Transcript William Wordsworth

Born on April 7, 1770 in Cockermouth,
Cumberland in the Lake District, the British poet
William Wordsworth is famous for leading the Romantic
movement of poetry.
Wordsworth had a happy childhood until he was
eight when his mother died followed by his father five
years later which led to him and his beloved younger
sister being separated along with his other brothers. The
Wordsworth children were left under the care of two of
his uncles and William was sent to a grammar school to
study.
After graduation in 1790, William set out on a walking journey through
France where he met Annette Vallon and had a love affair which resulted in a
illegitimate Daughter named Anne Caroline, who is thought to be the subject of
Wordsworth’s poem called Vaudracour and Julia.
In 1795, Wordsworth met Samuel Coleridge
and together they took inspiration from Nature
and created many lyrical works of poetry that
lead the romantic movement. Not extremely
successful with selling his poetry, Wordsworth
struggled with money issues throughout his life.
In 1802 he married Mary Hutchinson and
together they lived at Dove Cottage, Grasmere,
Cumbria where they cared for William sister
Dorothy for about twenty years.
In 1850 on April 23, William Wordsworth died
from respiratory failure. He was buried in St.
Oswald’s Churchyard in Grasmere, Cumbria,
England.
Why I enjoy Wordsworth…
William Wordsworth was greatly
influenced by the beauty of nature and he
expressed this passion often in his poetry.
This is what I admire and enjoy about
Wordsworth work because I as well share an
love for the splendor of the trees, wind,
flowers and everything else nature displays.
I also appreciate Wordsworth choice of
words and structure of his poems which he
communicates his emotions and viewpoints
extremely well.
Poetry
SHE DWELT AMONG THE UNTRODDEN WAYS
SHE dwelt among the untrodden ways
Beside the springs of Dove,
A Maid whom there were none to praise
And very few to love:
A violet by a mossy stone
Half hidden from the eye!
--Fair as a star, when only one
Is shining in the sky.
She lived unknown, and few could know
When Lucy ceased to be;
But she is in her grave, and, oh,
The difference to me!
THE WORLD IS TOO MUCH WITH US; LATE
AND SOON
THE world is too much with us; late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers:
Little we see in Nature that is ours;
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!
The Sea that bares her bosom to the moon;
The winds that will be howling at all hours,
And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers;
For this, for everything, we are out of tune;
It moves us not.--Great God! I'd rather be
A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn;
So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,
Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;
Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea;
Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn.
LONDON, 1802
MILTON! thou should'st be living at this
hour:
England hath need of thee: she is a fen
Of stagnant waters: altar, sword, and pen,
Fireside, the heroic wealth of hall and
bower,
Have forfeited their ancient English
dower
Of inward happiness. We are selfish men;
Oh! raise us up, return to us again;
And give us manners, virtue, freedom,
power.
Thy soul was like a Star, and dwelt apart:
Thou hadst a voice whose sound was like
the sea:
Pure as the naked heavens, majestic, free,
I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud
I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales
and hills,
When all at once I saw a
crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils,
Beside the lake, beneath the
trees
Fluttering and dancing in the
breeze.
Continuous as the stars that
shine
And twinkle on the Milky
Way,
They stretched in neverending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance
The waves beside them danced,
but they
Out-did the sparkling waves in
glee: A poet could not but be gay
In such a jocund company:
I gazed -and gazed -but little
thought
What wealth the show to me had
brought.
For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure
The Sun Has Long Been Set
The sun has long been set,
The stars are out by twos and threes,
The little birds are piping yet
Among the bushes and the trees;
There's a cuckoo, and one or two thrushes,
And a far-off wind that rushes,
And a sound of water that gushes,
And the cuckoo's sovereign cry
Fills all the hollow of the sky.
Who would go `parading'
In London, `and masquerading',
On such a night of June
With that beautiful soft half-moon,
And all these innocent blisses?
On such a night as this is!
My Imitation of a Wordsworth Poem
Morning Comes
Light breaks over the shadowed hill,
Unfolds a hand of life.
Shakes the trees of the morning chill;
Awakens last nights strife.
Arising with the stroke of sun,
Her face is streaked with tears.
Although the day has not begun;
Her heart is filled with fears.
For my imitation of
Wordworth's work I decided to
imitate Wordsworth’s rhyming
scheme and stanza structure as seen
in his poem, A slumber did my
spirit seal to form a poem of my
own.
Response to a Literary Criticism
I read a literary criticism by Amelia Warren with the title, The
Significance of Gender in Radcliffe and Wordsworth. This criticism
compares how Wordsworth’s poetry is often written in first person; using
“I” quite frequently instead of “he” or “she”. The author then proceeds to
compare Wordsworth’s tendency to compose poetry this way to another
poet, Ann Radcliffe (1764-1823) who instead tends to write using third
person.
Radcliffe’s poems are like novels, as in the poetry surrounds the
characters that are presented to us to discover. This style, which is quite
unlike Wordsworth’s singular presentation of the characters in his poems
that gives us a perspective and view of the world from Wordsworth’s eyes
in the 17th century.
Although both styles of poetry are appealing and pleasing to our
senses I can relate with Wordsworth’s frequently used style of writing in
first person because I tend to write in a similar style.
Websites:
1. Warren, A. (1993). The Significance of Gender in Radcliffe and Wordsworth.
Retrieved December 6, 2005, from Victorian Web
Web site: http://www.victorianweb.org/previctorian/ww/gender1.html
2. Selendy Communications. (2001).The complete poetical works of William Words.
Retrieved November 28, 2005, from the Archives of Classic poem
Web site: http://www.everypoet.com/archive/poetry/William_Wordsworth/
3. Menon, S. (2003). William Wordsworth. Retrieved December 6, 2005, from The
Literature Network
Web Site: http://www.online-literature.com/wordsworth/
Books:
1. Coffin, C. & Roelofs, G. (1954). The Major Poets: English and American.
New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, Inc.