Selected Poems (Wordsworth, William)

by William Wordsworth

One of the most enduringly popular of the Romantic poets, William Wordsworth epitomized the spirit of his age with his celebration of the natural world and his belief in the importance of feeling. This volume brings together a rich selection from the most creative period of Wordsworth’s life— from “Tintern Abbey,” an ode on the restorative powers of nature written during his intense friendship with Coleridge, to excerpts from his epic autobiographical poem, The Prelude . Also included are much-loved short works such as “I wandered as lonely as a Cloud,” “Composed Upon Westminster Bridge,” and the poignant “Lucy Gray.” These poems demonstrate Wordsworth’s astonishing range, power, and inventiveness, and the sustained and captivating vision that informed his work.

Genres: Poetry, Classics

352 pages, Kindle Edition

Published March 29, 2005

About the author

William Wordsworth (1770-1850) was a major English romantic poet who, with Samuel Taylor Coleridge, helped launch the Romantic Age in English literature with their 1798 joint publication, Lyrical Ballads.

Wordsworth's masterpiece is generally considered to be The Prelude, an autobiographical poem of his early years, which the poet revised and expanded a number of times. The work was posthumously titled and published, prior to which, it was generally known as the poem "to Coleridge". Wordsworth was England's Poet Laureate from 1843 until his death in 1850.

Reviews

[Chad · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have had this book sitting on my shelf for decades. I bought it at Barnes and Noble when I worked there as a bookseller in high school. The poetry shelf was one of my favorites, and I tried to buy the complete (or "selected", if they didn't sell complete) works of every dead poet I could find. But while I had this obsession to collect all these poetry collections, I didn't have the dedication to read them all. In fact, it was a challenge to read them at all because poetry is HARD.

Fast forward to today, I decided to give Wordsworth a try, but I used a different approach. Instead of trying to read it all in one go, I reserved a poem or two for a quiet moment before bed, or when I had some extra time. It worked great, and over a couple of months I was able to get through them all.

Wordsworth is a pleasure to read. He will spend stanzas describing a beautiful scene, which you might expect in a Romantic. But then he will also describe the tragic death of a young girl in the snow, or a young woman mourning the death of an infant after she was raped, or a blind beggar with a sign around his neck describing his plight. The poems can be dark and harrowing too, you find that the past is a foreign land when things were so very different. Wordsworth is more honest in portraying this era than any period drama could, and he focuses on the everyday, shepherds, beggars, and children. There are a few times when I felt he was full of himself a bit too much and his calling as a poet-- he has written his autobiography in blank verse at the end, and lines like this made me roll my eyes, when he is writing about his days at Cambridge:

So was it with me in my solitude;
So often among multitudes of men.
Unknown, unthought of, yet I was most rich,
I had a world about me; 'twas my own,
I made it; for it only lived to me,
And to the God who looked into my mind.
Such sympathies would sometimes shew themselves
By outward gestures and by visible looks.
Some called it madness: such, indeed, it was,
If child-like fruitfulness in passing joy,
If steady moods of thoughtfulness, matured
To inspiration, sort with such a name;
If prophesy be madness; if things viewed
By Poets in old time, and higher up
By the first men, earth's first inhabitants,
May in these tutored days no more be seen
With disordered sight...

But despite this, I came away moved by the thoughtfulness in small things, and wish to better live an examined life. Do you have to be a poet to think on the small things like this? That seems to be the takeaway, and I am saddened that I'm already done with the book!

[Tyler · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bought because I wanted to read The Ruined Cottage, which did rule

[Julia Koncurat · Rating 5 out of 5]

The poetry is fire but, ngl, it's kinda giving me an existentsial crisis and I generally try to avoid those.

[James Hartley · Rating 5 out of 5]

On a school trip to Dove Cottage, just to make my friends laugh, I belly-flopped onto Wordsworth's bed and think I broke a leg or two.
Having got that out of the way, I think Wordsworth is one of my favourite poets of all time, certainly among British poets. Much like Stevie Wonder, at his best he is simply brilliant - a writer who can take you out of time and place, especially to the past - but who, at his worst, is utter dogshit. But then, aren't we all?
The good people at Penguin are not silly enough to pick through pages and pages of crap for the odd gem, so what we have here is essentially a Greatest Hits. But what a Greatest Hits! This is a Wilson Pickett, Madonna type of Greatest Hits, all killer, no filler - stuffed to the brim with unrhymed iambic pentameter bangers - and they're not all romantic bollocks, either. There's something here for everyone because Wordsworth's themes were universal.
As with Agatha C, Cezanne, Lope de Vega and even Shakespeare, the great names sell tea-towels these days but at their heart these people were world changers for a reason: they changed the world THEN. They sang new songs, saw the world in new ways but - and here's the rub - they did it in a fucking thrilling way, putting letters and words in order to make them sing and make that singing resound with the listener/reader/watcher.
We all have the ideas the greats do, all think about the same things but not many of us have the talent, eloquence and heart to get the fuckers down and nail them like these people (and yes, many more) did and do.
Wordsworth nailed it. End of.
Who hasn't been somewhere in nature (here it's the River Wye for him) and felt this -

"How oft, in spirit, have I turned to thee,
O sylvan Wye! thou wanderer thro' the woods,
How often has my spirit turned to thee!"

In spirit, baby, in spirit - yes, we are spiritual, even the most money grabbing among us who worship cash saints.

And who CAN'T see the poet, alone, as a boy, slipping out of home - hearing the call of the wild - running out into the countryside to find/steal a boat in the night and going out on it onto a lake, alone, not really knowing why?

"No sooner had I sight of this small Skiff,
Discover'd thus by unexpected chance,
Than I unloos'd her tether and embark'd.
The moon was up, the Lake was shining clear
Among the hoary mountains; from the Shore
I push'd, and struck the oars and struck again
In cadence, and my little Boat mov'd on
Even like a Man who walks with stately step
Though bent on speed. It was an act of stealth
And troubled pleasure; not without the voice
Of mountain-echoes did my Boat move on,
Leaving behind her still on either side
Small circles glittering idly in the moon,
Until they melted all into one track
Of sparkling light."

There's something just plain GREAT about Wordsworth's best poems and even in the worst - I'm looking at you, The Recluse - there's the odd line, the odd construction - that pleases. It's listening to your grandma telling war stories - it's fine. Fret not, they are not included here - but they await the 'Wordsworth's OK actually' secret downloader and night reader.

Poets are damned, of course, in having to connect, connect, fucking connect all the time, when they are, at the same time, trying to write emotions, or recollections of emotions. Anyone who's tried to do that will know how elusive and difficult it can be. Try to catch it and it goes - the bastard thing is not actually here. But it was - because I felt it!

Ten thousand daffodils suddenly moving with the wind, meeting your daughter on a beach in France during a rare peace in years of endless war propagated by a tyrant you thought was going to be a hero, crossing a bridge in London and finding yourself lost in thought, thinking about the simplicity of nature - but it's complexity too. Ah, all these things are poems, surely.

William W saw himself as, if not an heir, in a line which Milton stood at the front of, blind and annoying. Will took this seriously: dedicating his life to it. And he pulled it off (the poetry, not Milton).

Did I tell you I broke his bed? Sprawled, like a newborn calf.

[Joseph Nakonechny · Rating 5 out of 5]

The best of the best of the Romantic movement.