William Wordsworth: A Hypertextual Biography
William Wordsworth: A Hypertextual Biography
William Wordsworth was born on April
7, 1770, at Cockermouth on the River Derwent, in the heart of the Lake District
that would come to be immortalized in his poetry. The son of a lawyer named
John Wordsworth, he was the second of five children. His father was the personal
attorney of Sir James Lowther, Earl of Lonsdale, the most powerful (and perhaps
the most hated) man in the area. His first formal education was at Anne Birkett's
school at Penrith, where one of his classmates was his future wife Mary
Hutchinson. Idyllic though his first few years may have been, Wordsworth
wrote very little poetry about his early childhood. (For example, the only
important incident from The Prelude which relates to the Cockermouth
years is the time when Wordsworth, so young he "could scarce hold a bridle,"
becomes separated from his guide and is frightened to discover the semi-legendary
scene of a murderer's execution. This moment is immortalized as a "spot of
time" in Book XII.)
Wordsworth's mother died in 1778. His immediate reaction
to this blow is not known (he treats his mother's death rather coolly, and
rather briefly, in
Book V of The
Prelude), but it should be noted that her death very quickly led to the
disintegration of the Wordsworth household. Raising five children on his
own was too much for John Wordsworth, and William (followed eventually by
all three of his brothers) was sent to school at Hawkshead in 1779. He would
not be reunited with his beloved sister Dorothy for eight years.
Wordsworth thrived at Hawkshead. When the adult Wordsworth
is reflecting on the beneficent influence Nature had on him as a child (The
Prelude I and
II, for example), he is generally referring to the Hawkshead years. Not long
after his arrival, he began to think of Hawkshead as his true home; indeed,
after his father died in 1783, he came to dread the holiday times that would
take him away from school. This no doubt had a great deal to do with
the influence of Ann Tyson, the woman with whom Wordsworth (later jooined
by his brothers)
boarded for the duration of his time in Hawkshead. The "frugal Dame" of
"Nutting" was in
essence a surrogate mother to Wordsworth, providing him with the structured
family life he was missing at home. Also, and perhaps equally important,
she allowed him the freedom to explore at will the natural beauty of the
Lake District.
John Wordsworth died in 1783, leaving the thirteen-year-old
William and his siblings orphans. (This event is described movingly in connection
with a "spot of time" in
Book XII of The
Prelude.) Wordsworth might have expected to have been well provided for,
but after his father's death it came out that the Earl of Lonsdale had owed
his attorney a sum of 4500 pounds. Through a variety of means, the Earl avoided
paying this debt until his death in 1802. (Converting this sum into its current
monetary value would be an interesting project. I would remark that when
Coleridge was given an annuity of 150 pounds a year in 1798, he evidently
considered this sum sufficient for him to devote himself to literature without
fear of starvation. Even divided five ways, 4500 pounds was a lot of money.)
Finding a livelihood for the children was now more urgent than it might have
been, and Wordsworth's uncles, now his guardians, considered many options
for William, with (it would appear) little concern for his own interests.
This brings us to another virtue of Hawkshead. The grammar
school in this small market town was superb, and Wordsworth was given a solid
foundation in Classics, mathematics, and science. The school had a strong
connection with Cambridge, and Wordsworth had exactly the sort of talents
to take advantage of this. His guardians had every reason to feel confident
about his prospects. Of more interest with respect to Wordsworth's later
life, the schoolmaster, a man named William Taylor, encouraged Wordsworth's
first fledgling attempts to write poetry.
As expected, Wordsworth matriculated at Cambridge in
1787. What was unexpected was the way Wordsworth squandered the opportunity
afforded by the university of Spenser, Milton, and Newton. (His lack of interest
in academic honors is discussed in
Book III of The
Prelude.) Wordsworth's uncles envisioned Cambridge as a shortcut to a
successful career as a clergyman or lawyer, but the student was unmtoivated
to work hard toward a career in which he had little interest. His grades
were consistently mediocre, and, when he received his degree in January of
1791, he was in fact no closer to permanent employment than he had been four
years earlier.
If study at Cambridge was not interesting to Wordsworth,
he was nevertheless trying to educate himself in other ways. In the summer
of 1790, before beginning his final term at college, Wordsworth went on a
walking tour of Europe with a friend from school named Robert Jones. The
two arrived in France just in time for the one-year celebration of the French
Revolution. At this point, however, Wordsworth was more interested in aesthetics
than politics, and the real highlight of the tour was the passage of the
famed Simplon Pass, described so movingly in
Book VI of The
Prelude. One of Wordsworth's most important encounters with the natural
sublime, this experience would remain vivid in his memory for many years.
The tour in general represents a high point in Wordsworth's young life, and
he and Jones remained friends. (Thirty years later, when Wordsworth reenacted
the journey, Jones, a bachelor clergyman in Wales, regretted not being able
to join his old friend.)
After graduation, Wordsworth's plans for the future remained
unsettled. In November of 1791, he returned to France, with the very vague
plan of mastering the language preparatory to becoming a traveling tutor.
This time, he stayed in France for a full year, and the impact of the visit
was enormous. Firstly, he became a passionate supporter of the French Revolution,
becoming close friends with Captain Michel Beaupuy (described in glowing
terms in Book IX
of The Prelude). Secondly, he fell in love with Annette Vallon, the
daughter of a surgeon in Orleans. Little is known of how deep their bond
was, and on the surface of it there were plenty of reasons for them not
to get along (she was Catholic and the daughter of a prominent Royalist
family). He may have intended to marry her, but money problems forced him
to return to England in December of 1792. Almost immediately, war broke out
between England and France, and another trip across the Channel would not
be possible until 1802. We can never fully know what Wordsworth's feelings
were about missing the childhood of his daughter Caroline, baptized on December
15, 1792.
The next couple of years were largely unhappy. Wordsworth's
uncles more or less washed their hands of him upon his return from France,
and finding a livelihood became all the more pressing. Personally, the separation
from Annette and his infant daughter must have been a terrible strain.
Politically, Wordsworth was horribly divided, balancing a desire to be loyal
to England with the feeling that, in a sense, his nation was fighting Liberty
itself. He spent much of his time in London, and many of his friends were
radicals, such as Godwin, Wollstonecraft, and Paine. They were not wise choices
for friends: after the beginning of the war, the government cracked down
on dissent, and Paine would eventually be convicted in absentia of seditious
libel for Part 2 of The Rights of Man, which supported the French
Revolution as a "rational" act. In 1793, Wordsworth wrote A Letter to
the Bishop of Llandaff. This work was shockingly radical (in it the execution
of Louis XVI is wholeheartedly supported), but perhaps the most notable thing
about it was that it was not published until after Wordsworth's death. In
the mid-1790s Wordsworth spent time with all the wrong people, and was for
a time a committed radical himself, but, unlike Coleridge and Southey, he
did not publish anything that would come back to haunt him. Really, he did
not publish much of anything at all.
Two things happened in 1795 which helped to give Wordsworth
direction. In January a young friend named Raisley Calvert, whom Wordsworth
had been nursing, died of tuberculosis. In his will, he granted Wordsworth
a legacy of 900 pounds, hoping to encourage his friend to deovte himself
to poetry. In August he met Coleridge, and the two became fast friends.
Explaining the significance of this event is well beyond the scope of this
essay, but most would agree that the "revolution" of 1798 would have been
impossible without it.
Over the next two years, the two young poets grew closer.
In July of 1797, Wordsworth and his beloved sister Dorothy moved to Alfoxden
House, which had the important virtue of being only a few miles from Coleridge's
home at Nether Stowey. This marks the beginning of the so-called "annus
mirabilis," the year of intense creative partnership that would result
in the first edition of Lyrical Ballads. Speaking of themselves and
Dorothy, Wordsworth would later say, "we were three persons with one soul."
Day after day, Wordsworth and Coleridge would write poetry, discuss their
theories on poetry, and comment on each other's poems. Attempts at "cowriting"
were failures, but the thoughts of one would inevitably find their way into
the verse of the other. (For example, it was Wordsworth's idea that the Ancient
Mariner should shoot the Albatross.)
Lyrical Ballads was published on October 4, 1798.
Presumably in recognition of its status as a "collaboration," the work was
released anonymously. The famous "Preface" had not yet been written, and
the literary establishment was largely unaware that war had been declared.
Much has been made of the impact Wordsworth and Coleridge hoped to
have on English letters, but it should also be noted that they needed money.
Coleridge was wanting to travel to Germany to study, and the book helped
pay for the trip. In September of 1798, Coleridge, along with Wordsworth
and Dorothy (who would not like Germany nearly as much as their friend),
left for the Continent.
Coleridge felt that he was learning a great deal about
German philosophy, but the Wordsworths had no such consolation. Lack of fluency
in the language made it difficult to make friends, and the bitterly cold
winter of 1798-99 prevented them from much communing with Nature. Leaving
Coleridge to his studies, they returned to England, and settled in 1799 at
Dove Cottage in Grasmere. Back in their beloved Lake District, the Wordsworths
would happily call Dove Cottage their home for the next eight years.
In 1800, back from Germany, Coleridge moved to Greta
Hall in Keswick, in order to be near his friends. It was a busy time. Wordsworth
was hard at work on the second edition of Lyrical Ballads. Reviews
of the first edition had been mixed, and Coleridge encouraged his friend
to write a preface that would clarify the project. Work on the second edition
would lead to a germ of discord between the two poets, asWordsworth enlarged
his role and diminished that of Coleridge. Wordsworth refused to include
"Christabel," and the 1800 edition, far from the anonymous partnership of
the first, would bear Wordsworth's name and his alone. At this time Wordsworth
was also working on what would become Books I and II of The
Prelude.
A third edition of Lyrical Ballads, with an expanded
"Preface," came out in 1802, but this year would also be significant to
Wordsworth for reasons that had nothing to do with poetry. On May 24 the
Earl of Lonsdale died, allowing Wordsworth and his siblings to finally come
into their inheritance. More importantly, the Peace of Amiens was declared,
ending more than nine years of war with France, and in August Wordsworth
(along with Dorothy) finally met his daughter Caroline. This trip to France
lasted only a month, but the meeting between Wordsworth and Annette appears
to have been amicable. The sight of his daughter inspired one of Wordsworth's
finest sonnets, "It
is a beauteous evening." While in France, he made arrangements to provide
Caroline with thirty pounds a year.
The trip to France provided Wordsworth closure to the
relationship with Annette Vallon, and it is easy to see why this was needed.
Early in the morning of October 4, 1802, Wordsworth married his childhood
friend, Mary Hutchinson. Interestingly, Dorothy did not attend the ceremony;
she was crying on her bed. William and Dorothy Wordsworth were the closest
of siblings, and some writers have suggested an incestuous subtext for their
relationship. In particular, the
"Lucy" poems have
been described as an attempt by Wordsworth to "kill" his improper feelings
for his sister. (No less an authority than Coleridge associates Lucy with
Dorothy.) Eventually Mary and Dorothy would become quite close.
In 1803 the first of Wordsworth's five children was born.
That same year, important friendships were formed with Walter Scott, Sir
George Beaumont, and Robert Southey. (Wordsworth and Southey already knew
each other, but had not been particularly friendly.) It was good that
Wordsworth's circle was expanding, because in April 1804, Coleridge, in poor
health and with a steadily worsening opium addiction, left for an extended
Mediterranean tour. Wordsworth would not see him for two years. 1804 saw
the conclusion of
Ode: Intimations
of Immortality, and a great deal of work on The Prelude. Coleridge
would have been pleased with the Prelude work; he had long believed
that Wordsworth would only achieve the ultimate expression of his greatness
as a philosophical poet through the vehicle of a longer work. Important as
The Prelude was, however, in the background were plans for an even
larger work which the two poets had been discussing for years; but it would
be still more years before Wordsworth did any substantial work on The
Recluse.
Also in 1804, Napoleon declared himself Emperor of France.
Wordsworth's disillusionment with the French Revolution has a long and
complicated progress (going back even to the Reign of Terror), but this is
certainly an important milestone in the poet's turn to conservatism. A decade
earlier, Wordsworth had believed in a Godwinian notion of societal evolution,
feeling that a revolution (even a bloody one) was a necessary precursor
of something better. Now it seemed that France had exchanged one tyrant for
another, a tyrant who seemingly wanted to conquer Europe. The French invasion
of Switzerland justified Wordsworth's apprehension.
In February of 1805, Wordsworth's sailor brother John
drowned. This was a terrible blow, but Wordsworth managed to complete The
Prelude in May. In December of 1806, Coleridge returned, just in time
to help Wordsworth prepare Poems, in Two Volumes for the printer.
As the public only knew Wordsworth for the various versions of Lyrical
Ballads, he rightly considered this edition of his poetry to be important
for establishing his reputation. Included in this edition was Ode: Intimations
of Immortality.
In 1807 the rapidly growing Wordsworth family left Dove
Cottage. Their new house had more room, but Allan Bank never really felt
like home. 1810 was the year of Wordsworth's great quarrel with Coleridge.
When Coleridge moved to London to live with Basil Montagu (whose son was
the inspiration for the poem
"Anecdote for
Fathers"), Wordsworth felt compelled to tell Montagu some unpleasant
things about Coleridge's personal habits, in particular the opium addiction.
When Montagu reported Wordsworth's concerns to Coleridge (evidently in
embellished fashion), Coleridge was deeply hurt, and shunned Wordsworth.
London is a long way from the Lake District, but when Coleridge came home
to visit his family in 1812, and went out of his way not to see his old friend,
Wordsworth became very angry at the snub. Later that year, Wordsworth apologized
for any misunderstanding, and there was at least a superficial healing of
the rift.
Also is 1812, the Wordsworth household was struck by
two tragedies. In June the poet's daughter Catherine died, and in December
his son Thomas. This was certainly one of the most devastating periods in
the poet's life. In May of 1813 the family left Allan Bank for Rydal Mount
at Ambleside, where Wordsworth would spend the rest of his life. A month
earlier Wordsworth had been given the post of Distributor of Stamps for
Westmorland, providing his household with some much needed financial stability.
(When later writers would come to mock Wordsworth's turncoat politics, the
taking of a government job by the former radical would be seen as especially
important, and would lead to Robert Browning's charge that the poet had abandoned
the good fight "just for a handful of silver." 1813, incidentally, is also
the year Robert Southey became the ultimate "establishment" poet by accepting
the office of Poet Laureate.)
Wordsworth's new duties did not prevent him from writing
poetry, and in 1814 part of The Recluse, planned some fifteen years
earlier with Coleridge, was finally published. Entitled The Excursion,
this long blank verse poem was intended to be the second of three parts of
The Recluse. Wordsworth had finally published the sort of long
philosophical poem Coleridge had been sure would guarantee his friend immortality
(The Prelude being still unpublished), and Wordsworth had high hopes
for the volume. The poem received some positive reviews in addition to the
famous negative critique by Francis Jeffrey in the Edinburgh Review
(which began "This will never do"), but on the whole the work was a financial
failure.
The last half of this decade was dominated by politics.
In 1817 a radical early work of Southey's, Wat Tyler, was published,
much to the now-conservative poet's embarrassment. Southey and his fellow
"Lake Poets" Wordsworth and Coleridge were attacked in print (by such people
as William Hazlitt) for having abandoned their youthful ideals, and this
skeleton from Southey's closet did not help matters. (In the subtitle of
The Vision of Judgement, Byron would gleefully refer to Southey as
"the author of Wat Tyler.") Also in 1817, Coleridge would publish
Biographia Literaria, and its detailed recalling of the old days would
provide Wordsworth with some discomfort. In 1819 Wordsworth published a long
poem called Peter
Bell, written in 1798, which he dedicated to Southey. In short order
Shelley responded with a parody enetitled Peter Bell the Third, which
mocked Wordsworth for his change of allegiances. Wordsworth did nothing to
endear himself to the younger generation of poets by campaigning for Tory
politicians in the 1818 and 1820 elections.
From this time onward, Wordsworth would spend a good
deal of time traveling. In 1820, along with Dorothy and Mary, he retraced
the path of the Continental tour he had taken with Robert Jones thirty years
earlier. (On this trip, Mary finally met Annette Vallon.) The 1820s brought
Wordsworth fame, but produced little poetry. As he approached the age of
sixty, he was confronted with the deaths of many of his oldest friends. Between
1825 and 1835, Beaumont, Scott, Coleridge, Charles Lamb, and Robert Jones
all died. In November of 1835, when he read in a newspaper about the death
of his old friend James Hogg, he produced the famous
"Extempore Effusion
on the Death of James Hogg," which recalled Wordsworth's many literary
friendships, and which many consider his last great poem.
The 1830s brought friendships with a new generation of
writers. In 1831 an awestruck John Stuart Mill would meet Wordsworth. In
1833 Wordsworth became acquainted with Emerson, and in 1835 Carlyle. In 1836
he met, separately, Robert Browning and his future wife Elizabeth Barrett.
Though he wrote little that was new, he spent much time revising earlier
works, including The Prelude. For years he had toyed with the
idea of doing new work on The Recluse, but in a new edition of
his poems in 1837 he publicly acknowledged that he had given up
on this.
His fame grew. In 1839 he was named an honorary Doctor
of Civil Law at Oxford, and handed the award for the Newdigate Prize Poem
to a twenty-year-old John Ruskin. In 1840 Queen Adelaide paid a visit to
Rydal Mount. In 1843, on the death of Southey, Wordsworth was named Poet
Laureate. In 1845 he met Tennyson, whose poetry he admired, and the two exchanged
kind and complimentary words. At the time of his death on April 13, 1850,
Wordsworth was widely considered the greatest poet in the world, and a national
institution; Matthew Arnold solemnly announced that "the last poetic voice
is dumb." Later that year, The Prelude was published under a title
suggested by Mary Wordsworth.
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