![]() This childhood idyll was not to continue, however. Wordsworth’s early childhood beside the Derwent and his schooling at Cockermouth are vividly recalled in various passages of The Prelude and in shorter poems such as the sonnet “Address from the Spirit of Cockermouth Castle.” His experiences in and around Hawkshead, where William and Richard Wordsworth began attending school in 1779, would also provide the poet with a store of images and sensory experience that he would continue to draw on throughout his poetic career, but especially during the “great decade” of 1798 to 1808. The intense lifelong friendship between William Wordsworth and his sister Dorothy probably began when they, along with Mary Hutchinson, attended school at Penrith. William attended the grammar school near Cockermouth Church and Ann Birkett’s school at Penrith, the home of his maternal grandparents. The Wordsworth children seem to have lived in a sort of rural paradise along the Derwent River, which ran past the terraced garden below the ample house whose tenancy John Wordsworth had obtained from his employer, the political magnate and property owner Sir James Lowther, Baronet of Lowther (later Earl of Lonsdale). Wordsworth’s deep love for the “beauteous forms” of the natural world was established early. Wordsworth is best known for Lyrical Ballads, co-written with Samuel Taylor Coleridge, and The Prelude, a Romantic epic poem chronicling the “growth of a poet’s mind.” He began writing poetry as a young boy in grammar school, and before graduating from college he went on a walking tour of Europe, which deepened his love for nature and his sympathy for the common man: both major themes in his poetry. The son of John and Ann Cookson Wordsworth, William Wordworth was born on Apin Cockermouth, Cumberland, located in the Lake District of England: an area that would become closely associated with Wordsworth for over two centuries after his death. He is remembered as a poet of spiritual and epistemological speculation, a poet concerned with the human relationship to nature and a fierce advocate of using the vocabulary and speech patterns of common people in poetry. ![]() William Wordsworth perfects this in the poem as he describes his happiness and joy.William Wordsworth was one of the founders of English Romanticism and one its most central figures and important intellects. Poets must use appropriate words in order to comply with the dictates of poetry while enhancing the communication of their feelings and emotions. Additionally, romanticism vouches for the expression of a poet’s inner feelings and emotions. This gives authority to the voice in the poem thus enhancing the emotional description of the thematic issues in the poem. The use of such personal pronouns enables the author to describe his feelings and experiences. “I wandered lonely as a cloud” (line 1) and “When all at once I saw a crowd” (line 3) are some of the basic examples drawn from the poem. William Wordsworth upholds this in the poem as he uses such pronouns as “me”, “I”, “my” and “mine”. Romanticism requires a personal touch with the lyrics in a poem. This way, the poem has a unique emotional appeal, a prerequisite in romanticism (Wordsworth & Suomalainen, 2005). ![]() The vivid description enhances the consumption of the work since it does not only help in the conceptualization of the mental imagery but also portrays the poet’s emotional connection with the themes. The culture of romanticism defined poetry as “emotion recollected in tranquility.” William Wordsworth portrays this in his poetry as he strives to describe the natural scenery in an emotional and personal manner thus portraying his feelings and thoughts. The poet observes the literary and poetic techniques and strategic devices to enhance his personal, natural and emotional presentation of themes. His work, I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud is an artistic masterpiece in which the poet observes the dictates of romanticism in poetry. William Wordsworth is one of the iconic poets who fostered the growth of romanticism.
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