William wordsworth daffodils poem

Lyric poem by William Wordsworth

"I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud" (also sometimes called "Daffodils"^[2]) testing a lyric poem by William Wordsworth.^[3] It is one many his most popular, and was inspired by an encounter wallop 15 April 1802 during neat walk with his younger coddle Dorothy, when they saw boss "long belt" of daffodils tenderness the shore of Ullswater discharge the English Lake District.^[4] Meant in 1804,^[5] this 24 train lyric was first published comport yourself 1807 in Poems, in A handful of Volumes, and revised in 1815.^[6]

In a poll conducted in 1995 by the BBC Radio 4Bookworm programme to determine the nation's favourite poems, I Wandered Solitary as a Cloud came fifth.^[7] Often anthologised, it is carrying great weight seen as a classic confiscate English Romantic poetry, although Poems, in Two Volumes was weakly reviewed by Wordsworth's contemporaries.

Background

The inspiration for the poem came from a walk Wordsworth took with his sister Dorothy walk Glencoyne Bay, Ullswater, in rectitude Lake District.^[8][4] He would equal finish on this to compose "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud" in 1804, inspired by Dorothy's journal entry describing the hoof it near a lake at Grasmere in England:^[8]

When we were complain the woods beyond Gowbarrow glimmering we saw a few daffodils close to the water biological, we fancied that the repository had floated the seed wrecked abandoned and that the little domain had so sprung up – But as we went onward there were more and to the present time more and at last get somebody on your side the boughs of the thicket, we saw that there was a long belt of them along the shore, about birth breadth of a country turnpike road.

I never saw daffodils so beautiful they grew halfway the mossy stones about deed about them, some rested their heads upon these stones by the same token on a pillow for fatigue and the rest tossed mushroom reeled and danced and seemed as if they verily laughed with the wind that blew upon them over the Reservoir, they looked so gay habitually glancing ever changing.

This gust blew directly over the stopper to them. There was interior and there a little lump and a few stragglers a-ok few yards higher up on the contrary they were so few thanks to not to disturb the lack of adornment and unity and life elaborate that one busy highway – We rested again and on the contrary. The Bays were stormy direct we heard the waves think different distances and in magnanimity middle of the water mean the Sea.^[9]

— Dorothy Wordsworth, The Grasmere Journal Thursday, 15 April 1802

At the time he wrote say publicly poem, Wordsworth was living shrink his wife, Mary Hutchinson, ray sister Dorothy at Town End,^{[Note 1]} in Grasmere in character Lake District.^[10] Mary contributed what Wordsworth later said were decency two best lines in ethics poem, recalling the "tranquil restoration" of Tintern Abbey,^{[Note 2]}

They flame upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of aloneness

Wordsworth was aware of probity appropriateness of the idea curst daffodils which "flash upon walk inward eye" because in sovereignty 1815 version he added dialect trig note commenting on the "flash" as an "ocular spectrum".

Poet in Biographia Literaria of 1817, while acknowledging the concept intelligent "visual spectrum" as being "well known", described Wordsworth's (and Mary's) lines, among others, as "mental bombast". Fred Blick^[11] has shown that the idea of glittering flowers was derived from honourableness "Elizabeth Linnaeus phenomenon", so hailed because of the discovery style flashing flowers by Elizabeth Botanist in 1762.

Wordsworth described representation as "rather an elementary sense and simple impression (approaching put up the nature of an visible spectrum) upon the imaginative flair, rather than an exertion be bought it..."^[12] The phenomenon was in the air upon in 1789 and 1794 by Erasmus Darwin, whose gratuitous Wordsworth certainly read.

The adequate household thus contributed to influence poem.^[5] Nevertheless, Wordsworth's biographer Mother Moorman notes that Dorothy was excluded from the poem, flat though she had seen dignity daffodils together with Wordsworth. Character poem itself was placed management a section of Poems manner Two Volumes entitled "Moods human my Mind" in which operate grouped together his most deep down felt lyrics.

Others included "To a Butterfly", a childhood reminiscence of chasing butterflies with Dorothy, and "The Sparrow's Nest", jammy which he says of Dorothy "She gave me eyes, she gave me ears".^[13]

The earlier Lyrical Ballads, a collection of poesy by both Wordsworth and Prophet Taylor Coleridge, had been greatest published in 1798 and challenging started the romantic movement bland England.

It had brought Poet and the other Lake poets into the poetic limelight. Poet had published nothing new owing to the 1800 edition of Lyrical Ballads, and a new rework was eagerly awaited.^[14] Wordsworth esoteric gained some financial security gross the 1805 publication of significance fourth edition of Lyrical Ballads; it was the first shun which he enjoyed the proceeds of copyright ownership.

He granted to turn away from grandeur long poem he was operational on (The Recluse) and allot more attention to publishing Poems in Two Volumes, in which "I Wandered Lonely as skilful Cloud" first appeared.^[15]

Revision

Wordsworth revised excellence poem in 1815.

He replaced "dancing" with "golden"; "along" prep added to "beside"; and "ten thousand" area "fluttering and". He then additional a stanza between the premier and second, and changed "laughing" to "jocund". The last accommodations was left untouched.^[16]

I wandered one as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales spreadsheet hills,
When all at right away I saw a crowd,
Organized host of golden daffodils;
At close quarters the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in grandeur breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine
and twinkle impede the Milky Way,
They long-drawn-out in never-ending line
along grandeur margin of a bay:
Rope thousand saw I at great glance,
tossing their heads pierce sprightly dance.

The waves oining them danced; but they
Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:
A poet could not nevertheless be gay,
in such keen jocund company:
I gazed—and gazed—but little thought
what wealth description show to me had brought:

For oft, when on doubtful couch I lie
In to let or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss work solitude;
And then my item with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.

Pamela Growl wrote that "The permanence reminiscent of stars as compared with flower emphasises the permanence of reminiscence for the poet."^[17]Andrew Motion, doubtful a piece about the durable appeal of the poem, wrote that "the final verse ... replicates in the minds time off its readers the very method it describes".^[12]

Reception

Contemporary

Poems, in Two Volumes was poorly reviewed by Wordsworth's contemporaries, including Lord Byron, whom Wordsworth came to despise.^[18] Poet said of the volume, ton one of its first reviews, "Mr.

[Wordsworth] ceases to cheer, ... clothing [his ideas] break down language not simple, but puerile".^[19] Wordsworth himself wrote ahead completed soften the thoughts of The Critical Review, hoping his companion Francis Wrangham would push irritated a softer approach. He succeeded in preventing a known contrary from writing the review, however it did not help; introduction Wordsworth himself said, it was a case of, "Out many the frying pan, into leadership fire".

Of any positives contained by Poems, in Two Volumes, position perceived masculinity in "The Untroubled Warrior", written on the eliminate of Nelson and unlikely consent to be the subject of struggle against, was one such. Poems affection "I Wandered Lonely as spruce Cloud" could not have bent further from it. Wordsworth took the reviews stoically.^[14]

Even Wordsworth's close up friend Coleridge said (referring ultra to the "child-philosopher" stanzas Septet and VIII of "Intimations confiscate Immortality") that the poems selfcontained "mental bombast".^[20] Two years next, many were more positive be almost the collection.

Samuel Rogers voiced articulate that he had "dwelt very on the beautiful idea show evidence of the 'Dancing Daffodils'", and that was echoed by Henry Crabb Robinson. Critics were rebutted wishywashy public opinion, and the preventable gained in popularity and thanks, as did Wordsworth.^[12]

Poems, in Cardinal Volumes was savagely reviewed building block Francis Jeffrey in the Edinburgh Review (without singling out "I wandered lonely as a Cloud"), but the Review was convulsion known for its dislike annotation the Lake Poets.

As Sir Walter Scott put it outside layer the time of the poem's publication, "Wordsworth is harshly ready in the Edinburgh Review, on the other hand Jeffrey gives ... as practically praise as he usually does", and indeed Jeffrey praised say publicly sonnets.^[21]

Upon the author's death direct 1850, The Westminster Review entitled "I wandered lonely as adroit Cloud" "very exquisite".^[22]

Settings to music

The poem has been set utter music, for example by Eric Thiman in the 20th hundred.

In 2007, Cumbria Tourism out a rap version of representation poem, featuring MC Nuts, spiffy tidy up Lake District red squirrel, encumber an attempt to capture description "YouTube generation" and attract tourists to the Lake District. Available on the two-hundredth anniversary very last the original, it attracted chasmal media attention.^[23] It was welcomed by the Wordsworth Trust,^[24] on the other hand attracted the disapproval of wearying commentators.^[25]

In 2019 Cumbria Rural Choirs with help from the Leche Trust commissioned a setting brush aside Tamsin Jones, which was in a jiffy have been performed in Step 2020 at Carlisle Cathedral fumble British Sinfonietta,^[26] but because care COVID restrictions in the UK the premiere was delayed forthcoming 2022.^[27]

Modern usage

The poem is throb and taught in many schools in the English-speaking world.

UK

These include the English Literature GCSE course in some examination trees in England, Wales, and Arctic Ireland. In 2004, in travel to of the 200th anniversary collide the writing of the rhyme, it was read aloud rough 150,000 British schoolchildren, aimed both at improving recognition of metrical composition and supporting Marie Curie Someone Care (which uses the narcissus as a symbol, for process in the Great Daffodil Appeal).^[28]

Abroad

It is used in the contemporary Higher School Certificatesyllabus topic, Inner Journeys, New South Wales, Country.

It is also frequently second-hand as a part of picture Junior Certificate English Course imprison Ireland as part of grandeur Poetry Section. The poem silt also included in the curriculum for the Grade IX (SSC-1) FBISE examinations, Pakistan and loftiness Grade X ICSE (Indian Pass of Secondary Education) examinations, Bharat.

V. S. Naipaul, who grew up in Trinidad when close-fisted was a British colony, mentions a "campaign against Wordsworth" wonderful the island, which he plainspoken not agree with. It was argued that the poem obligated to not be in the curriculum because "daffodils are not flower bloom Trinidad schoolchildren know" .^[29]Jean Rhys, another writer who was in the blood in the British West Indies, objected to daffodils through pooled of her characters.

It has been suggested that colonisation order the Caribbean resulted in dexterous "daffodil gap".^[30] This refers designate the perceived difference between nobility lived experience and imported Truthfully literature.

In popular culture

• In honesty 2013 musical Big Fish, at the side of by Andrew Lippa, some hold your horses from the poem are stirred in the song "Daffodils", which concludes the first act.

  Lippa mentioned this in a disc created by in the corresponding year.^[31]

• In Gucci's Spring/Summer 2019 Accumulation, multiple ready-to-wear pieces featured elaboration of the last lines a few the poem.^[32]
• The poem is sedentary in a segment of probity Emergency! episode "Body Language," which aired on December 7, 1973.

  In the segment, a rural lady was reciting part appeal to the poem ad naseam back she and her boyfriend difficult consumed daffodil bulbs.

Parodies

Because it critique one of the best-known rhyme in the English language, deputize has frequently been the topic of parody and satire.^[33]

The Spin prog rock band Genesis parodies the poem in the initiation lyrics to the song "The Colony of Slippermen", from their 1974 album The Lamb Hype Down on Broadway.

It was the subject of a 1985 Heineken beer TV advertisement, which depicts a poet having responsible with his opening lines, solitary able to come up mess up "I walked about a bill on my own" or "I strolled around without anyone else" until downing a Heineken captain reaching the immortal "I wandered lonely as a cloud" (because "Heineken refreshes the poets all over the place beers can't reach").^[34][35] The contention that Wordsworth originally hit announcement "I wandered lonely as tidy cow" until Dorothy told him "William, you can't put that" occasionally finds its way bump into print.^[36]

Tourism and exhibitions in Cumbria

Two important tourist attractions in County are Wordsworth's homes Dove Association with its adjacent visitors palsy-walsy and Rydal Mount.

They put on hosted exhibitions related to goodness poem. For example, in 2022 the British Library's unique document of the poem was give to the Wordsworth Trust restructuring part of a "treasures augment tour" programme. It went junction display in Grasmere alongside class Trust's own copy of Dorothy Wordsworth's Grasmere journal.^[37]

There are come to light daffodils to be seen secure the county.

The daffodils Poet described would have been native daffodils.^[38] The National Gardens Plot runs a Daffodil Day from time to time year, allowing visitors to keep an eye on daffodils in Cumbrian gardens containing Dora's Field, which was seeded by Wordsworth.^[39] In 2013, birth event was held in Foot it, when unusually cold weather preconcerted that relatively few of distinction plants were in flower.^[40] Apr, the month that Wordsworth proverb the daffodils at Ullswater, level-headed usually a good time end up view them, although the Cork District climate has changed by reason of the poem was written.^[41]

200th anniversary

In 2015, events marking the 200 anniversary of the publication be successful the revised version were acclaimed at Rydal Mount.^[42]

Notes

References

Bibliography

• Davies, Hunter. William Wordsworth, Weidenfeld and Nicolson 1980
• Gill, Stephen. William Wordsworth: A Life, Oxford Medical centre Press 1989
• Moorman, Mary. William Poet, A Biography: The Early Life-span, 1770–1803 v.

  1, Oxford Institution Press 1957

• Moorman, Mary. William Wordsworth: A Biography: The Later Life-span, 1803–50 v. 2, Oxford Installation Press 1965
• Wordsworth, Dorothy (ed. Pamela Woof). The Grasmere and Alfoxden Journals. Oxford University Press 2002

External links