Lecture Literary criticism - Lecture 16: Wordsworth’s theory of poetry

Wordsworth has described the theory of poetry and his conception of the function of a poet.In his theory of poetry he set down the origin,nature and purpose of poetry and the function of the poet in a civil society.

WORDSWORTH’S THEORY

OF POETRY

• Wordsworth has described the theory of poetry and his conception of the function of a poet.In his theory

of poetry he set down the origin,nature and purpose

of poetry and the function of the poet in a civil

society.

• Wordsworth defines poetry as the spontaneous

overflow of powerful feelings,it takes its origin from emotions recollected in tranquility,the emotion is contemplated till the tranquility disappears and an emotion kindered to that which was before the

subject of contemplation is gradually produced and does itself actually exist in mind.

THE POETIC PROCESS

• Poetry is an overflow of powerful emotions which involves a

reconciliation of opposite powerful emotions and profound

thought

• The sequence of events described in the preface for the

production of poetry is a notable experience,deep and long

contemplation,a period of tranquility,sudden overflow of

powerful feelings as the notable experience is recollected

• Pleasure in the poet’s pleasurable emotion as the experience is recaptured and recreated shaping of the poem,hardly touched

on in the preface except as a transition in the pleasure of the poet pleasure for the reader

WORDSWORTH’S DEFINITION OF

POETRY

• Spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings.This refers to the nature of poetry.Poetry is a matter of feeling and mood.It flows from the internal feelings of the poet

• When the poet is in the poetic mood he sings out rapture as sorrow spontaneously from the core of his heart

• In a poetic mood,poetry flows out naturally from poet’s heart.In such moments,his language of discourse becomes the

language poetical inspiration

• Poetry cannot be composed under duress”The clear spring of poetry must flow freely and spontaneously it cannot be made to flow through artificially laid pipes

EXPRESSION OF POWERFUL

FEELINGS

• Wordsworth talks of expressing powerful feelings felt in the

heart and not generated in the mind.Poetry takes its birth in the springs of the heart and not in cold store of the intellect.”Poetry

is born,not in the mind,but in the heart overflowing with

emotions.”

• All of us feel,so does the poet,but he feels intensely and

deeply.The poet’s heart leap up when he beholds a rainbow

• The heightened emotional state of the poet finds expression

through two verses.Thus according to Wordsworth,deep

emotion is the fundamental condition of poetry.It is the feeling that matters

• He discards the Aristotelian doctrine.For him,the plot or situation

is not the first thing.Wordsworth himself says that “The feelings there in developed gives importance to the action and situation

• Wordsworth told that a poet must be a man possessed of more than usual organic sensibility.In fact sensibility is the great birth right of our being.

• In the case of ordinary men,it is overpowered by the weight of custom,whereas in the poet it is augmented and sustained

• That is not all Wordsworth has in mind His poet is not simply a Man of feelings.feelings of course he must have since poetry is

in fact the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings and arise from the emotions recollected in tranquility

• But before the emotions come the senses and it is not of them that Wordsworth is thinking when he adds the epithet”organic”

ORGANIC SENSIBILITY

• Organic sensibility then means or implies the

capacity to receive impression through senses.

• The emotion which accompanied the original

impression revives when the impression is recalled.

• The ability thus to reconstruct an emotion belongs in

an eminent degree to the poet,being in fact a portion

of his native endowment more than usual organic sensibility.

EMOTIONS RECOLLECTED IN

TRANQUILITY

• Wordsworth observed that sensibility alone is not sufficient to ensure good poetry,it must be directed by a calm mind

• He explains the role of calm thinking and deliberate

contemplation in the composition of poetry later on in the

preface when he says”The emotion is contemplated till by a species of reaction,the tranquility gradually disappears and an emotion kindered to that which was before the subject of

contemplation is gradually produced and does itself actually exist in the mind

• In this mood of successful composition generally begins and in

a mood similar to this it is carried on.The process of poetic

composition is not an easy one

• Wordsworth has mentioned six causes that lead to poetic composition.

(i) observation and description

FUNCTION OF POETRY

• Wordsworth lay emphasize that good poetry is never

an immediate reaction to the proviking cause that our sensations must be allowed time to back into the

common fund of our experience,there to find their

level and due proportion.

• That level is found for them by the mind in the act of contemplation,the sensations revive and out of the union of the contemplating mind and the receiving

sensibility rises the unique mood of expression which

we call poetry.

• Wordsworth says that poetry is the breath and finer spirits of all knowledge;the impassioned expression that is in the countenance of all sciences.

• Wordsworth felt strongly that there was no worthy

pursuit but the idea of doing some good for the world.

• He hoped that his poems would separate in then

degree to extend the domain of sensibility for the

delight,the honor and the benefit of human nature.

• He asserted that the poet should console the

afflicted.He should make the happy,happier and

should lead the young and gracious of every age,to see,to think and to feel.

• Such is the poet’s office and there is none more

• The poet through his poetry,imparts moral lessons for the betterment of human life.

• Wordsworth says that “a poetry of revolt against the moral ideas is a poetry of revolt against life,a poetry

of indifference towards moral ideas is a poetry of

indifferent towards life.

• Wordsworth subscribes to the view that to the poet the particular is nothing and the universal everything.

• Wordsworth is precise and emphatic in stating that pleasure is the end of poetry.

• “the end of poetry is to produce excitement in

coexistence with an over balance of pleasure.

• Thus the rehabilitation of pleasure to a primary

position was a major item in the romantic creed which Wordsworth was out to promulgate.

• Wordsworth proposes to throw”a certain coloring of imagination whereby ordinary things should be

presented to the mind in an unusual aspect” few

modern poets have embodied in then work,whether

by statement by implication so firm a sense of the dignity or worth of the common individual man.

• Wordsworth found some meaning in human life,if human beings lived in close proximity to nature and allowed it would begin its influence to sink into their soul.he thought that oral elevation

and spiritual edification of man was not possible in the humdrum life of towns and cities

• Rustic people lead a life of primal simplicity in constant

communication with nature

• He decided to deal with the lives of cadgers and rustic instead

of politicians and statesmen stupefied with victory and in toxified with glory and power.He refuses to glorify lives of kings and

princes and men belonging to higher strata of society,because

in their lives he found an artificiality that he despised

• He chose rustic life for poetic treatment in that condition of

life”essential passion of the heart finds a better soil”

• He showed much independence of mind as reflecting the

traditional subjects derived by his predecessors fro the

fashionable social life

• By his own temperament he was prone to be attracted by things

of elemental simplicity and necessary Corollary to the choice of subjects from the low rural life,he decided to use the language

of common people as the vehicle of poetic expression rejecting the artificial diction of the 18th century

• Wordsworth rejected the “guardian and insane phraseology of many modern writers”.He insists that his poems contain little

poetic diction and are written in a “selection of the real language

of men in a state of vivid sensation”,

• Wordsworth defined the employment of meter in poetry as a

protest against the use of poetic diction”whereas in the matter of poetic diction,Wordsworth breaks with the orthodox convention

of his days and return to the natural diction of normal men

• In te matter of meter he appeals to the tradition

• The concurring testimony of the ages he says has established the laws of meter and all reasonable people submit to them and acknowledge them as superadded charm

• Wordsworth says that in his poems he has dealt with great and universal passion of men,the most general and interesting of their occupations,as the entire

world of nature before him.

• He could have written in prose as well but he decided

to write in meter for the sake of charm.

• Pleasure is clear from the fact that poems written on humbler subjects and in more naked and simpler

language have continued to give pleasure from

generation to generation.

• While defining the meter the end of poetry is to produce

excitement to coexistence with an overbalance of pleasure

• This excitement is an unusual state of mind.In that state of

excitement,ideas and feelings do not follow each other in the usual regular order;the expressions of ideas and feelings

appear to be incoherent

• Again if the words by which this excitement is produced are

powerful,then there is some danger that excitement maybe

carried beyond its proper bounds

• Therefore in order to restrain and temper the ideas and feelings

in the state of excitement meter is essential it restrains the

unusual state of mind

• There are four stages of process of poetic creation.

(i)observation

(ii)recollection

(iii)contemplation

(iv)imaginative excitement

nature.This observation excites in his certain emotions.He does not give poetic expression to their immediately but carry them in heart for sometime.

upon them and revive his original emotional excitement.

accidental,temporary and super flows.

process of poetic creation which gives joy both to the poet and the

reader.