The Rime of the Ancient Mariner autobiographical portrait of Coleridge himself, comparing the mariner's loneliness with Coleridge's own feelings of loneliness expressed in his letters and journals. In addition to being referred to in several other notable works, due to the popularity of the poem the phrase "albatross around one's neck" has become an English language idiom referring to "a heavy burden of guilt that becomes an obstacle to success". Monty Python's "Albatross Sketch" in which an irascible movie-theatre refreshment vendor tries to sell a single albatross from a tray around his neck, is a parody of Coleridge's description of the Mariner. The phrase "Water, water,
Doldrums of days or weeks. Colloquially, the "doldrums" are a state of inactivity, mild depression, listlessness, or stagnation. The word may be derived from "dold," an archaic term meaning "stupid", and "-rum(s)", a noun suffix found in such words as "tantrum." The doldrums are notably described in Samuel Taylor Coleridge's poem "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner" (1798), in Patrick O'Brian's novel "Desolation Island" (1978), and in Laura Hillenbrand's non-fiction book "" (2010). Additionally, the Doldrums are a fictional place in Norton Juster's novel "The Phantom Tollbooth" (1961). Noel Gallagher used the term to describe a woman stuck in the decade