The Nightingale: A Conversation Poem

Content Warning: This section of the guide contains discussion of sexual assault and violence.

Right from the beginning of the poem, everything in nature exists in a harmony, and the still evening therefore brings “pleasure” (Line 11) to the three friends gathered, even though the stars may be dim. At the first sound of the nightingale’s song, Coleridge dismisses the notion that the song is melancholy, because nothing in nature can be melancholy (Line 15); that is not nature’s voice or mood. Instead, Coleridge celebrates what he and his friends believe to be the truth, that “Nature’s sweet voices” (Line 42) are “always full of love / And joyance!” (Lines 42-43). This is their fundamental belief, and it permeates the poem. Thus, the song of the nightingale is a “love-chant” (Line 48); it is “merry” (Line 43) and like “tipsy joy” (Line 88). Even in its smallest manifestations, nature is an expression of love—the light of the tiny glow-worm, for example, is a “love-torch” (Line 70).

For Coleridge (and Wordsworth), the human mind experiences joy in contemplation of nature because joy is the essence of life—the deepest reality of it. Mind and nature are not separate in this respect; the same spirit of joy pulses through them both.