The Rime of the Ancient Mariner 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." George Whalley, in his 1946–47 essay, "The Mariner and the Albatross", suggests that the Ancient Mariner is an
The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket believing the novel was an autobiographical narrative by Pym. In addition to historical sources, Poe was influenced by other writers. "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner" by Samuel Taylor Coleridge was a general influence, and scenes of Pym and Dirk Peters in a cave echo scenes in Daniel Defoe's "Robinson Crusoe", which many reviewers noted at the time, including London publications such as the "Court Gazette" and the "Torch". The ship of corpses recalls the legend of the "Flying Dutchman", a ship which is cursed and unable to return home. Poe also incorporated the theories of Reynolds and John Cleves