Tintern Abbey And Frost At Midnight Analysis

Amanda Lutick
Professor Raitt
2 November 2014
British Literature II The Idea of the Imagination in “Tintern Abbey” and “Frost at Midnight”
At the end of the eighteenth century and moving into the nineteenth, the Romantic era emerges in Europe. The Romantic imagination is captured by the revolutionary change of this period, namely the French Revolution. However, political and social reform extends to England as well inspiring Romantics including Wordsworth and Coleridge. In addition to the revolutionary spirit of the Romantic era, the Romantics also concern themselves with the natural world. Wordsworth and Coleridge both write on the natural world in “Tintern Abbey” and “Frost at Midnight”, respectively. Specifically, they redefine the relationship

By again experiencing now what he did five years ago, Wordsworth’s imagination is able to bring together both of these experiences. Therein, Wordsworth is operating on another level within his imagination: “Almost suspended, we are laid asleep / In body, and become a living soul / While with an eye made quiet by the power / Of harmony, and the deep power of joy / We see into the life of things” (NAEL, D, 289, ll.47-49). Here, his revisiting of Tintern Abbey stirs in him an explicitly greater understanding of the world. In thinking on the “body” and “living soul”, Wordsworth perceives the “deep power of joy” in this oneness of the universe. At the heart of this oneness, Wordsworth describes nature as “the anchor of my purest thoughts, the nurse / the guide, the guardian of my heart, and the soul / Of all my moral being” (NAEL, D, 291, ll.109-111). Through his journey into the imagination, Wordsworth claims nature to be his moral compass. He delves into the Romantic imagination through nature and finds a greater understanding of the world and his place in

For Wordsworth in “Tintern Abbey”, this means wanting his sister to experience the same experiences that he has had with nature. Coming out of his introspective state, Wordsworth suddenly shifts focus onto his sister: “My dear, dear Sister! and this prayer I make / Knowing that Nature never did betray…” (NAEL, D, 291, ll.121-22). Wordsworth leverages his past experience with nature that “never did betray” and wishes his sister to do the same. Given his certainty in the goodness of nature, Wordsworth asks that his sister remember him and their shared experiences at Tintern Abbey: “Therefore let the moon / Shine on thee in thy solitary walk…If solitude, or fear, or pain, or grief / Should be thy portion, with what healing thoughts / Of tender joy wilt thou remember me…” (NAEL, D, 291, ll.134-145). Even when Wordsworth is no longer there, he wants his sister to experience nature and wants her to remember him by it. In projecting his understanding of the world onto his sister, Wordsworth passes on his knowledge of the goodness of nature in the hopes that it care for