‘Composed from Westminster Bridge’ invokes a strong sense of nature into the reader. It is from this that we can see the beauty of Wordsworth’s London. One can argue that it is the purpose of this sonnet to highlight the power of nature and how civilization fits in around it. Primarily this can be seen in the linguistic choices of the Sonnet, particularly the role of personification, the function of phonological features such as rhyme and rhythm and the position of secondary sources. Using this methodology we should be able to explore the awe inspired respect of nature and how the city of London meshes with nature.
Wordsworth makes heavy use of personification within the Sonnet. These personifications animate the city beyond the literal description we encounter into a more natural affair.
‘This city now doth like a garment wear/ The Beauty of the morning; silent, bare.’ To suggest that the city is wearing a garment implied that it is being covered up or censored. We could take this as a sign that nature hides the sins of civilization in the morning time when the people are still asleep. Further more as nature is being worn by civilization we could infer that Wordsworth only takes on this appreciation of the city due to the effects of nature. To prove this we can look at Wordsworth’s description of London in relation its surroundings. The description of London’s ‘Ships, towers, domes, theatres and temples’ in the syndetic list is almost paralleled in the latter line of ‘In his first Splendour valley, rock or hill;’ which is the view of Suckersmith who states that
‘the listed details of the city skyline, 'Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples' find a careful parallel in the features of the natural landscape, 'valley, roc...
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...alden:Blackwell Publishing 2006) p.534-535 All subsequent references are to this edition
Harvey Peter Sucksmith, ‘Ultimate Affirmation: A Critical Analysis of Wordsworth's Sonnet, 'Composed upon Westminster Bridge', and the Image of the City in 'The Prelude’, The year book of English studies 6 (1976) p. 115
Charles V. Hartung, ‘Wordsworth on Westminster Bridge: Paradox or Harmony?’, College English 4 (1952) p.202
Harvey Peter Sucksmith, ‘Ultimate Affirmation: A Critical Analysis of Wordsworth's Sonnet, 'Composed upon Westminster Bridge', and the Image of the City in 'The Prelude’, The year book of English studies 6 (1976) p. 115
C. V. Wicker, ‘On Wordsworth’s Westminster Bridge Sonnet’, The News Bulletin of the Rocky Mountain Modern Language Association 9 (1955) pg.4
Carl Woodring, ‘Nature and Art in the Nineteenth Century’, PMLA 92 (1977)pg. 193
Everett, Nicholas From The Oxford Companion to Twentieth-century Poetry in English. Ed. Ian Hamiltong. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994. Copyright 1994 by Oxford University Press.
One of Anthony Burgess less know works, Five Revolutionary Sonnets, is a section from the novels Inside Mr. Enderby and Ederby Outside. The tone is distinct enough where the reader does not need to look for it. This sonnet takes place where a young man angered man is becoming unsettled with the peace of things surrounding him. He comes across a ‘flame’ that he reads and tells him that he cannot pick up the flower. With him being in a unstable mind he plucks the flower up and a series of actions happen to him, he blinded with color and a shrill of sound makes him disoriented, then all of a sudden he falls. With this sonnet being taken out of a novel it makes it somewhat harder for it to understand the context that surrounds it but overall the
Canfield Reisman, Rosemary M. “Sonnet 43.” Masterplots II. Philip K. Jason. Vol. 7. Pasadena: Salem Press, 2002. 3526-3528. Print.
Five different situations are suggested in "Lines" each divided into separate sections. The first section details the landscape around the abbey, as Wordsworth remembers it from five years ago. The second section describes the five-year lapse between visits to the abbey, during which he has thought often of his experience there. The third section specifies Wordsworth's attempt to use nature to see inside his inner self. The fourth section shows Wordsworth exerting his efforts from the preceding stanza to the landscape, discovering and remembering the refined state of mind the abbey provided him with. In the final section, Wordsworth searches for a means by which he can carry the experiences with him and maintain himself and his love for nature. .
... with Us. Lastly, Wordsworth’s poem London, 1802 also shows his fear of premature mortality of the imagination. All of these works contain his fear of losing imagination and how man should return to nature.
By concurring to the Italian sonnet’s rules and exploiting the room he was left to utilize, not only does Wordsworth create a poem that is both coherent and clever, he leaves the reader with a sense of communion, that he isn’t alone in the world. A brief moment of solace is sometimes all one asks for, and “Nuns Fret Not” has shown us how it’s obtained.
In "Lines Composed a Few Miles Above Tintern Abbey," William Wordsworth explains the impact of Nature from Tintern Abbey in his every day life. "Tintern Abbey" shows the great importance of nature to Wordsworth in his writings, love for life, and religion. The memories he has of Tintern Abbey make even the darkest days full of light.
The poems ‘lines composed on Westminster Bridge’ and ‘London’ are created by William Wordsworth and William Blake respectively. Wordsworth’s work originated in the eighteenth century and he himself lived in the countryside, and rarely visited large cities such as London. This is reflected on his poem, making it personal to his experience in London, however William Blake on the other hand had a vast knowledge of London and was actually a London poet, which allowed him to express his views of London from a Londoner’s point of view. I therefore will be examining comparisons in both poems, as well as their contrasting views of London and the poetic devices used to express their opinions.
Despite his position, Wordsworth can hear the “soft island murmur” of the mountain springs. As “five long winters” suggests, Wordsworth is cold and dreary—London, we must remember, is a bitter place. He longs for the islands: the sand, sun, and warm waters that those murmurs suggest. The coldness of winter could be brought about by Rebecca’s distance from her brother; they had been, at the time of the poem’s writing, separate for five long years. But he can hear reconciliation coming just at the edge of hearing: he can spot the horizon of friendship. But no sooner does friendship appear in the poem than it is thwarted by these lines:
The speaker of “Lines Composed of a Few Miles above Tintern Abbey” is Wordsworth himself. He represents Romanticism’s spiritual view of nature. His poetry is written
..., D. E. (2009, November 7). The Sonnet, Subjectivity, and Gender. Retrieved October 11, 2011, from mit.edu: www.mit.edu/~shaslang/WGS/HendersonSSG.pdf
Canfield Reisman, Rosemary M. “Sonnet 43.” Masterplots II. Philip K. Jason. Vol. 7. Pasadena: Salem Press, 2002. 3526-3528. Print.
Bender, Robert M., and Charles L. Squier, eds. The Sonnet: An Anthology. New York: Washington Square P, 1987.
Durrant, Geoffrey. Wordsworth and the Great System, A Study of Wordsworth’s Poetic Universe. Cambridge: University Printing House, 1970.
Tintern Abbey is just an old ruin (William). However, throughout Wordsworth’s poetry Tintern Abbey becomes something slightly more than a ruin. His poem recognizes the ordinary and turns it into a spectacular recollection, whose ordinary characteristics are his principal models for Nature. As Geoffryy H. Hartman notes in his “Wordsworth’s poetry 1787-1814”, “Anything in nature stirs [Wordsworth] and renews in turn his sense for nature” (Hartman 29). “The Poetry of William Wordsworth” recalls a quote from the Prelude to Wordsworth’s 1802 edition of Lyrical ballads where they said “[he] believed his fellow poets should "choose incidents and situations from common life and to relate or describe them...in a selection of language really used by men” (Poetry). In the shallowest sense, Wordsworth is using his view of the Tintern Abbey as a platform or recollection, however, this ordinary act of recollection stirs within him a deeper understanding. In his elaboration in “Tintern Abbey”, he says “For I have learned to look on nature, not as in the hour of thoughtless youth, but hearing oftentimes the still, s...