William_Wordsworth

William Wordsworth By Jade Robinson William Wordsworth was an English Romantic poet who helped start the Romantic Age by his and Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s publication of Lyrical Ballads in 1798. Wordsworth was born on April 7th, 1770 in Cockermouth, Cumberland (England) in the Lake District, which was an area surrounded by mountains, lakes and streams – a setting that was very inspiring to him. His parents were Anne Cookson (who died when Wordsworth was only eight) and John Wordsworth (who died when William was 13 years old). He was the 2nd of 5 children, and the names of his brothers and sisters were Dorothy (to whom he was very close to for all of his life), Richard, John, and Christopher. Wordsworth's father, taught him poetry, (such as works of John Milton, William Shakespeare and Edmund Spenser). He also stayed at his mother's parents house in Penrith, Cumberland. At Penrith, Wordsworth was exposed to the moors, and the landscape influenced him and resulted in him turning more towards nature and was influenced by his experience with the landscape and was further turned toward nature. He could not get along with his grandparents and his uncle, and this made him so depressed that he started to think about committing suicide. After the death of his mother, William’s father sent him to Hawkshead Grammar School. He began going to St John’s College, Cambridge, where he got his B.A degree. After that, he visited Revolutionary France and fell in love with Annette Vallon, who in 1762 gave birth to their daughter Caroline. He returned to England by himself the next year, but war broke out between France and England which prevented him for seeing Annette and Caroline. He started to become more unhappy, depressed, and very near to a mental collapse caused by him being away from his wife and child. Once he had moved back to England, he married Mary Hutchinson, one of his childhood friends. Mary and William had five children: John, Dora, William, Catherine, and Thomas Wordsworth. Wordsworth got a Doctor of Civil law degree and became the Poet Laureate before he died on April 23rd, 1850 and was buried at St. Oswald’s church in Grasmere. In Wordsworth’s Preface to Lyrical Ballads, he discusses the elements of a new type of poetry based on the “real language of men”. William wanted to express the power of ordinary speech. He liked to use common life situations to write about, (glory in the commonplace) where humble or underprivileged people lived a simple life close to nature with “essential passions of the heart”. Another type of poem that William liked to write about were nature poems (or meditative poems) , and how nature provoked feelings. He gave landscapes human qualities and described their beauty. In his poetry the central focus is on the relationship between the mind and the natural world and also the poets own life (emotions). Wordsworth’s definition of good poetry was “the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings”, meaning that writing was the result of inspiration and vision. Like many other poets during the Romantic period, he used the lyric poem written in first person. He debuted as a writer in 1787 when he published a sonnet in “The European magazine”, and in 1793 Wordsworth had his first published poetry. The same year as he had his first published poetry, he met Samuel Taylor Coleridge, who he developed a close friendship with. Wordsworth and Coleridge worked together to produce Lyrical Ballads (published in 1798), which became an important work in the English Romantic movement. During a trip to Germany he wrote poems revolving around themes of death, separation, grief, and unhappiness. Wordsworth wrote and published an autobiographical poem called The Recluse, he also published his Poems in Two Volumes. “I wandered lonely as a cloud” is a poem that explains the feelings of Wordsworth while he is in a field of daffodils, and how they make him happy. He gives personal qualities to the daffodils such as “fluttering and dancing in the breeze” and “tossing their heads in sprightly dance”. In this poem he explains how he saw a group (or a field) of daffodils that seem to stretch out and never end. He compares them to waves and at the end explains how if he is by himself thinking he thinks of the daffodils and feels happier. He uses the love of nature in this poem, explaining his serenity while in nature. This poem also shows how individual he is (leading to his loneliness). “The Solitary Reaper “(another of Wordsworth’s poems) glorifies the commonplace. Wordsworth describes a girl singing sadly in a field while cutting grain. He describes her song and compares it to birds (more beautiful), and wonders why she sings so sadly. It seems she does not have an ending to her song and he listens to it. He explains that even after he has gone over the hill (when he can no longer hear the music) he will always have the music in his heart. It shows that he was amazed by an innocent girl cutting grain, and writes for ordinary people using simple words. Thed girl in this poem seems underprivileged and Wordsworth pities her. He is inspired by her song and that supports his beliefs that the real feelings of the heart were best in a humble or rustic lives.