alph to guide the reader through his dream....