The Prelude - William Wordsworth Flashcards
(24 cards)
when was this poem published?
1850
themes?
- power - the power of nature over humans
- nature
- love - the persona loves and enjoys being in nature
- time - about a time in Wordsworth’s life
- place - about how a persona interacts with their surroundings
- man
- death - the metaphorical death of innocence or the end of childhood
poet context
- lived between 1770 and 1850
- an English poet who lived in rural areas such as the Lake District
- had a distant relationship with his father
- his mother died when he was 7 or 8
- he had four siblings and was particularly close with his sister, Dorothy, who was a year younger than him
- he was sent to boarding school
- he lived with his maternal grandparents and uncle in rural Cumbria; he did not get on with them and contemplated suicide
- Wordsworth spent a lot of time outdoors and believed nature could be like a parent or teacher
- was a Romantic poet
- he loved to ice skate, and learned how to do it on Esthwaite lake
- he started to write ‘The Prelude’ in his 20s and he never finished it, even though its 14 books long and was autobiographical
- it focuses on Wordsworth’s childhood and relationship with nature
- ‘The Prelude’ is subtitled ‘the growth of a poet’s mind’
- Romantics connected winter with a counter Enlightenment response as it is a place of instinct, emotion and memory
what is the meaning of this poem?
- this autobiographical poem depicts a young William Wordsworth as he plays out in nature
- we see a glimpse of his negative view of home, as he ‘heeds not the summons’, but mostly see him playing games with his friends, including ice-skating, shown by ‘shod with steel’
- however, the ‘alien’ noises made by nature startle and unsettle him, and the poem ends on an uncertain note
what is the mood of this poem?
- generally, the poem’s mood is one of ‘rapture’, as the young Wordsworth has fun playing ‘games confederate’ as he ice-skates, which was a known hobby of his
- however, towards the end of the poem, the tone is one of ‘melancholy’, as he is startled by the sounds of nature all around him
what was the motivation for the poet to write this poem?
- an iconic Romantic poet, Wordsworth glorifies nature’s potential for enjoyment, which he took advantage of as a child when playing ‘games confederate’
- in line with the Romantic movement, he illustrates nature’s impact on the individual, resulting in a poem that is profoundly emotionally charged; whereas nature is capable of bringing great joy and ‘rapture’, it may also bring about feelings of ‘melancholy’, making this poem an honest celebration of nature
title: ‘Excerpt from The Prelude’
LANGUAGE:
- a prelude is a type of introduction - this could relate to the theme of time (youthfulness and innocence)
- context tells us that this is about Wordsworth’s childhood
- this tells us that this poem is autobiographical
‘frosty season’
‘The cottage windows through the twilight blaz’d’
LANGUAGE:
- contrast between cold (‘frosty’) and heat (‘blaz’d) suggests that nature and ‘the domestic’ are incompatible
- Wordsworth felt severely unhappy at his maternal grandparents house but found immense happiness in nature
‘Was set’
STRUCTURE:
- enjambment emphasises ‘was set’, which could foreshadow the idea of things ending
‘I heeded not the summons’
LANGUAGE:
- the first person persona is presented as rebellious - this could suggest a negative relationship with the domestic which Wordsworth had once his mother had died
- the focus on the individual created by the first person pronoun ‘I’ is a feature of Romantic poetry
- the past tense reflects how the persona is an adult male looking back on childhood
’-‘
‘;’
‘:’
‘,’
STRUCTURE:
- the use of caesura could represent the persona’s passion, excitement and breathlessness
‘happy time’
‘It was a time of rapture’
‘I wheel’d about’
‘exulting’
LANGUAGE:
- the positive tone reflects the persona’s love for and enjoyment of nature
‘Proud and exulting, like an untir’d horse, That cares not for his home’
IMAGERY:
- the persona feels confident, strong and free
- they like and associate with nature
- equine imagery used to compare the persona with the free nature of a horse
‘All shod with steel, We hiss’d along the polish’d ice’
STRUCTURE:
- sibilance reflects the sound of ice-skating
- Wordsworth loved ice skating and maintained it to his old age so this use of sibilance could express Wordsworth’s emotions
LANGUAGE:
- ‘hiss’d’ contains sibilance which imitates the sound of ice skating
‘chace’
‘horn’
‘Pack’
‘hunted’
IMAGERY:
- childhood games are compared to hunting: loud, manic and intrinsically rooted in nature - the persona is connected with nature
‘And woodland pleasures’
‘loud bellowing’
‘we flew’
‘not a voice was idle’
LANGUAGE:
- the positive tone is maintained, as the persona is having fun
‘din’
LANGUAGE:
- negative connotations: too loud, too long, too unpleasant
- volta of poem as tone has shifted to be unsettling
‘the precipices rang aloud, The leafless trees, and every icy crag’
STRUCTURE:
- nature is responding to the children by making the same noise as them, yet it sounds sinister
- ‘leafless’ has connotations of death
‘alien sound’
LANGUAGE:
- suggests a strangeness and unfamiliarity - the persona no longer feels comfortable in nature
- signalling a massive change from the start of the poem
- there is a sadness in the echos which suggests childhood is transitory
‘Of melancholy’
STRUCTURE:
- this stands out by the enjambment - this could be because the change of feeling is both strong and unusual for the persona
- enjambment mimics the movement of ice-skating which is continued throughout the poem
‘The orange sky of evening died away’
IMAGERY:
- the ‘death’ of an evening could represent a loss of innocence or a death for their love for nature
- could also symbolise the death of Wordsworth’s mother that caused him to move in with his grandparents
‘din’
‘Meanwhile’
‘leafless trees’
‘distant hills’
‘tumult’
‘alien sound’
‘melancholy’
‘died away’
LANGUAGE:
- a negative tone is used to show the persona’s change of attitude towards nature
form
- epic form
- autobiography
structure
2 main sections:
- first shows the fun of childhood
- second shows a distinct change
- reflects how humans are distanced from nature
