Ode intimations to immortality

 is the second of five children born to John
Wordsworth and Ann Cookson on 7 April
1770 in Wordsworth House in Cockermouth,
Cumberland—part of the scenic region in
Northwest England, the Lake District.
 his mother died when he was 8 years old
 spent his free days and sometimes “half the
night” in the sports and rambles
 also found time to read voraciously in the books owned by his young master,
William Taylor who encouraged him in his inclination to poetry.
 His father, John Wordsworth, died when he was 13 years
 He took his degree on 1791 at St Johns College, Cambridge
 Wordsworth became a fervent “democrat” and proseleyte of the French
Revolution – which seemed to him, as to many other generous spirit, to promise
a “glorious renovation”.

 he had a love affair with Annette Vallon the
impetuous and warm-hearted daughter of a
French surgeon at Blois.
 It seems clear that Wordsworth and
Annette planned to marry, despite
their difference in religion and
political inclinations (Annette
belongs to an Old Catholic family
whose sympathies were royalist).
 Wordsworth and Annette had a daughter named Caroline – lack of funds forced
Wordsworth back to England.
 The outbreak of war between England and France made it impossible for him
to rejoin Annette until they had drifted so far apart in sympathies that a
permanent union no longer seemed desirable.
 His suffering, his near collapse, and the successful effort, after his sharp break
with his past, to re-establish “a saving intercourse with my true self”, are the
experiences that underlie many of his greatest poems.

 He settled in a rent-free cottage at Racedown,
Dorsetshire, with his beloved sister, Dorothy,
who now began her long career as confidante,
inspirer and secretary;
 At the same time Wordsworth met Samuel
Taylor Coleridge; two years later he moved to
Alfoxden House, Somersetshire, to be near
Coleridge, who lived four miles away at Nether
Stowey.
 Even he had been an undergraduate at Campbridge, Coleridge had detected signs of
genius in Wordsworth’s rather conventional poem about his tour in the Alps,
Descriptive Sketches, published in 1793. Coleridge hailed Wordsworth
unreservedly as “the best poet of the age”.
 The two poet collaborated in some writings and freely trade thoughts and passages
for others; and Coleridge even undertook to complete a few poems that
Wordsworth had left unfinished.

 The result of their joint efforts was a small
volume, published anonymously in 1798,
Lyrical Ballads, with a Few Other Poems.
It opened with Coleridge’s Ancient Manner,
included three other poems by Coleridge, a
number of Wordsworth ‘s verse anecdotes and
psychological studies of human people;
 Lyrical Ballads sold out in two years, and Wordsworth published over his own
name a new edition , dated 800, to which he added a second volume of poems,
in close consultation with Coleridge;
 In 1802 Wordsworth finally came into his father’s inheritance and amicable
settlement with Annette Vallon, married Mary Hutchinson, a lake country
woman whom he had known since childhood.

 The course of his existence after that time
was broken by various disasters: the
drowning in 1805 of his favorite brother
John, a sea captain whose ship was wrecked
in the storm; the death of two of his five
children in 1812; a gradual estrangement
from Coleridge, culminating in an open
quarrel (1810) from which they were not
completely reconciled for almost two
decades; and from the 1830s on, the physical
and mental decline of his sister, Dorothy.
 In 1813, an appointment as Stamp Distributor (revenue collector) for
Westmorland was concrete evidence of his recognition as a national poet.
Gradually his residences, as he moved into more commodious quarters, became
standards stops for tourists; he was awarded honorary degrees and, in 1843,
appointed poet laureate.
 He died in 1850 at the age of eighty; only then his executors published his
masterpiece “The Prelude”- autobiographical poem which he had written in
two parts in 1799, expanded to its full length in 1805, and then continued to
revise almost to the last decade of his long life.

 Wordsworth is above all the poet of the
remembrance of things past, or as he
himself put it, of “emotion recollected
in tranquility”. Some object or event in
the present triggers a sudden renewal
of feelings he had experienced in
youth; the result is a poem exhibiting
the sharp discrepancy between what
Wordsworth called “two
consciousness”: himself as he is now
and himself as he is once was.
 Occasionally in his middle and later life a jolting experience would revive the
intensity of Wordsworth remembered emotion and also his earlier poetic
strength.
 The moving sonnet Surprised by Joy, was written in his forties at the
abrupt realization that time was beginning to diminish his grief at the death
some years earlier of his little daughter Catherine.

Major Works
 Lyrical Ballads, with a Few Other Poems (1798)
"Simon Lee"
"We are Seven“
"Lines Written in Early Spring"
"Expostulation and Reply"
"The Tables Turned"
"The Thorn"
"Lines Composed A Few Miles above
Tintern Abbey"
 Lyrical Ballads, with Other Poems (1800)
Preface to the Lyrical Ballads
"Strange fits of passion have I known"
"She Dwelt among the Untrodden Ways"
"Three years she grew"
"A Slumber Did my Spirit Seal"
"I travelled among unknown men"
"Lucy Gray"
"The Two April Mornings"
"Nutting"
"The Ruined Cottage"
"Michael"
"The Kitten At Play"
 Poems, in Two Volumes (1807)
"Resolution and Independence"
"I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud" Also known
as "Daffodils"
"My Heart Leaps Up"
"Ode: Intimations of Immortality"
"Ode to Duty"
"The Solitary Reaper"
"Elegiac Stanzas"
"Composed upon Westminster Bridge,
September 3, 1802"
"London, 1802"
"The World Is Too Much with Us"
 Guide to the Lakes (1810)
 " To the Cuckoo "
 The Excursion (1814)
 Laodamia (1815, 1845)
 The Prelude (1850)

Ode
Intimations of
Immortality from
Recollections of Early
Childhood
By: William
Wordsworth

The Child is Father of the Man;
And I could wish my days to be
Bound each to each by natural piety.
There was a time when meadow, grove, and stream,
The earth, and every common sight,
To me did seem
Apparelled in celestial light,
The glory and the freshness of a dream.
It is not now as it hath been of yore;--
Turn wheresoe’er I may,
By night or day,
The things which I have seen I now can see no more.

The rainbow comes and goes,
And lovely is the Rose,
The doth with delight
Look round her when the heavens are bare,
Waters on a starry night
Are beautiful and fair;
The sunshine is a glorious birth;
But yet I know, wher’er I go,
That there hath past away a glory of the earth.

Now, while the birds thus sing a joyous song,
And while the young lambs bound
As to the tabor’s sound,
To me alone there came a thought of grief:
A timely utterance gave the thought relief,
And I again am strong:
The cataracts blow their trumpets from the steep;
No more shall grief of mine the season wrong;
I hear the Echoes through the mountains throng,
The Winds come to me from the fields of sleep,
And all the earth is gay;
Land and sea
Give themselves up to jollity,
And with the heart of May
Doth every Beast keep holiday;--
Thou child of Joy,
Shout round me, let me hear thy shouts, thou happy
Shepherd-boy!

Ye blessed Creatures, I have heard the call
Ye to each other make; I see
The heavens laugh with you in your jubilee;
My heart is at your festival,
My head hath its coronal,
The fulness of your bliss, I feel– I feel it all.
Oh evil day! If I were sullen
While Earth herself is adorning,
This sweet May-morning,
And the Children are culling
On every side,
In a thousand valleys far and wide,
Fresh flowers; while the sun shines warm,
And the Babe leaps up on his Mother’s arm:--
I hear, I hear, with Joy I hear!
--But there’s a Tree, of many, one,
A single Field which I have looked upon,
Both of them speak of something that is gone:
The Pansy at my feet
Doth the same tale repeat:
Whither is fled the visionary gleam?
Where is it now, the glory and the dream?

Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting:
The Soul that rises with us, our life’s Star,
Hath had elsewhere its setting,
And cometh from afar:
Not in entire forgetfulness,
And not in utter nakedness,
But trailing clouds of glory do we come
From God, who is our home:
Heaven lies about us in our infancy!
Shades of the prison-house begin to close
Upon the growing Boy,
But He beholds the light, and whence it flows,
He sees it in his joy;
The Youth, who daily farther from the east
Must travel, still in Nature’s Priest,
And by the vision splendid
Is on his way attended;
At length the Man perceives it die away,
And fade into the light of common day.

Earth fills her lap with pleasures of her own;
Yearnings she hath in her own natural kind,
And, even with something of a mother’s mind,
And no unworthy aim,
The homely Nurse doth all she can
To make her Foster-child, her Inmate Man,
Forget the glories he hath known,
And that imperial palace whence he came.

Behold the Child among His new-born blisses,
A six years’ Darling of a pigmy size!
See, where ‘mid work of his own hand he lies,
Fretted by sallies of his mother’s kisses,
With light upon him from his father’s eyes!
See, at his feet, some little plan or chart,
Some fragment from his dream of human life,
Shaped by himself with newly-learned art;
A wedding or a festival,
A mourning or a funeral;
And this hath now his heart,
And unto this he frames his song:
Then will he fit his tongue
To dialogues of business, love, or strife;
But it will not be long
Ere this be thrown aside,
And with new joy and pride
The little Actor cons another part;
Filling from time to time his “humorous stage”
With all the Persons, down to palsied Age,
That life brings with her in her equipage;
As if his whole vocation
Were endless imitation.

Thou, whose exterior semblance doth belie
Thy Soul’s immensity;
Thou best Philosopher, who yet dost keep
Thy heritage, thou Eye among the blind,
That, deaf and silent, read’st the eternal deep,
Haunted for ever by the eternal mind,--
Mighty Prophet! Seer blest
On whom those truths do rest,
Which we are toiling all our lives to find,
In darkness lost, the darkness of the grave;
Thou, over whom thy Immortality
Broods like the Day, a Master o’er a Slave,
A Presence which is not to be put by;
Thou little Child, yet glorious in the might
Of heaven-born freedom on thy being’s height,
Why with such earnest pains dost thou provoke
The years to bring the inevitable yoke,
Thus blindly with thy blessedness at strife?
Full soon thy Soul shall have her earthly freight,
And custom lie upon thee with a weight,
Heavy as frost, and deep almost as life!

O joy! That in our embers
Is something that doth live,
That nature yet remembers
What was so fugitive!
The thought of our past years in me doth breed
Perpetual benediction: not indeed
For that which is most worthy to be blest;
Delight and liberty, the simple creed
Of Childhood, whether busy or at rest,
With new-fledged hope still fluttering in his breast:--
Not for these I raise
The song of thanks and praise;
But for those obstinate questionings
Of sense and outward things,
Fallings from us, vanishings;
Blank misgivings of a Creature
Moving about in worlds not realised,
High instincts before which our mortal Nature
Did tremble like a guilty Thing surprised:
But for those first affections,
Those shadowy recollections,
Which, be they what they may,
Are yet the foundation light of all our day,
Are yet a master of light of all our seeing;
Upholds us, cherish, and have the power to make
Our noisy years seem moments in the being
Of the eternal Silence: truths that wake,
To perish never;
Which neither listlessness, nor mad endeavour,
Nor Man nor Boy,
Nor all that is at enmity with joy,
Can utterly abolish or destroy!
Hence in a season of calm weather
Though inland far we be,
Our Souls have sight of that immortal sea
Which brought us hither,
Can in a moment travel thither,
And see the Children sport upon the shore,
And hear the mighty waters rolling evermore.

Then sing, ye Birds, sing, sing a joyous song!
And let the young Lambs bound
As to the tabor’s sound!
We in thought will join your throng,
Ye that pipe and ye that play,
Ye that through your hearts to-day
Feel the gladness of the May!
What though the radiance which was once so bright
Be now for ever taken from my sight,
Though nothing can bring back the hour
Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower;
We will grieve not, rather find
Strength in what remains behind;
In the primal sympathy
Which having been must ever be;
In the soothing thoughts that spring
Out of human suffering;
In the faith that looks through death,
In years that bring the philosophic mind.

And O, ye Fountains, Meadows, Hills, and Groves,
Forebode not any severing of our loves!
Yet in my heart o hearts I feel Your might;
I only have relinquished one delight
To live beneath your more habitual sway.
I love the Brooks which down their channels fret,
Even more than when I tripped lightly as they;
The innocent brightness of a new-born Day
Is lovely yet;
The clouds that gather round the setting sun
Do take a sober colouring from an eye
That hath kept watch o’er man’s mortality;
Another race hath been, and other palms are won.
Thanks to the human heart by which we live,
Thanks to its tenderness, its joys, and fears,
To me the meanest flower that blows can give
Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears.

Who is speaking?
 An adult/ a man who reflects his
attitudes towards nature (William
Wordsworth)
To whom is the speaker speaking?
 to the reader who are also
unconscious of their behavior
towards nature

What is the situation?
The poem split into three movements, the first
of 4 stanzas discusses or concerns about lost
vision (inability to see divine glory of nature, the
problem of the poem), the second of 4 stanzas
describes how age causes man to lose sight of the
divine (negative response to the problem), and
the third of 3 stanzas is hopeful in that the
memory of the divine allows us to sympathize
with our fellow man (positive response to the
problem).

What is the speaker’s tone?
 the poem had a change of
tone in every stanza;
 each of the first three stanzas
has a mixture of joy and grief,
but after having found a
compensation for that loss, the
poet is now able to celebrate
the spirit of May.

What does it
convey in
every stanza?

Stanza I
The speaker declares that once
natured appeared mystical to him. It
was like a dream; now that feeling
has disappeared. It says that for all
his attempts he can’t see the things
in the manner he used to.

Stanza I
The Child is Father of the Man;
And I could wish my days to be
Bound each to each by natural piety.
To me did seem
By night or day,
 The author says wistfully and
said that “ there was a time”
(childhood) when all of the
nature seemed dreamlike to
him (“Apparelled in celestial light”).
 what is described is the poets
lamentation on not being able
to see any more the glory and
freshness of a dream that his
childhood had (“The things which I
have seen no more”).

StanzaII
The speaker confess that though the
natural objects like rainbow, the rose,
the moon, and the sun are still
visible to him, and he accepts that
they are still beautiful there is
definitely something missing.

Stanza II
Look round her when the heavens are
bare,
That there hath past away a glory of
the earth.
• The speaker says that
even though he can
still see the rainbow,
the rose, the moon,
and the sun, and even
though they are still
beautiful, something is
different… something
has been lost. “But yet I
know, wher’er I go, thatthere
hathpast away a glory of the
earth”.

Stanza III
The speaker says that the singing of the
birds and the jumping of the lambs
saddens him. However, he says that he is
determined not to be depressed because
it will mar(spoil) the beauty of nature
in the season. He asserts that the whole
earth is happy, and he inspires the
shepherd boy to shout.

Stanza III
To me alone there came a thought of grief:
A timely utterance gave the thought relief,
And I again am strong:
No more shall grief of mine the season wrong;
Land and sea
Thou child of Joy,
Shepherd-boy!
While listening to the birds sing
in springtime and watching the
young lambs leap and play, he
suddenly becomes sad and
fearful (“To me alone there camea
thought of grief”): but this sadness
doesn’t last long, because the
soul of nearby waterfalls, the
echoes of the mountains…
restored him to strength. He end
saying that all the earth is gay,
because of that he urge strongly
a shepherd boy to play around
him.

Stanza IV
 The speaker declares that it would not be
right if he remained aloof in that season. He
continues to be a part of the delight of the
season. In spite of sharing the joy of the
season, he says that when he sees a tree, a
field, and a pansy at his feet he again feels
that something is wrong. He does not find
the shine of the visions and he does not see
any glory.

Stanza IV
Ye blessed Creatures, I have heard the call
Ye to each other make; I see
The heavens laugh with you in your jubilee;
My heart is at your festival,
My head hath its coronal,
The fulness of your bliss, I feel– I feel it all.
Oh evil day! If I were sullen
On every side,
In a thousandvalleys far and wide,
Fresh flowers; while the sun shines warm,
And the Babe leaps up on his Mother’s arm:--
I hear, I hear, with Joy I hear!
--But there’s a Tree, of many, one,
A single Field which I have looked upon,
Both of them speak of something that is gone:
The Pansy at my feet
Doth the same tale repeat:
Whither is fled the visionary gleam?
Where is it now, the glory and the dream?
• The speaker continues to be a part of
the joy of the season, saying that it
would be wrong to be sad (“While Earth
herself isadorning,andthe children areculling
onevery side, in thousandvalleys forandwide”).
• He declares it is impossible to feel
sad in such a beautiful May morning,
with children playing around him
among the flowers. Although,
suddenly, he looks at a tree and a
field which said to each other that
something is gone. The same is made
by a pansy. Because of that he asked
himself what has happened to
appearance of nature (“wither isfledthe
visionarygleam? Whereisit now,the gloryand
the dream?”).

Stanza V
 Stanza V is highly significant, for it has the most
emphatic and famous line of the poem: “ Our birth is but a
sleep and a forgetting”. He says in our infancy we have some
memory of heaven but with our growth the
connection is lost. He says that if there is a
connection like the children have, we can enjoy
nature more beautifully.

Stanza V
Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting:
The Soul that rises with us, our life’s Star,
Hath had elsewhere its setting,
And cometh from afar:
Not in entire forgetfulness,
And not in utter nakedness,
But trailing clouds of glory do we come
From God, who is our home:
Heaven lies about us in our infancy!
Shades of the prison-house begin to close
Upon the growing Boy,
But He beholds the light, and whence it flows,
He sees it in his joy;
The Youth, who daily farther from the east
Must travel, still in Nature’s Priest,
And by the vision splendid
Is on his way attended;
At length the Man perceives it die away,
And fade into the light of common day.
• Contains the most famous lines
in the poem:”Ourbirth is buta sleep
and a forgetting”. Wordsworth says
that human beings are asleep
and should forget important
things. He goes on to say that
as infants we have some
memory of heaven, but as we
grow we lose that connection
with heaven causes us to
experience nature’s glory more
clearly. Once we are grown, the
connection is lost.

Stanza VI
The speaker turns philosophically and
says that soon after our arrival on
the earth, everything around us
conspires to make us forget about
the place whence we came.
Here the place alludes to heaven.

Stanza VI
And, even with something of a mother’s mind,
The homely Nurse doth all she can
To make her Foster-child, her Inmate Man,
And that imperial palace whence he came.
as soon as we get to
earth, everything
conspires to help us
forget the place we
came from: heaven.
“Forget the glories he hath,and
thatimperialpalace whencehe
came’.

Stanza VII
Imagining about a six year old boy, the speaker
foresees the rest of his life. According to the
speaker the child will learn through experience
he/she gets, but most of his efforts will be
just the imitation. According to the speaker he
believes that his entire life will necessarily be
“endless imitation”.

Stanza VII
A wedding or a festival,
A mourning or a funeral;
And this hath now his heart,
And unto this he frames his song:
Then will he fit his tongue
To dialogues of business, love, or strife;
But it will not be long
Ere this be thrown aside,
And with new joy and pride
The little Actor cons another part;
Filling from time to time his “humorous stage”
With all the Persons, down to palsied Age,
That life brings with her in her equipage;
As if his whole vocation
Were endless imitation.
• The author is looking at a six year old
boy, and imagines his life and the
love that his parents feel fort him.
Wordsworth describes the way in
which a young boy leaves nature,
because he has to deal with
adulthood and a whole different kind
of life. That is reflected when he sees
the boy playing with some imitated
fragment of adult life (“little planorchart”,
“awedding ora festival”,“amourning ora
funeral”).He says that the child will
learn from his experiences, but that
he will spend most of his effort on
imitation: “andwithnew joy,“the little actor
consanotherpart”.At the end, the author
says that all life is an imitation.

Stanza VIII
The speaker addresses to the child
directly and the calls the child who
happens to be so close to heaven during
its early years wants to grow quickly into
an adult.

Stanza VIII
Thou, whose exterior semblance doth belie
Thy Soul’s immensity;
Thou best Philosopher, who yet dost keep
Thy heritage, thou Eye among the blind,
That, deaf and silent, read’st the eternal deep,
Haunted for ever by the eternal mind,--
Mighty Prophet! Seer blest
On whom those truths do rest,
Which we are toiling all our lives to find,
In darkness lost, the darkness of the grave;
Thou, over whom thy Immortality
Broods like the Day, a Master o’er a Slave,
A Presence which is not to be put by;
Thou little Child, yet glorious in the might
Of heaven-born freedom on thy being’s height,
Why with such earnest pains dost thou provoke
The years to bring the inevitable yoke,
Thus blindly with thy blessedness at strife?
Full soon thy Soul shall have her earthly freight,
And custom lie upon thee with a weight,
Heavy as frost, and deep almost as life!
• The poet addresses the boy as
if he was a prophet of the lost
truth (“Mighty Prophet! SeerBlest! On
whom those truths do rest”).
• He speaks directly to the child,
calling him a philosopher.
• The speaker cannot
understand why the child, who
is so close to heaven in his
youth, would rush to grow into
adult. He ask him, “Why with such
earnest pains dost thou provoke/ The
years to bring the inevitable yoke,/ Thus
blindly with thy blessedness at strife?”

Stanza IX
 longest in the poem
 has 38 lines
 According to the declaration made by the
speaker, he experiences immerse joy, realizing
that his memory will enable him to always
connect to his childhood and through
childhood he would be able to be connected
to nature.

Stanza IX
O joy! That in our embers
Is something that doth live,
That nature yet remembers
What was so fugitive!
The thought of our past years in me doth breed
Perpetual benediction: not indeed
For that which is most worthy to be blest;
Delight and liberty, the simple creed
Of Childhood, whether busy or at rest,
With new-fledged hope still fluttering in his breast:--
Not for these I raise
The song of thanks and praise;
But for those obstinate questionings
Of sense and outward things,
Fallings from us, vanishings;
Blank misgivings of a Creature
Moving about in worlds not realised,
High instincts before which our mortal Nature
Did tremble like a guilty Thing surprised:
But for those first affections,
Those shadowy recollections,
Which, be they what they may,
Are yet the foundation light of all our day,
Are yet a master of light of all our seeing;
Upholds us, cherish,and have the power to make
Our noisy years seem moments in the being
Of the eternal Silence: truths that wake,
To perish never;
Which neither listlessness, nor mad endeavour,
Nor Man nor Boy,
Nor all that is at enmity with joy,
Can utterly abolish or destroy!
Hence in a season of calm weather
Though inland far we be,
Our Souls have sight of that immortal sea
Which brought us hither,
Can in a moment travel thither,
And see the Children sport upon the shore,
And hear the mighty waters rolling evermore.
The speaker experiences a flood of joy when he realizes that through memory
he will always be able to connect to his childhood, and through his childhood to
nature.

Stanza X
The speaker speaks to the creatures he had
mentioned in the opening part of the poem and
tells them to sing a song of joy. He confesses
that growing out of his childhood, there is
definitely some loss of the glory of nature, but
he feels solace(comfort) because he has
knowledge and he can rely on his memory which
will take him back to his childhood.

Stanza X
We in thought will join your throng,
Ye that through your hearts to-day
Feel the gladness of the May!
What though the radiance which was once so bright
Be now for ever taken from my sight,
Though nothing can bring back the hour
Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower;
We will grieve not, rather find
Strength in what remains behind;
In the primal sympathy
Which having been must ever be;
In the soothing thoughts that spring
Out of human suffering;
In the faith that looks through death,
In years that bring the philosophic mind.
• After that thoughts, he has become
very happy, because of that he
urges the birds to sing, and urges all
creatures to participate in what he
says “Thegladness ofthemay”.Then,
again, he is stricken by the thought
that he is old now, but that sad
doesn’t last too long because with
the thought that he has been with
nature all the years makes him
happy again, because he has a lot of
recollections of his childhood with
the nature so, he can feel the joy
like he felt before.

Stanza XI
The speaker accepts that nature
gives support to everything to his
life. It is the stem of everything. It
brings him insight, and fill his
memories and his belief that his soul
is never going to die, it is immortal.

Stanza XI
I only have relinquished one delight
To live beneath your more habitual sway.
I love the Brooks which down their channels fret,
Even more than when I tripped lightly as they;
Is lovely yet;
Another race hath been, and other palms are won.
Thanks to the human heart by which we live,
Thanks to its tenderness, its joys, and fears,
To me the meanest flower that blows can give
Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears.
nature still the stem of
everything in his life,
bringing him insight,
fueling his memories and
his belief that his soul is
immortal: “Tome the meanest
flower that blows can give /
Thoughts thatdo often lie too
deep for tears?
• Wordsworth claims that
he will in love with it
until he dies.

Imagery: Stanza I
To me did seem
By night or day,
 the poet describes a picture of nature such that you
can almost picture them in is dream.

Imagery: Stanza II
Look round her when the heavens are bare,
That there hath past away a glory of the earth.
The poet continues to describe these natural figures
as his experienced during childhood that will never
be repeat anymore

Imagery: Stanza III
………………………………………………………………………..
………………………………………………………………………………
Land and sea
Thou child of Joy,
Shepherd-boy!
The poet picture out the
singing of the birds and the
jumping of the lambs
He also describes that the
whole earth is happy, and he
inspires the shepherd boy to
shout.

Imagery: Stanza IV
On every side,
In a thousand valleys far and wide,
Fresh flowers; while the sun shines warm, (lines 43-48)
………………………………………………………………….
The Pansy at my feet (line 54)
 The speaker declares it is impossible to feel sad in such a
beautiful May morning, with children playing around him
among the flowers.
 The same is made by a pansy.

Imagery: Stanza VII
 Thespeaker isimaginingabouta six yearold boy,andforesees the rest of his life.
 Thespeaker states thatthechild will learn throughexperience he/she gets,but mostofhis
efforts will be just the imitation.
 thespeaker believes thathis entire life will necessarily be“endless imitation”.
Lines 85-92:

Imagery: Stanza X
 Thespeaker speaks tothe creatureshe had mentioned in the opening part
ofthe poem and tells them tosing a song of joy.
Lines 168-170

Imagery: Stanza XI
…………………………………………………………….
Is lovely yet;
 Thespeaker accepts that naturegives support to everythingto his life. It is the
stem of everything. It brings him insight, and fill his memories and hisbelief that
his soul is nevergoing to die, it is immortal.

Theme
Wordsworth identifies the poem’s principal theme as the “Immortality
of the Soul”.
According to Wordsworth, the poem emerges from two
recollected feelings of a childhood: the lost vividness of sense
objects, which appear different to the adult poet from how they
appeared to him as a child; and the child’s inability to accept his
own mortality and to reconcile the fact of his own death with the
world around him.

Word/s: Phrase/s Denotation Connotation
As to the tabor’s sound Like the sound of a small
drum
Timely utterance The sounds of nature, such
as wind and waterfalls
Eternal mind God
Life’s star soul sun
Mighty Prophet! Seer Blest The one who declares
publicly a message that one
believes has come from God
or a god; a person who
predicts the future
The little child
palms Palms leaves worn as symbols of victory

Word/s: Phrase/s Denotation Connotation
My head hath its coronal Circlet of flowers, with
which the shepherd boys
trimmed their hats in May.
homely Suggesting home life Simple and friendly
fretted irritated
Moving about in worlds not
realised,
Not seeming real

Metaphor-Comparison between unlike things
without using like, as, or than
Thecataracts blow their trumpets from the steep (line 25)
(Comparison of waterfallsto musicians)
The Soul that rises with us, our life's Star
(line 60)
(Comparison of the soul to a guiding star)

Personification-Comparison of a thing to a person
The Moon doth with delight
Look round her when the heavens are bare (lines 12-13)
(Theselines compare the moon to a person experiencing delight)
Land and sea
Give themselves up tojollity (lines 30-31)
(These lines compare the land and the sea to jolly persons)
And, even with something of a mother's mind,
The homely nurse doth all she can
To make her foster-child, her Inmate Man,
And that imperial palace whence he came. (lines 78-85)
(This stanza compares earth to a woman—in particular, to a mother and a nurse)

Synecdoche-substitution of a part to stand
for the whole, or the whole to stand for a part
Thoueyeamong the blind (line 112)
("Eye" represents a child who guides adults)

Alliteration-repetition of consonant word
 From God, who is our home
(line 66)
 Behold the Child among his new-born blisses
(line 86)
 See, at his feet, some little plan or chart,
Some fragment from his dream of human life
(lines 91 and 92)

Ye that through your hearts to-day (lines 177-178)
Anaphora-Repetition of a word, phrase, or clause
at the beginning of word groups occurring one after
the other.

Apostrophe-Addressing an abstraction or a thing,
present or absent, or addressing an absent person or entity
And O yeFountains, Meadows, Hills, and Groves,
Forebode notany severing of our loves! (lines 192-193)

Paradox-Contradictory statement used
to express a truth
Thoseshadowy recollections,
Which, be they what they may, (line 155)
Are yet the fountain-lightof all our day,
Are yet a master-lightof all our seeing
(Shadows are a source of light)

Meter and Feet
 Wordsworth uses iambic feet throughout the
poem.
 in the fifth line of the first stanza, the first
two syllables (The GLOR) make up the first
iambic foot, and the second two syllables (y
AND) make up the second iambic foot.
........1..............2.................3................4.................5
The GLOR..|..y AND..|..the FRESH..|..ness OF..|..a
DREAM.
 The meter of the poem varies from dimeter to
hexameter.

Rhyme
 The poem uses end rhyme and
internal rhyme.
 The pattern of the end rhyme
varies.
 for example, the difference
between the rhyming pattern
of the first stanza and that
of the second.

There was a time when meadow, grove, and stream, a
The earth, and every common sight, b
To me did seem a
Apparell'd in celestial light, b
The glory and the freshness of a dream. a
It is not now as it hath been of yore;— c
Turn wheresoe'er I may, d
By night or day, d
The things which I have seen I now can see no more. c
The rainbow comes and goes, a
And lovely is the rose; a
The moon doth with delight b
Look round her when the heavens are bare; c
Waters on a starry night b
Are beautiful and fair; c
The sunshine is a glorious birth; d
But yet I know, where'er I go, e
That there hath pass'd away a glory from the earth. d

Wordsworth uses internal rhyme carefully but to good
effect.
But yet I know, where'er I go (line 17)
Fallings from us, vanishings; 147 (line 147)
Which, be they what they may, (line 155)
Though inland far we be (line 167)

Wordsworth believed that, upon being born, human beings move from a
perfect, idealized realm into the imperfect, un-ideal earth. As children, some
memory of the former purity and glory in which they lived remains, best
perceived in the solemn and joyous relationship of the child to the beauties
of nature. But as children grow older, the memory fades, and the magic of
nature dies. Still, the memory of childhood can offer an important solace,
which brings with it almost a kind of re-access to the lost purities of the
past. And the maturing mind develops the capability to understand nature
in human terms, and to see in it metaphors for human life, which
compensate for the loss of the direct connection.

 Wordsworth’s poems initiated the Romantic era by
emphasizing feeling, instinct, and pleasure above formality
and mannerism. He gave expression to undeveloped human
emotion.
“Intimations of Immortality” is one of his most important
works, together with “The Prelude” and “Lyrical Ballads”. The
Ode deals with childhood’s lost connection with nature as
human beings get old. That connection only can be preserved
in memory.
When we are children, we are innocent, we like to play, we
haven’t got problems; but when we are adult, we have to deal
with problems in the job, in the family… because of that we
forget the good and beautiful things of our childhood.

I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o’er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd
A host of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.
Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the milky way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced; but they
Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:
A poet could not but be gay,
In such a jocund company:
I gazed—and gazed—but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:
For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.

Who is speaking?
 William Wordsworth
 to the reader

 The poet is reminiscing his past while lying
in his couch the time when he saw many
daffodils in the woods of Lake District.
What is the speakers tone?
 the poem goes through a gradual shift of
tone, from wandered lonely (line 1) to but
be gay (happy) (line 15), and pleasures
fills.

What does it
convey in
every stanza?
Stanza I
The speaker presents his wandering
over the valleys and hills, lonely as a
cloud. At one place he sees a large
number of daffodils covering a very
vast stretch of land. He says that
flowers were fluttering and dancing in
the breeze.

Lines 1-2
I wandered lonely as a cloud
The speaker describes how he walked around and felt as
lonely as a cloud. He doesn’t say “walked around”, but
uses the much more descriptive word “wandered”.
Wandered means roaming around without a purpose like
when you explore something
the speaker is projecting his own loneliness on the clouds

Lines 3-4
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Suddenly (all at once), the speaker sees a group of daffodil
flowers. We tend to think as daffodils as “yellow”, but he uses
the more majestic-sounding word “golden”.
He calls them a crowd, so they must be packed tightly
together. Then he elaborates on “crowd” by adding the noun
“host”.
“Host” and “crowd” mean pretty much the same thing. A
“crowd” is associated with groups of people, while “host” is
associated with angels, because people often refer to a “host
of angels”. Coupled with the description of their angelic
“golden” color, we seem to be dealing with some very special

Lines 5-6
He sees the daffodils beside a lake and underneath
some trees. It’s a breezy (windy) day, and the flowers
“flutter” and “dance” on their stems.
“Fluttering” suggests flight, which could bring us to the
angels or even birds or butterflies. “Dancing” is
something that usually only humans do.

What does it
convey in
every stanza?
StanzaII
The speaker gives more details about the
flowers. He says that those flowers reminded
him of the Milky Way. He says that there
were so many flowers and the scene seemed
too infinite; thousands of flowers were tossing
their heads while dancing joyfully.

Lines 7-8
The poet emphasizes that there are a whole lot of
daffodils; more daffodils than he has probably ever
seen before;
The flowers stretch “continuously”, without a break like
the stars in the Milky Way, each one gleaming like a
star.

Lines 9-10
Like the Milky Way galaxy, the flowers are roughly
concentrated in a line that seems to stretch as far as
the eye can see (“ never-ending”). The flowers line
the shore (“margin”) of a bay of the lake, which must
be a relative large lake.

Lines 11-12
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.
The speaker takes in “ten thousand” dancing flowers at
once.
The flowers “toss their heads” while dancing to the wind. By
“heads” we think he means the part of the flower with the
petals, the weight of which causes the rest of the flowers to
bend.
“Sprightly” means happily or merrily. The word derives from
“sprite”, which refers to the playful little spirits that people
once thought inhabited nature. “Sprites” are supernatural
beings, almost like fairies.

What does it
convey in
every stanza?
StanzaIII
The speaker says that the flowers were
dancing beside the lake. He says that the
dance of the flowers was better than the
sparkling waves of the lake. He says that a
poet can only be happy in such a joyous
surroundings. He says that he stayed their
for a long time but during that period he
just continued to observe.

Lines 13-14
The waves beside them danced; but they
The waves also dance in the breeze, but the daffodils
seem happier than the waves.
The entire scene has suddenly been invested with a joyful
human-like presence. Since waves do not bring as much
joy as the yellow flowers, the flowers “out-did” the waves
with their happiness.
The waves “sparkle”, which creates yet another
association with the stars. Everything seems to be
gleaming, twinkling, shining and sparkling.

Lines 15-16
A poet could not but be gay,
In such a jocund company:
Despite his earlier loneliness, the speaker now can’t help
but feel happy, or “gay”, with such a beautiful vision to
look at.
Or, as he puts at, with such joyful and carefree ("jocund")
"company" to hang out with. The flowers and waves feel
like companions to him. They are all pals.

Lines 17-18
I gazed--and gazed--but little thought
The repetition of "gaze" tells us that he kept looking at
the flowers for a long time. It's as if the speaker enjoys
looking at these daffodils at the time, but doesn’t realize
exactly how great of a gift he has just received with this
vision.
Apparently, the speaker doesn't think that he fully
appreciated the vision at the time.
The word "wealth" expresses a more permanent kind of
happiness.

What does it
convey in
every stanza?
StanzaIV
The speaker says that when he is lying
on a couch and he is feeling lonely, the
scene comes back to his mind and his
heart is filled with joy. His heart
begins to dance with the daffodils.

Lines 19-20
For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
First, he sets the scene: he often sits on his couch, kind of
feeling blah about life, with no great thoughts and sights.
Sometimes his mind is empty and "vacant," like a bored
teenager sitting on the sofa after school and trying to
decide what to do. At other times he feels "pensive,"
which means he thinks kind-of-sad thoughts.

Lines 21-22
They flash upon that inward eye
So, often when our speaker gets in these downer moods,
the image of the daffodils "flashes" through his mind.
 The "inward eye" expresses what Wordsworth felt to be a
deeper, truer spiritual vision. A person cannot share his or
her own spiritual vision completely with others, and so it is
a form of "solitude." But its truth and beauty make it
"blissful."

Lines 23-24
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils
When the memory of the flowers and the lake flashes into
his head, he feels happy again. It’s almost like the same
experience he had while "wandering" through nature at
the beginning of the poem, when the real daffodils pushed
the loneliness out of his head.
His heart is set to dancing, just like the flowers. He
dances along "with" them – they are his cheerful
companions once again.

Imagery: Stanza I
And twinkle on the Milky Way
the poet paints a wonderful picture of daffodils such that you can
almost picture them in the breeze

Imagery: Stanza II
The poet continues to describe what he and hissister saw at Lake District
and he compares daffodils to the stars that shine

Imagery: Stanza IV
“For oft when on my couch I lie”
The poet isreminiscing his experienced at Lake District while he
was lying on a couch

Themes:
1. Nature' s beautyupliftsthe humanspirit.
A poet could not but be gay, (line 15)
And then my heart with pleasure fills, (line 23)
And dances with the daffodils (line 24)
2. People sometimes failto appreciatenature's wondersas theygo about theirdailyroutines.
I gazed--and gazed--but little thought
3. Nature bloomsunattended. The daffodils bloomin splendoralongthe shore of the lake
without the need for human attention.
.

Personification-Comparison of a thing to a person
Line 1-2: I wandered lonely as a cloud
 Comparison ofthe cloud to a lonely human
Lines 3-4: When all at once I saw a crowd,
 Thedaffodils arepersonified as a crowd of people. This personification
will continuethroughoutthe poem.
Lines 6: Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.
 Daffodils cannotactually "dance,"so Wordsworthis ascribing
to them anaction that is associated with people.

Lines 12: Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.
Thepersonification ofthe daffodils becomes more specific. The"heads"ofthe
daffodils are thepart ofthe flower with the petals. It is largerand heavier than the
stem, and so it bobs in a breeze
Lines 13-14: The waves beside them danced; but they
Thewaves also get in on some of thedancing action,
butthedaffodils arenot to be out-done –theyare
happier thanthe waves.

Metaphor
Lines 21-24: They flash upon that inward eye
Wordsworthimagines the daffodils in his spiritual vision, forwhich he
usesthe metaphor of an"inward eye." His heartdanceslike a person,
too.
Lines 3-4: When all at once I saw a crowd,
Comparison of daffodils to a crowd of people
Lines 4 and 6: A host of golden daffodils;
Comparison of daffodils to dancing humans

Simile
Line1: I wandered lonely as a cloud
Comparison (using as) of the speaker's solitariness to that of a
cloud
Lines 7-8: Continuous as the stars that shine
Comparing the shape and numberof the daffodils to the
band of stars that we call the Milky Way Galaxy.

Hyperbole- exaggeration
Line 9: They stretched in never-ending line
The speaker says that the line of daffodils is "never-ending,"
but we know this can’t be strictly true:all good things come to
an end.
Line 11: Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
 We cannot count the flowers that are packed together
in a glance

Alliteration-repetition of consonant word
lonely as a cloud (line 1).
high o'er vales and Hills (line 2).
When all at once (line 3).
(Note that the w and o have the same consonant sound.)
Beside the Lake, beneath the trees, (line 5)

Structure and Rhyme Scheme
The poem contains four stanzas of six lines each. In each
stanza, the first line rhymes with the third and the second with
the fourth. The stanza then ends with a rhyming couplet.
Meter
The lines in the poem are in iambic tetrameter, as
demonstrated in the third stanza.
Enjambment (line 13-14)
 “The waves beside them danced; but they
Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:”

..........1..............2..................3...................4
The WAVES.|.be SIDE.|.them DANCED;.|.but THEY
......1................2..................3................4
Out-DID.|.the SPARK.|.ling WAVES.|.in GLEE:—
....1.............2.............3.............4
A PO.|.et COULD.|.not BUT.|.be GAY
......1.............2...........3............4
In SUCH.|.a JOC.|.und COM.|.pa NY:
.......1................2..................3.................4
I GAZED—.|.and GAZED—.|.but LIT.|.tle THOUGHT
...........1....................2............3...............4
What WEALTH.|.the SHOW.|.to ME.|.had BROUGHT:
 In the first stanza, line 6 appears to veer from the metrical
format. However, Wordsworth likely intended fluttering to be
read as two syllables (flut' 'RING) instead of three so that the line
maintains iambic tetrameter

Nature should be highly appreciated;
Nature can pushed the loneliness out
of your head;
To Wordsworth, the memory of the
daffodils is as good as the real thing.
Whenever you are feeling kind of
upset, just think of nature and you
can find joy thinking of it (thinking
about your experienced in nature
makes you feel comfortable).

The world is too much with us; late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers:
Little we see in Nature that is ours;
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!
This Sea that bares her bosom to the moon;
The winds that will be howling at all hours,
And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers;
For this, for every thing, we are out of tune;
It moves us not.—Great God! I’d rather be
A pagan suckled in a creed outworn;
So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,
Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;
Have sight of Proteus rising the sea;
Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn.

Who is speaking?
 To the people
 The poet (William Wordsworth)
What is the speakers tone?
angry
 The persona of the poem accuses the
modern age of having lost its connection to
nature and to everything meaningful.

 Thespeaker regretsthat the world is excessively fuelofhumanthings and they
are wasting theirpowers, going away from nature.He saysthat humanshave
given their heartssomewhere else and that is sad.
 According to the speaker, sea, winds, and almost everything that is present in
naturehasmaintained a powerful connection, but humanhas taken him away
from that.
 Thespeaker usesthe phrase“out oftune”to show that humansarenot living in
harmonywith nature:He saysthat theyare not involved in naturein the way
they should.
 Thespeaker saysthat hewould ratherbe a pagan who follows a worn out
system ofbelief ifhewere said to be outoftunewith nature.
 He saysthat even a pagan is able to seethe thingswhich would bring some
hyappiness to him. Healludes tothe sea gods, Proteusand Triton.

Imagery
Lines 5-7
This Sea that bears her bosom to the moon;
And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers
 The poet paints his comparison to a woman and of the
moontoa person whosees the woman

Imagery
Lines 12-14
So might I standing in this pleasant lea,
Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;
Have sight of Proteus rising the sea;
Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn.
We can picture out that in these lines Wordsworth is yelling
angrily standing on the shore

Theme
Society is so bent on making andspending money
in smokyfactoriesandfast-pacedbusiness
enterprisesthat it ignores the pristineglory of
nature, which is a reflectionof the divine.
( a universaltheme that remainsin today’s world)

Word/s, phrase/s Denotation Connotation
Sordid boon Shameful gain; tarnished
blessing
Late and soon Our fixation on materialism
has been a problem in the
past and will continue to be
a problem in the future.
Suckled in a creed outworn Brought up in an outdated
religion

Alliteration
Line 1: The world is too much with us
Line 2: we lay waste our powers
Line 4: We have given our hearts away
Line 5: bares her bosom
Line 6: The winds that will be howling

Metaphor
Line 4: We have given our hearts away
(Comparison ofheartstoattentionor concernortoenthusiasmor life)
Line 10: suckled in a creed outworn
Comparisonofcreedtoamother nursingherchild

Oxymoron - a form of paradox that
compares contradictory words.
Line 4: sordid boon.
 shameful gain; tarnished
blessing.

Personification
Line 5: The Sea that bares her bosom to the
moon
Comparisonoftheseatoawoman andofthemoon toaperson who
seesthewoman

Simile
Lines 6-7:
And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers
Comparisonofthewindstoflowers

Structure
The World Is Too Much With Us is a Petrarchan sonnet that is
structured as an octave (eight lines) and a sestet (six lines).
The octave often proposes a problem or concern that the sestet
resolves or otherwise engages. The ninth line – the first line of
the sestet – marks a shift in the direction of the poem and is
called the "turn" or the volta (Italian).
Rhyme Scheme
The rhyme scheme of the octave is ABBA ABBA, while the rhyme
scheme of the sestet is more flexible; two of the most common is
CDCDCD.

Enjambment
Lines 9-10
It moves us not.--Great God! I'd rather be
A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn;

 The poet is highly disappointed with the
humanity andhe is readyto choose a
different way which connectshim to
nature.
 We can say that all our activities are
graduallytaking us away from nature.

Ode intimations to immortality

Ode intimations to immortality

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