In William Wordsworth’s poems, the role of nature plays a more reassuring and pivotal r ole within them. To Wordsworth’s poetry, interacting with nature represents the forces of the natural world. Throughout the three poems, Resolution and Independence, Tintern Abbey, and Michael, which will be discussed in this essay, nature is seen prominently as an everlasting- individual figure, which gives his audience as well as Wordsworth, himself, a sense of console. In all three poems, Wordsworth views nature and human beings as complementary elements of a sum of a whole, recognizing that humans are a sum of nature. Therefore, looking at the world as a soothing being of which he is a part of, Wordsworth looks at nature and sees the benevolence of the divinity aspects behind them. For Wordsworth, the world itself, in all its glory, can be a place of suffering, which surely occurs within the world; Wordsworth is still comforted with the belief that all things happen by the hands of the divinity and the just and divine order of nature, itself. In William Wordsworth’s poem, Resolution and Independence, Wordsworth describes the moods of the poem through the description of nature. The first appearance of the speaker, himself, is shown in (line 15); where he classifies himself as a traveler who has been seduced, as he states, “The pleasant season did my heart employ” (line 19). We see the traveler as a bright and joyful person as Wordsworth’s characteristics of nature as a means of description continues throughout the poem. As the poem progresses, the speaker’s attitude changes in (line 26), where he tells us that his mood is lowered. It is here that the speaker presents himself as “a happy child of earth” in (line 31); as once again Wordsworth... ... middle of paper ... .../ Of the unfinished sheepfold may be seen / Besides the boisterous brook of Greenhead Ghyll,” showing the growth of human beings in relative notion to nature. William Wordsworth has respect and has great admiration for nature. This is quite evident in all three of his poems; the Resolution and Independence, Tintern Abbey and Michael in that, his philosophy on the divinity, immortality and innocence of humans are elucidated in his connection with nature. For Wordsworth, himself, nature has a spirit, a soul of its own, and to know is to experience nature with all of your senses. In all three of his poems there are many references to seeing, hearing and feeling his surroundings. He speaks of hills, the woods, the rivers and streams, and the fields. Wordsworth comprehends, in each of us, that there is a natural resemblance to ourselves and the background of nature.
...here are similar aspects to each writer's experience. Engaging the imagination, Ramond, Wordsworth and Shelley have experienced a kind of unity; conscious of the self as the soul they are simultaneously aware of 'freedoms of other men'. I suggested in the introduction that the imagination is a transition place wherein words often fail but the experience is intensified, even understood by the traveler. For all three writers the nature of the imagination has, amazingly, been communicable. Ramond and Wordsworth are able to come to an articulate conclusion about the effects imagination has on their perceptions of nature. Shelley, however, remains skeptical about the power of the imaginative process. Nonetheless, Shelley's experience is as real, as intense as that of Ramond and Wordsworth.
The unity of God, man, and nature is of course a common theme in Wordsworth's poetry, having been given equally memorable treatments in Tintern Abbey and elsewhere, but it was the seemingly paradoxical sentiment of this passage from The Prelude that made such a strong impression on me. As John Beer points out in his article "Romantic Apocalypses," "Although traditionally the apocalypse and the millennium have gone together, recently, the first, with its sense of doom, has been more prominent" (109). To a reader who has lived through the passing of both a new century and a new millennium, the phrase "Characters of the great Apocalypse" tends to evoke feelings of eschatological anxiety, and to suggest the fragility and transience of the landscape Wordsworth is attempting to describe. It is easy to forget that Wordsworth used the term in its original sense of "simply 'revelation,' the name given to the English version in the New Testament" (Beer 109); and that in its evocations o...
The woman is detached from reality, having lost everything she once knew and is left wandering Salisbury Plain, finding solace in a decaying spital. As within many of his poems, Wordsworth reverts back to nature as a symbol of purity and hope, presenting the morning sunlight as...
William Wordsworth is easily understood as a main author whom expresses the element of nature within his work. Wordsworth’s writings unravel the combination of the creation of beauty and sublime within the minds of man, as well as the receiver through naturalism. Wordsworth is known to be self-conscious of his immediate surroundings in the natural world, and to create his experience with it through imagination. It is common to point out Wordsworth speaking with, to, and for nature. Wordsworth had a strong sense of passion of finding ourselves as the individuals that we truly are through nature. Three poems which best agree with Wordsworth’s fascination with nature are: I Wandered as a Lonely Cloud, My Heart leaps up, and Composed upon Westminster Bridge. In I Wandered as a Lonely Cloud, Wordsworth claims that he would rather die than be without nature, because life isn’t life without it, and would be without the true happiness and pleasure nature brings to man. “So be it when I shall grow old, Or let me
Greenblatt, Stephen. Cogan university professor of the Humanities Harvard University, The Norton Anthology of English Literature, Ninth Edition, Volume D. Coleridge Ancient Mariner, Wordsworth “I” in “Tintern Abbey”, Maria Edgeworth Phelim O’Moone.
Although there had been a 'long absence'; from the abbey, the memories of his hurried time in the Wye had consoled him ' 'mid the din of towns and cities'; (lines 26-27). 'With tranquil restoration'; Wordsworth has changed from the state of observing to the state of recalling his 'unremembered pleasures[s]'; (31). He had many times returned in spirit to the Wye, to escape the 'fever of the world'; (53). These memories have produced emotions beyond his understanding; enlightening him and relieving his frustrations. It is the abbey, 'in which the heavy and the weary weight of all this unintelligible world, is lightened'; and makes him become a 'living soul';. (40-49) Wordsworth was claiming th...
William Wordsworth's Tintern Abbey As students, we are taught that William Wordsworth's basic tenets of poetry are succinct: the use of common language as a medium, common man as a subject, and organic form as an inherent style. Yet beyond these rudimentary teachings, it should be considered that it was the intimacy with nature that was imperative to the realization of Wordsworth's goals set forth in the "Preface" to Lyrical Ballads. In his "Preface," Wordsworth states, "Poetry is the image of man and nature" (Norton 247). A study of "Tintern Abbey," the intended finale and last impression of the Lyrical Ballads, reveals Wordsworth's conviction that the role of nature is the force and connection that binds mankind not only to the past and the future, but to other human beings as well. Regardless of the language employed, the subject used, or the method of delivery, it was the primal connection with nature that fueled Wordsworth's poetic genius.
Wordsworth and Hopkins both present the reader with a poem conveying the theme of nature. Nature in its variety be it from something as simple as streaked or multicolored skies, long fields and valleys, to things more complex like animals, are all gifts we take for granted. Some never realize the truth of what they are missing by keeping themselves indoors fixating on the loneliness and vacancy of their lives and not on what beauty currently surrounds them. Others tend to relate themselves more to the fact that these lovely gifts are from God and should be praised because of the way his gifts have uplifted our human spirit. Each writer gives us their own ideals as how to find and appreciate nature’s true gifts.
Wordsworth, William, and Dorothy Wordsworth. Poems by William Wordsworth including Lyrical Ballads, and the Miscellaneous Pieces of the Author, with Additional Poems, a New Preface, and a Supplementary Essay. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown, 1815. Print.
For Wordsworth nature seems to sympathise with the love and suffering. of the persona, i.e. the persona. The landscape is seen as an interior presence rather. than an external scene, i.e. His idea is that emotions are reflected in the tranquillity of the nature. On the contrary, Coleridge says that poetry is.
Wordsworth truly emphasized the influence nature had on human morals and emotion. He spiritualised nature and regarded the environment as a philosophical moral teacher, as a mother and even guardian, as the one true elevating influence that was greater than any other. He believed that between man and Nature there is mutual consciousness and understanding, as well as a spiritual connection. According to him, human beings who grow up in the lap of Nature like he did were the ideal humans, the perfect kind. Above all, Wordsworth emphasized the moral influence of Nature as this pastoral influence. “They are second only to nature, which is "the breath of God." (Wordsworth 221). It was his special characteristic to concern himself, not with the strange and remote aspects of the earth, and sky, but nature in ordinary, familiar, everyday moods.Wordsworth stressed upon the moral influence of Nature and the need of man’s spiritual discourse with it “Great and benign, indeed, must be the power/ Of living nature,” (Wordsworth 167). He did not recognize the scary, hideous side of nature, only its
William Wordsworth’s “Tintern Abbey” is an ideal example of romantic poetry. As the web page “Wordsworth Tintern Abbey” notes, this recollection was added to the end of his book Lyrical Ballads, as a spontaneous poem that formed upon revisiting Wye Valley with his sister (Wordsworth Tintern Abbey). His writing style incorporated all of the romantic perceptions, such as nature, the ordinary, the individual, the imagination, and distance, which he used to his most creative extent to create distinctive recollections of nature and emotion, centered on striking descriptions of his individual reactions to these every day, ordinary things. Tintern Abbey is just an old ruin (William). However, throughout Wordsworth’s poetry, Tintern Abbey becomes something slightly more than a ruin.
In poetry the speaker describes his feelings of what he sees or feels. When Wordsworth wrote he would take everyday occurrences and then compare what was created by that event to man and its affect on him. Wordsworth loved nature for its own sake alone, and the presence of Nature gives beauty to his mind, again only for mind’s sake (Bloom 95). Nature was the teacher and inspirer of a strong and comprehensive love, a deep and purifying joy, and a high and uplifting thought to Wordsworth (Hudson 158). Wordsworth views everything as living. Everything in the world contributes to and sustains life nature in his view.
All in all, throughout all the history of American poetry, we can easily find numerous poems concerning nature from different angles, for nature will never betray a nature-loving heart just as William Wordsworth says.
To conclude, William Wordsworth uses form and syntax and figurative language to stress on his mental journey, and to symbolize the importance of the beauty and peace of nature. In my opinion, the poet might have written this poem to show his appreciation towards nature. The poem has a happy mood especially when the poet is discussing the daffodils. In this poem the daffodils are characterized as more than flowers, but as humans “fluttering and dancing in the breeze” (line 6). In addition, the poet mentioned himself to be part of nature since nature inspires him to write and think. Therefore, the reason that the poet wrote this poem was to express the feeling of happiness in his mental journey in nature.