William Wordsworth as a Romantic Poet

February 07, 2013

William Wordsworth is the strong voice in literature who declared a new

movement in creative art especially in poetry. With the publication of
Lyrical Ballads, jointly published by Wordsworth and Coleridge, the
people of the world stepped into a new stage of English literature as well
as world literature. In the Preface to Lyrical Ballads, Wordsworth
explained different aspects of this new sort of literary movement. He
.explained both the thematic and linguistic ideals of romanticism

Indeed, romanticism started as a revolt of the individual against the

established traditional values. But , it was more interesting that this
movement itself turned into an established outlook because of its ever
appealing declaration of individual freedom. Earlier poetry and literature
was intended for and about rich people and Wordsworth freed poetry
from such limitation. In stead of kings, queens, dukes, historical and
mythological figures, Wordsworth declared to accept the "incidents and
situations from common life." as the theme of poetry and a "selection of
language really used by men." as the language of poetry. With
Wordsworth, Coleridge is also regarded highly as the co fighter and
Blake as the pioneer of romantic movement. All of them are credited for
starting the movement and are considered as the first generation of
romantic poets. However, Shelley, Keats and Byron are counted as the
second generation of romantic poets for their continuing the movement.
.Though, in the hand of Byron, romanticism got a new shape

Wordsworth's literary theories explained in The Preface to Lyrical

Ballads are reflected in most of his writings especially in the poetry
collection in Lyrical Ballads. 'The Prelude', Tintern Abbey', 'Ode:
Intimations of Immortality' etc can be mentioned as some of his examples
.of romantic poetry