The age-old cliché “It is better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all” is the basis of “Love” by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, as the narrator tells it. a story within a story about the confusing idea of ​​love's ever-changing emotions that range from the extreme of joy to heartbreak. The format of the poem set up by Coleridge in 24 quatrains makes it easier to see the effect that the story the narrator tells his beloved has on his life. Coleridge's use of setting, word choice, and metaphors emphasizes how this event forever changed the course of the narrator's life. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get an original essay The first two quatrains are essential because Coleridge uses them to introduce the narrator and essential details about his views on love. Before recognizing his lover, the narrator defines what love is to create a basis for this tale. He describes it as “all thoughts, all passions, all delights” (line 1) which are only “ministers of Love” (line 3). There are many words in these two lines that have meaning, one being "all". ", nothing is omitted, everything is included, whether it is passionate jealousy or romantic pleasures. This is Coleridge's way of implementing that love includes all forms of feeling, not just the noblest. The second being that of "ministers", perhaps a foreshadowing to reveal the purpose of the anecdote that the narrator tells his love. It is evident after the second quatrain that what follows is a memory of "often in [his] waking dreams [did he]/ Relive that happy hour, /When half-way on the mountain [he] lay [s] /Next to the ruined tower. He relives this certain memory from time to time because it makes him feel the same way he did at that moment. In lines 9 to 12, the narrator introduces his beloved Genevieve and the setting in which they both exist, one with "the moonlight" which was "mixed with the lights of the day before", a very euphoric description and romantic. His love enjoys it when he sings the “songs that make her cry” (line 20). The narrator concedes this wish and “plays a sweet and doleful air,” a strange way of saying that he would do anything to make her happy. This is one of the songs that shows his love for her, a second is by defining how striking her physical features are to him, "she knew he couldn't choose/But look at her face" (line 28 ). He begins to tell the story of the Knight and "that he courted the Lady of the Country for ten long years", which emphasizes that this story resembles his own love for Genevieve. During this story, he "said to him: how he longs-" (line 33) and the narrator most certainly identifies with the Knight when he writes "With whom I sang of another's love , / Interpreted mine” (lines 34-35). It is important to note that the "K" in "Knight" is capitalized, this is most likely a metaphor for the narrator since he feels the same passion as the Knight, the intense love for each other and doing everything for him as mentioned later, "And this, without knowing what he did, / He leapt into the midst of a murderous band, / And saved from an outrage worse than death / The Lady of the Country! " (lines 49-52). The Knight went so far as to commit murder to save the woman he loved. In the narration, we learn that the knight is injured during the fight to save his love and that she tries to heal him, although he is mortally wounded. As the narrator tells Geneviève what “her last words” were (line 65), 93-96).