Christabel Analysis

In his preface to the poem, Coleridge claims that he has basically made up the form and meter for this poem. This new poetic form, he claims, is about counting the accents in the words (in other wo...

It is not really clear who the speaker is in this poem. In fact, there appears to be more than one speaker at times, since the tone shifts dramatically from the main sections of the poem to the con...

The whole poem—what there is of it—takes place either inside Sir Leoline's castle or in the wooded area just outside it. It all seems pretty straightforward—but we certainly know by now that...

Coleridge starts us out with some heavy alliteration in the first stanza of "Christabel." The harsh, hard C sounds in lines 1-10 ("castle clock" and "crowing cock") are almost alarming, as if the s...

The title is—wait for it—the main character's name. That makes sense, right? Christabel is the first character whom the reader is introduced to, and the first part and its conclusion to that se...

Coleridge had a rather complicated relationship with women. As is befitting the time, Coleridge believed that women were the inferior sex, and without the guidance of a man they would surely go ast...

The main thing that makes this such a hard poem to figure out is the fact that it isn't finished. It's really difficult to even take guesses when so much of the material is missing. Add that to the...

Being unfinished hasn't prevented "Christabel" from inspiring off-Broadway plays. Many of them are abysmal failures—probably because no one knows how to end it. (Source) Coleridge's father though...

Let's be honest. "Christabel" deals with what the movie industry would call "adult themes." However, it does so in a fairly tasteful way. Sure, there's a really steamy lesbian sex scene at the end...