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1770-1850, English poet of the early Romantic movement.
1770-1850, English poet of the early Romantic movement. [[Poet Laureate]].  


== Life ==
Life:


William Wordsworth was born on 7 April 1770. His parents John and Ann Wordsworth lived in Cockermouth back then, a small town in Cumberland, England. Working as an attorney and later appointed law agent and land stewart (Masson 5), William's father had good connections in society despite his very young age (Gill 1). At the age of seven, William, his three brothers and his sister Dorothy lost their mother in March 1778. John Wordsworth died six years later at the age of 42. Together with his older brother Richard, William was sent to Hawkshead boarding-school in Lancashire after Ann Wordsworth died, until he was seventeen.
William Wordsworth was born in Cockermouth (England). He was the second of five children. William's sister Dorothy was born a year after him and was a poet and diarist. The two were very close and Dorothy plays an important role in some of William's works. As William's father travelled a lot, he was not very close to him. His relationship with his mother was better.


From 1787 on he attended St. John’s College, Cambridge. However, the young man could not quite adapt to the system. "He found himself imprisoned within ancient walls, and required to submit to the diginified authority that is based on old systems and older traditions" (Masson 15). As Wordsworth quickly lost his serious academic interest at college, he decided to go to France in 1790. There he got into contact with the enthusiasm of the French Revolution and republican ideas. [http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/647975/William-Wordsworth]
Wordsworth first went to a school in Cockermouth, after which he attended a school in Penrith. After his mother died, his father sent him to Hawkshead Grammar School in Lancashire. His sister Dorothy was sent elsewhere [where precisely?], which is why William and Dorothy did not see each other for nine years. In 1787, Wordsworth attended St John's College in Cambridge. He received his BA degree in 1791.


In France he met Annette Vallon, who gave birth to their daughter Caroline in 1792. They did not marry and the outbreak of the war between France and Britain disrupted their relationship. William did not meet his daughter before she was nine years old. Back in Cambridge William did not follow any career options - except for writing - rather he developed a resistance "to having his life shaped for him by those he did not like and in ways he could not approve" (Gill 40).
In 1792 he met [where? in France or Britain? If in France: what did Wordsworth do there?] a French woman called Annette Vallon, with whom he also fell in love. Their daughter Caroline was born in 1792. Due to the strained relations between Great Britain and France [this is too nicely put. Please be more precise], Annette and William did not marry. He later married Mary Hutchinson.
"Unprepared for any profession, rootless, virtually penniless, bitterly hostile to his own country’s opposition to the French, he lived in London in the company of radicals like William Godwin and learned to feel a profound sympathy for the abandoned mothers, beggars, children, vagrants, and victims of England’s wars who began to march through the sombre poems he began writing at this time." [http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/647975/William-Wordsworth]


His reunion with his sister [[Dorothy Wordsworth]] in 1795 ended his dark period. The siblings moved to Alfoxden House, near Bristol. At that time his friendship with poet [[Samuel Taylor Coleridge]] developed, which "would change both poets’ lives and alter the course of English poetry"[http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/647975/William-Wordsworth].
In 1802 William married Mary Hutchinson, a childhood friend.[http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/647975/William-Wordsworth] They had three sons and two daughters.


He then returned to England to marry Mary Hutchinson, a childhood friend, and start an English family, which had grown to three sons and two daughters by 1810.
William Wordsworth collaborated with Samuel Taylor Coleridge on the famous collection of poems ''Lyrical Ballads'' (1798). His poetry is characterised by a deep connection with nature. Themes such as memory, childhood and the influences of the natural environment are often dealt with in his works. He believed in the transformative power of nature and sought to capture the emotional and spiritual impact of the natural world on the human soul.


== Works ==


William Wordsworth's works can be roughly divided into two phases: "the young Romantic revolutionary and the aging Tory humanist"[http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/647975/William-Wordsworth].
Works [please adapt to MLA style]:


, risen into what John Keats called the “Egotistical Sublime.” Little of Wordsworth’s later verse matches the best of his earlier years.
- I Wandered Lonely As a Cloud


- The Solitary Reaper


- Expostulation and Reply


== Reflection ==
- The Tables Turned


- To the Cuckoo


- To a Butterfly


== References ==
- There was a Boy


"William Wordsworth." Encyclopædia Britannica. 2010. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. 25 Jan. 2010 <http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/647975/William-Wordsworth>.
- Three Years She Grew in Sun and Shower


Gill, Stephen. ''William Wordsworth. A Life''. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1989.
- The World Is Too Much With Us


Masson, Rosaline. ''Wordsworth''. London: T.C. & E.C. Jack, 1912.
- It Is a Beauteous Evening, Calm and Free


Wordsworth, Jonathan, Michael C. Jaye, and Robert Woof eds. ''William Wordsworth and the Age of English Romanticism''. 2nd ed. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1988.
- The Simplon Pass
 
- Goody Blake and Harry Gill
 
- London, 1802
 
- England! The Time Is Come
 
 
Sources [please adapt to MLA style]:
 
Borgmeier, R. (2004). Wordsworth, William. In: Engler, B., Kreutzer, E., Müller, K., Nünning, A. (eds) Englischsprachige Autoren. J.B. Metzler, Stuttgart. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-476-02951-5_112
 
Kohl, S. (2015). William Wordsworth. In: Kindler Kompakt: Englische Literatur, 19. Jahrhundert. J.B. Metzler, Stuttgart. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-476-05527-9_6
 
https://internetpoem.com/william-wordsworth/biography/

Latest revision as of 20:22, 4 January 2024

1770-1850, English poet of the early Romantic movement. Poet Laureate.

Life:

William Wordsworth was born in Cockermouth (England). He was the second of five children. William's sister Dorothy was born a year after him and was a poet and diarist. The two were very close and Dorothy plays an important role in some of William's works. As William's father travelled a lot, he was not very close to him. His relationship with his mother was better.

Wordsworth first went to a school in Cockermouth, after which he attended a school in Penrith. After his mother died, his father sent him to Hawkshead Grammar School in Lancashire. His sister Dorothy was sent elsewhere [where precisely?], which is why William and Dorothy did not see each other for nine years. In 1787, Wordsworth attended St John's College in Cambridge. He received his BA degree in 1791.

In 1792 he met [where? in France or Britain? If in France: what did Wordsworth do there?] a French woman called Annette Vallon, with whom he also fell in love. Their daughter Caroline was born in 1792. Due to the strained relations between Great Britain and France [this is too nicely put. Please be more precise], Annette and William did not marry. He later married Mary Hutchinson.


William Wordsworth collaborated with Samuel Taylor Coleridge on the famous collection of poems Lyrical Ballads (1798). His poetry is characterised by a deep connection with nature. Themes such as memory, childhood and the influences of the natural environment are often dealt with in his works. He believed in the transformative power of nature and sought to capture the emotional and spiritual impact of the natural world on the human soul.


Works [please adapt to MLA style]:

- I Wandered Lonely As a Cloud

- The Solitary Reaper

- Expostulation and Reply

- The Tables Turned

- To the Cuckoo

- To a Butterfly

- There was a Boy

- Three Years She Grew in Sun and Shower

- The World Is Too Much With Us

- It Is a Beauteous Evening, Calm and Free

- The Simplon Pass

- Goody Blake and Harry Gill

- London, 1802

- England! The Time Is Come


Sources [please adapt to MLA style]:

Borgmeier, R. (2004). Wordsworth, William. In: Engler, B., Kreutzer, E., Müller, K., Nünning, A. (eds) Englischsprachige Autoren. J.B. Metzler, Stuttgart. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-476-02951-5_112

Kohl, S. (2015). William Wordsworth. In: Kindler Kompakt: Englische Literatur, 19. Jahrhundert. J.B. Metzler, Stuttgart. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-476-05527-9_6

https://internetpoem.com/william-wordsworth/biography/

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