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Thomas Maurice
2. Cave of ice
Only a few pages intervene between the description of the Nile and Maurice's
description of Kashmir, in which he discovers a giant ice sculpture in a
cave. Coleridge makes a note for his hymn to the moon.
Hymns Moon
That ice sculpture, appearing and then disappearing in a cave, may have
suggested the caves of ice in Kubla Khan, nearby fountains that are sacred.
That nexus of imagery may have poured into Coleridge's poem, because the
image itself is so unusual, and the description is so vivid. Lowes is
certain of it.
The Image of Ice, accordingly, in the cave in the mountains of Cashmere,
sank below the threshold as an atome crochu. And its particular 'hook
of the memory'--that potentiality of junction which it carried with it--was
the sacred river. And through their association with the sacred river
the caves of ice were drawn into the dream: Through wood and dale the sacred river ran, |
Other sources
William Bartram |
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