The Nightingale: A Conversation Poem is a poem written by Samuel Taylor Coleridge in April 1798. Originally included in the joint collection of poems called Lyrical Ballads, the poem disputes the traditional idea that nightingales are connected to the idea of melancholy. Instead, the nightingale represents to Coleridge the experience of nature. Midway through the poem, the narrator stops discussing the nightingale in order to describe a mysterious female and a gothic scene. After the narrator is returned to his original train of thought by the nightingale's song, the narrator recalls a moment when he took his crying son out to see the moon, which immediately filled the child with joy. Critics have found the poem either decent with little complaint or as one of his better poems containing beautiful lines.
The Nightingale was written in April 1798 during the same time Coleridge wrote Fears in Solitude. During this time, France threatened to invade Britain; the belief held by many Britons was that France would invade the Irish kingdom, which was experiencing rebellion at the time. These fears of an invasion manifested in April 1798 and Britons began to arm themselves. During April, Coleridge traveled to his childhood home at Ottery and then went to visit William and Dorothy Wordsworth. It was during this time that Coleridge wrote "Fears in Solitude: Written in April 1798, During the Alarm of an Invasion".
The poem was included in a joint publication with William Wordsworth called Lyrical Ballads, which first appeared in 1798 (see 1798 in poetry). Originally, Coleridge intended to place Lewti or the Circassian Love-chaunt in the collection. The Nightingale was published in seven other editions but was altered little.
The poem begins with Milton's line in Il Penseroso about nightingales and then corrects it:
The poem introduces Philomela, a character from Greek legend that suffered and whose name was later connected to the nightingale:
The poem introduces a female character that is Gothic and Romantic:
Eventually, the poem discusses Hartley, Coleridge's child. After the child started crying, the narrator takes him out into the night for the poem's conclusion:
The nightingale is used as an image to begin a topic that was directed towards William and Dorothy Wordsworth, Coleridge's friends. The nightingale was used as a sign of melancholy because of its relationship to the legend of Philomela, a rape victim. Although Coleridge corrects the idea of nightingale as melancholic, the poem relies on the tradition and gothic descriptions to guide the poem. Eventually, the nightingale is what brings the narrator back to his topic after diverging from it in a manner similar to John Keats's use in Ode to a Nightingale.