Well, probably I'm just in an absurdly charitable frame of mind. Obviously, all of your points are good ones.
It's just that I have this niggling feeling that in quoting Hamlet's soliloquy from the highest of high tragedy for the colt of an ass, Coleridge is being deliberately over-the-top. It's hard to imagine how it could be otherwise (I shudder to think). Again, I'm reminded of Thomas Gray's deliberate mock epic tone in "Ode on the Death of a Favorite Cat Drowned in a Tub of Goldfish" (Nor all that glisters gold"). To call that sentimental--which one well might--would be missing the point entirely.
Or maybe it's from living in Greece and seeing those poor sweet patient donkeys tied up to an olive tree for days on end...
cheers,
Alicia
[This message has been edited by A. E. Stallings (edited January 21, 2001).]
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