Who wrote the poem 'The Rime of the Ancient Mariner'?

Samuel Taylor Coleridge wrote the poem The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.

Coleridge composed the poem in 1797–1798, during the early period of British Romanticism. It first appeared in 1798 in Lyrical Ballads, the groundbreaking collection Coleridge published with William Wordsworth. The volume is often regarded as a starting point for English Romantic poetry, although the poem’s supernatural atmosphere and archaic language initially divided readers.

The narrative follows an old sailor who stops a Wedding-Guest and tells how he killed an albatross during a sea voyage. The act brings disaster upon the ship and its crew, and the mariner must wander from place to place retelling his experience. Its central ideas include guilt, punishment, spiritual renewal, and respect for the natural world.

Coleridge revised the poem repeatedly. The 1817 version added the famous marginal gloss, while later editions altered wording and presentation. The poem also gave English several enduring expressions, including “an albatross around one’s neck” and “water, water, everywhere.” Its title originally used the archaic spelling The Rime of the Ancyent Marinere.