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. |
From inside the book
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... stars being obscured . The cloudless night sky is the most comprehensive reminder of man's imprisonment within the ... star , All the green summer , to forlorn cascades Among the windings hid of mountain brook . ( Prelude , 1 : 483–90 ) ...
... stars Eastward were sparkling clear , and in the west The orange sky of evening died away . Not seldom from the ... star That fled , and , flying still before me , gleamed Upon the glassy plain ; and oftentimes , When we had given our ...
... stars , and forests as things upon which man can look with bodily eyes and take comfort in the permanence they seem to symbolize . Nature's images , and those made with hands , stimulate the same kind of “ imagina- tive impulse ...
Contents
Acknowledgments | 9 |
Ordered and Disordered Time | 29 |
The Nature and Status of the Mind | 51 |
Copyright | |
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