what is the character of the ancient mariner
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The poem's protagonist. He is unnaturally old, with skinny, deeply-tanned limbs and a "glittering eye." He sets sail from his native country with two hundred other men who are all saved from a strange, icy patch of ocean when they are kind to an Albatross that lives there. Impulsively and inexplicably, he shoots the Albatross with his crossbow and is punished for his crime by a spirit who loved the Albatross. He is cursed to be haunted indefinitely by his dead shipmates, and to be compelled to tell the tale of his downfall at random times. Each time he is compelled to share his story with someone, he feels a physical agony that is abated only temporarily once he finishes telling the tale.
The protagonist (and in many ways the antagonist) of the poem. The poem is largely the story of how, while sailing in Antarctic waters, the Mariner killed the albatross, and then how both nature and the supernatural rose up against him and his shipmates, until the Mariner comes to recognize that all of God’s creatures are beautiful and must be treated with reverence. Put another way, the poem focuses first around the Mariner’s sin, and then his penance for that sin. And yet the Mariner’s story is also not quite as simple as all that. First, the poem never explains why the Mariner kills the albatross – does he kill it out of a hatred of nature, or out of a desire to master and control nature, or for some other reason entirely? Second, despite the Mariner’s penance and realization, the absolution he receives is only partial: he regains the ability to pray, but at the same time he finds himself compelled to tell his story to others, such as the Wedding Guest. He is doomed to forever spread his story and instruct potential sinners in the best way to live, which is in harmony with and reverent awe of nature and God’s creations. The Mariner becomes a kind of herald of the natural and spiritual worlds that his killing of the albatross outraged, and with his strange and intense demeanor, his “glittering eye,” his ability to recognize from their faces which men must hear his story, and his overwhelmingly compelling storytelling itself, he also takes on aspects of the supernatural or spiritual world that he experienced.