iron maiden rime of the ancient mariner meaning
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner On a surface level the poem explores a violation of nature and the resulting psychological effects on the mariner and on all those who hear him. According to Jerome McGann the poem is like a salvation story. The poem's structure is multi-layered text based on Coleridge's interest in Higher Criticism. "Like the Iliad or Paradise Lost or any great historical product, the Rime is a work of transhistorical rather than so-called universal significance. This verbal distinction is important because it calls attention to a real one. Like The Divine Comedy or any other poem, the Rime is not valued or used always or everywhere or by everyone in the same way or for the same reasons."[13]
It ain't over till the fat lady sings The phrase is generally understood to be referencing the stereotypically overweight sopranos of the opera. The imagery of Richard Wagner's opera cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen and its last part, Götterdämmerung, is typically the one used in depictions accompanying reference to the phrase. The "fat lady" is the valkyrie Brünnhilde, who is traditionally presented as a very buxom lady with horned helmet, spear and round shield (although Amalie Materna played Brünnhilde during Wagner's lifetime (1876) with a winged helmet). Her farewell scene lasts almost twenty minutes and leads directly to the finale of the whole Ring Cycle.[1] As Götterdämmerung is about the end of the world (or at least the world of the Norse gods), in a very significant way "it is [all] over when the fat lady sings."