Time and Mind in Wordsworth's PoetryWilliam Wordsworth was fascinated by the relationship of the creative mind to the created world, and by the effect of time on both of them. In this important new study, Jeffrey Baker explores the significant ways in which the theme of time is manifested in the imagery and diction of Wordsworth's major poetry. He discusses the poet's preoccupation with "clock" and "natural" time, as well as his escape from time through "deliberate holiday" and in the famous visionary "spots of time." Throughout his analysis, Baker concentrateson the texts which the poet himself approved for publication, asserting that the growing practice of citing poetically inferior versions for biographical or other extra poetic reasons misdirects a reader's attention. Only by reexamining the familiar poems as poems, rather than as philosophical or psychological statements, is it possible to appreciate how Wordsworth's changing concepts of the creator, the poet, and the ambiguities of time function as works of art. The volume includes a selected bibliography and an appendix describing the early Christian shrines alluded to in The Prelude. |
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... Close up those barren leaves ; Come forth , and bring with you a heart That watches and receives . ( Ll . 29-32 ) These lines not only concede that it is possible to refuse to submit , but that Matthew is refusing . And if it is ...
... close attention . Paul Sheats has defined the method : " The initial shift of attention from Margaret to her cottage enables Wordsworth to describe the invisible and painful decline of the human being by means of the analogous , visible ...
... close enough really to deceive the senses . An expanse of white cloud in fact looks nothing like the sea . A " billowy ocean " cannot be " meek and silent . " And above all , the real thing is there , distant but visible , and still ...
Contents
Acknowledgments | 9 |
Ordered and Disordered Time | 29 |
The Nature and Status of the Mind | 51 |
Copyright | |
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