'The Excursion' and Wordsworth's Iconography

Romantic Reconfigurations Studies in Literature and Culture 1780-1850 #5

by Brandon C. Yen

This book considers William Wordsworth’s use of iconography in his long poem 'The Excursion'. Through the iconographical approach, the author steers a middle course between The Excursion’s two very different interpretive traditions, one focusing upon the poem’s philosophical abstraction, the other upon its touristic realism. Fresh readings are also offered of Wordsworth’s other major works, including 'The Prelude'.
Yen explores Wordsworth’s iconography in The Excursion by tracing allusions and correspondences in an abundance of post-1789 and earlier verbal and pictorial sources, as well as in Wordsworth’s prose and poetry. He analyses how the iconographical images in 'The Excursion' contribute to, and impose limitations on, the overarching preoccupations of Wordsworth’s writings, particularly the themes of paradise lost and paradise regained in the post-revolutionary context. Shedding light on a vital aspect of Wordsworth’s poetic method, this study reveals the visual etymologies – together with the nuances and rhetorical capacities – of five categories of apparently ‘collateral’ images: envisioning, rooting, dwelling, flowing, and reflecting.

336 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2018

Reviews

[Lawrence · Rating 3 out of 5]

It’s very odd to be trying to review this on goodreads when I read it in the first place in order to review it for a journal. I feel like three stars is probably too harsh, but my own personal experience of it was in that middling “fine” zone. It is a fear of sense close reading that almost persuades me of its core methodological move, but leaves me oddly feeling like there’s very little argumentative payoff for this depth and intensity of work. Of course given my baseline dislike of Wordsworth the problem could easily be that I’m not too invested in the arguments it’s making. I’ll be chewing on this one further!