BIOGRAPHY:

William Wordsworth , was born on 7 April 1770 in Cockermouth,

Cumberland, in the Lake District. His father was John Wordsworth, Sir James Lowther's attorney. The magnificent landscape deeply affected Wordsworth's imagination and gave him a love of nature. He lost his mother when he was eight and five years later his father. The domestic problems separated Wordsworth from his beloved and neurotic sister Dorothy, who was a very important person in his life. With the help of his two uncles, Wordsworth entered a local school and continued his studies at Cambridge University. Wordsworth made his debut as a writer in 1787, when he published a sonnet in The European Magazine . In that same year he entered St. John's College, Cambridge, from where he took his B.A. in 1791. During a summer vacation in 1790 Wordsworth went on a walking tour through revolutionary France and also traveled in Switzerland. On his second journey in France, Wordsworth had an affair with a French girl, Annette Vallon, a daughter of a barber-surgeon, by whom he had a illegitimate daughter Anne Caroline. The affair was basis of the poem "Vaudracour and Julia", but otherwise Wordsworth did his best to hide the affair from posterity the son of an attorney, was born on 7 April 1770 in Cockermouth, England; He went to school first at Penrith and then at Hawkshead Grammar school before

studying, from 1787, at St John's College, Cambridge - all of which periods were later to be described vividly in The Prelude. In 1790 he went with friends on a walking tour to France, the Alps and Italy, before arriving in France where Wordsworth was to spend the next year. Whilst in France he fell in love twice over: once with a young French woman, Annette Vallon, who subsequently bore him a daughter, and then, once more, with the French Revolution. Returning to England he wrote, and left unpublished, his Letter to the Bishop of Llandaff - a tract in support of the French Revolutionary cause. In 1795, after receiving a legacy, Wordsworth lived with his sister Dorothy first in Dorset and then at Alfoxden, Dorset, close to Coleridge. In these years he wrote many of his greatest poems and also travelled with Coleridge and Dorothy, in the winter of 1798-79, to Germany. Two years later the second and enlarged edition of the Lyrical Ballads appeared in 1801, just one year before Wordsworth married Mary Hutchinson. This was followed, in 1807, by the publication of Poems in Two Volumes, which included the poems 'Resolution and Independence' and 'Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood'. He was a major English Romantic poet, who with the help of Samuel Taylor Coleridge launched the Romantic Age in English literature by the publication of 'Lyrical Ballads' in 1798. The magnificent landscapes deeply affected Wordsworth's imagination and gave him a love of nature. He made his debut as a writer in 1787 when he published a sonnet in The European Magazine. William Wordsworth was one of the major poets of his time honored as England's Poet Laureate.

MAJOR WORKS:
Some of the major works of William Wordsworth are: Lyrical Ballads, With a Few Other Poems (1798) - Lines Composed a Few Miles Above Tintern Abbey, We are Seven, Simon Lee, Lines Written in Early Spring Lyrical Ballads, with Other Poems Volume 1 (1800) - Lucy Gray, Strange Fits of Passion Have I Known, She Dwelt Among the Untrodden Ways, Preface to the Lyrical Ballads Poems, in Two Volumes (1807) - Ode: Intimations of Immortality, Daffodils,

Resolution and Independence, Composed upon Westminster Bridge, The World is Too Much with Us

EMPHASIS:
Wordsworths personality and poetry were deeply influenced by his love of nature, especially by the sights and scenes of the Lake Country, in which he spent most of his mature life. A profoundly earnest and sincere thinker, he displayed a high seriousness tempered with tenderness and a love of simplicity. Nature's beauty induces in Wordsworth a deep and powerful mourning for how mankind has perverted his own nature in his then modern society. He stayed true to Romanticism's philosophy, in his poems, of embracing not only nature but the careful expression of the poet's emotions through art and how nature can so deeply affect it. His emphasis was on being able to find bliss from solitude. His poems lead the reader through a revelation of sorts as Wordsworth reflects upon the simple beauties of nature and childhood that is lost to the agony and pain of man. Despite the hardships and failings of life, there remains an intrinsic beauty of the mind that overcomes even the decay of age and time. The imagery of nature and the peacefulness that is created is accomplished through the many metaphors, similes and descriptive language that he uses.

SOME OF HIS POEMS AND THERE SUMMARIES

LUCY GRAY
Oft I had heard of Lucy Gray: And, when I crossed the wild, I chanced to see at break of day The solitary child. No mate, no comrade Lucy knew; She dwelt on a wide moor,

--The sweetest thing that ever grew Beside a human door! You yet may spy the fawn at play, The hare upon the green; But the sweet face of Lucy Gray Will never more be seen. "To-night will be a stormy night-You to the town must go; And take a lantern, Child, to light Your mother through the snow." "That, Father! will I gladly do: 'Tis scarcely afternoon-The minster-clock has just struck two, And yonder is the moon!" At this the Father raised his hook, kiAnd snapped a faggot-band; He plied his work;--and Lucy took The lantern in her hand. Not blither is the mountain roe: With many a wanton stroke Her feet disperse the powdery snow, That rises up like smoke. The storm came on before its time: She wandered up and down; And many a hill did Lucy climb: But never reached the town. The wretched parents all that night Went shouting far and wide; But there was neither sound nor sight To serve them for a guide. At day-break on a hill they stood That overlooked the moor;

And thence they saw the bridge of wood, A furlong from their door. They wept--and, turning homeward, cried, "In heaven we all shall meet;" --When in the snow the mother spied The print of Lucy's feet. Then downwards from the steep hill's edge They tracked the footmarks small; And through the broken hawthorn hedge, And by the long stone-wall; And then an open field they crossed: The marks were still the same; They tracked them on, nor ever lost; And to the bridge they came. They followed from the snowy bank Those footmarks, one by one, Into the middle of the plank; And further there were none! --Yet some maintain that to this day She is a living child; That you may see sweet Lucy Gray Upon the lonesome wild. O'er rough and smooth she trips along, And never looks behind; And sings a solitary song That whistles in the wind.

Summary:
I think it is important to note all of the language that Wordsworth devotes to equating Lucy more with nature than with the life of a human. Lucy is a symbol or spirit like manifestation that is closely affiliated to nature and appears to be just that nature. In a modern context it can be conceived that this issues a warning on the

exploitation of nature. Lucy could represent natural beauty or productivity which humanity takes for granted and abuses, seen through the orders of the parents. Where the parents are indicative of society and the pressures it places on the environment, the bridge can be seen as the point or boundary which limits human involvement and when Lucy crosses it, society has pushed nature too far. Also the apparent confusion experienced by Lucy when she goes out to complete her duty can reflect the disorientating effect human interference has on the environment and ecosystems where animals and plants are forced to adjust their behavioral patterns, thus perplexing themselves and others. Furthermore, Lucy can be seen to follow an innocence cycle or specifically the transition from innocence to experience. The parents can represent society which has a negative effect on the youth by both corrupting it and removing its innocence. Or they can be seen as her tutors whose main task is to preserve a childs innocence or to protect the youth form the evils of society. Nevertheless the parents fail in their duties, and Lucy is trapped in a storm, the negative influence of society. Hence she crosses the bridge of childhood and innocence and into adulthood and experience. This is why the parents cant seem to find her but the poet insists she lives on- she is now an adult and different in incarnation to what she was before hand.

DAFFODILS
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 never-ending line Along the margin of a bay: Ten thousand saw I at a glance, Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced, but they Out-did the sparkling leaves in glee; A poet could not be but gay, In such a jocund company! I gazedand gazedbut 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 fills, And dances with the daffodils.

Summary:
Daffodils is one of the most popular poems of the Romantic Age, unfolding the poet's excitement, love and praise for a field blossoming with daffodils or we can say, nature. Various peaceful images of nature, including a field of daffodils, possess human qualities in the poem. These natural images express Wordsworth's self-reflections, whether it be tranquil solitude at the beginning of the poem or excitement about being in the company of daffodils at the end. Through nature a mood is instantly created from the very first line, "I wandered lonely as a cloud." The atmosphere established in this poem is very peaceful and the use of nature creates a tranquil yet joyful setting. It starts with the narrator describing his action of walking in a state of worldly detachment; his wandering "As lonely as a cloud / that floats on high o'er vales and hills,". What he is thinking of we never really uncover, but his description leaves us to analyze his words as a sort of "head in the clouds" daydream-like state where his thoughts are far away, unconcerned with the immediate circumstances in which he finds himself. Wordsworth, ever the

Romanticist, perhaps uses these two introductory lines to describe the disconnected and dispassionate ways that we all live our lives; walking through life in a haze of daily ritual and monotonous distractions in a pointless and spiritually disinterested state where we fail as emotional creatures to appreciate the quiet beauties of life that we as human beings need for spiritual sustenance. William Wordsworth's "lonely cloud" is our own private impersonal perception of the world, floating miles above it and missing the quiet virtues of nature, beauty, and other sources of emotional nourishment. Wordsworth goes on to describe these "golden daffodils" as a vast plot of swaying flowers around the fringes of a bay, outdoing the beauty of the ocean's waves with their own golden oscillation. Wordsworth helps us to visualize what he himself has seen and was so moved by; "Tossing their heads in sprightly dance. / The waves beside them danced; but they / Out-did the sparkling waves in glee". These light-hearted daffodils, weaving in unison with each other in the wind, have romantically touched Wordsworth, their natural beauty reaching him in ways that he describes as not fully understanding until later: "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:" In William Wordsworth's "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud", the daffodils become much more than mere flowers. They are a symbol of natural beauty and, more importantly, symbolize living a life as rich in experience and sensation as would make a life worth living.

IMPACT OF HIS POEMS ON THE SOCIETY:

He was in many ways, the very model of a modern neoconservative, defending the Wests liberal tradition against radicalism. Still more relevant today is the key insight underlying Wordsworths political conversion. The Prelude, subtitled Growth of a Poets Mind, could just as easily, especially in its later editions, be called Growth of a Conservatives Mind. It tells how, in a radical age, in a life of integrity, patriotism, and decency, and by the sheer power of a poetic intelligence equaled very rarely in human history, Wordsworth rediscoveredalmost reinventedthe central enduring principle of the conservative ideal. As every conservative will have guess, all this set Wordsworth like an immovable stone against the elite intellectual current of his age. All his long life, he received the most relentlessly and uniformly vicious reviews ever given

to so great a writer. Yet slow by slow, the people came to him, the poets first and then the rest. Again and again, admirers would tell him that his work stood with them second only to the Bible. John Stuart Mill, suffering a breakdown after his rigorous Utilitarian upbringing, found his way back to mental health by reading Wordsworth. Well, of course, through his understanding of the imagination and its interplay with reality, he had led even unbelievers back to their souls.

DEATH:
William Wordsworth died on 23 April 1850. His widow Mary published his lengthy autobiographical "poem to Coleridge" as The Prelude several months after his death. It has since come to be recognized as his masterpiece.

It was his truthand oursthat had borne away the victory

Today Wordsworth's poetry remains widely read. Its almost universal appeal is perhaps best explained by Wordsworth's own words on the role, for him, of poetry; what he called "the most philosophical of all writing" whose object is "truth...carried alive into the heart by passion

Quotes William Wordsworth

On learning, maturity, beauty, and growth
My heart leaps up when I behold A rainbow in the sky: So was it when my life began; So is it now I am a man; So be it when I shall grow old, Or let me die! The Child is father of the Man; I could wish my days to be

Bound each to each by natural piety.

A Quote by William Wordsworth

I listened, motionless and still; and, as I mounted up the hill, the music in my heart I bore, long after it was heard no more.

On life, kindness, and love

That best portion of a good man's life,-his little, nameless, unremembered acts of kindness and of love.

On soul and stars

Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting; The Soul that rises with us, our life's Star, Hath had elsewhere its setting, And cometh from afar;

On dream, earth, light, and time

There was a time when meadow, grove, and stream, The earth, and every common sight, To me did seem Apparelled in celestial light, The glory and the freshness of a dream.

On life, spirituality, and sublimity

Until, the breath of this corporeal frame And even the motion of our human blood Almost suspended, we are laid asleep In body, and become a living soul: While with an eye made quiet by the power Of harmony, and the deep power of joy, We see into the life of things.

On kindness and love

"The best portion of a good man's life: his little, nameless, unremembered acts of kindness and love."

On fear, apprehension, questions, cruel, and hateful

My apprehensions come in crowds;/ I dread the rustling of the grass;/ The very shadows of the crowds/ Have power to shake me as they pass:/ I question things and do not find/ One that will answer to my mind;/ And the entire world appears unkind.

A Quote by William Wordsworth

Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers. Little we see in nature that is ours.

On poorest, poor, blessings, kindness, heart, and wordsworth

Many, I believe, there are Who live a life of virtuous decency, Men who can hear the Decalogue and feel No self-reproach; who of the moral law Established in the land where they abide Are strict observers; and not negligent In acts of love to those with whom they dwell, Their kindred, and the children of their blood. Praise be to such, and to their slumbers peace! --But of the poor man ask, the abject poor; Go, and demand of him, if there be here In this cold abstinence from evil deeds, And these inevitable charities, Wherewith to satisfy the human soul? No--man is dear to man; the poorest poor Long for some moments in a weary life When they can know and feel that they have been, Themselves, the fathers and the dealers-out

Of some small blessings; have been kind to such As needed kindness, for this single cause, That we have all of us one human heart.

On hope, effort, expectation, and desire

With hope it is, hope that can never die, Effort, and expectation, and desire, And something evermore about to be.

On thought
We meet thee, like a pleasant thought, When such are wanted.

On blessings
All that we behold is full of blessings .

Major works

Lyrical Ballads, with a Few Other Poems (1798)

o o o o o o o

"Simon Lee" "We are Seven" "Lines Written in Early Spring" "Expostulation and Reply" "The Tables Turned" "The Thorn" "Lines Composed A Few Miles above Tintern Abbey"

Lyrical Ballads, with Other Poems (1800)

o o o o o

Preface to the Lyrical Ballads "Strange fits of passion have I known"[13] "She Dwelt among the Untrodden Ways"[13] "Three years she grew"[13] "A Slumber Did my Spirit Seal"[13]

o o o o o o o

"I travelled among unknown men"[13] "Lucy Gray" "The Two April Mornings" "Nutting" "The Ruined Cottage" "Michael" "The Kitten At Play"

Poems, in Two Volumes (1807)

o o o o o o o o o o

"Resolution and Independence" "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud" Also known as "Daffodils" "My Heart Leaps Up" "Ode: Intimations of Immortality" "Ode to Duty" "The Solitary Reaper" "Elegiac Stanzas" "Composed upon Westminster Bridge, September 3, 1802" "London, 1802" "The world is too much with us"

The Excursion (1814) The Prelude (1850)