William Wordsworth was born on April 7, 1770 at Cockermouth Cumberland. He was one of four brothers and had a sister, Dorothy, with whom he was very close to. He survived the death of his mother at age eight, and the death of his father at age thirteen. He went to school at Hawkshead, Lancashire for nine years. It was here that he received and enjoyed a liberal education. From 1787 to 1791 Wordsworth attended St. John’s College, Cambridge.
In the summer of 1970 he toured the Alps and France. It was in France that he became exposed to the revolutionary ideas at the time. A year later he returned to France and associated himself with a moderate faction of the Revolution. While there he fell in love with Annette Vallon and fathered a daughter named Caroline. He returned home a year later carrying with him guilt and remorse for leaving France and spent the next five years rediscovering his identity as an Englishman and as a poet.
Through this hard time he relied on his sister, Dorothy, greatly. Three years later, William met Samuel Tayor Coleridge, who proved to be the catalyst in William’s recovery. With Colredige’s help, Wordsworth was able to publish his first book in 1798 as Lyrical Ballads, With a Few Other Poems. Historically, this volume of work was considered the most important in English Literature since the Renaissance. It sparked the poetry of the inner self.
As the intellectual concept of the inner self grew, english literature began to incorporate nature into its works. Wordsworth made the decisive step when instead of choosing a subject to write a poem about, he chose his own subjectivity.
In 1799 at Grasmere, he settled with his sister, Dorothy; Coleridge settled close by. He became happily married in 1802, yet misfortune came upon him. In 1805 his eldest brother drowned. In 1810 Coleridge and he ended their friendship in a terrible quarrel. Two of his children died in 1812. From 1807 onward, his poetry swiftly declined.
Included in Lyrical Ballads, With a Few Other Poems was a poem titled "Expostulations and Reply". The poem reflects Wordsworth’s theory that nature is the best teacher. He saw nature as something holy and pure. He felt that by meditating on the natural world one could attain a spiritual understanding of what was good.
Bibliography:
Bloom, Harold and Lionel Trilling, eds.The Oxford Anthology of English Literature. New York:Oxford University Press, 1973.
Hudson, William Henry, ed.Wordsworth and His Poetry. London: George G. Harrap & Co, Ltd., 1918.