William Wordsworth is one of the most widely read and respected poet in English Literature. “Lines Composed A Few Miles Above Tintern Abbey” is a fine display of his poetic genius. The poem is evidently subjective. The speaker expresses that he longed to return to the special place a few miles above Tintern Abbey since he visited there five years before. In the past five years, he always pondered over this magical place with its steep lofty cliffs and its beautiful scenery. The sereneness of the place gives him a chance to stop and think - seclusion.
Wordsworth begins his poem talking about how five years have passed since he visited this magical place. He longed to visit the waters from the mountain springs, to hear their soft inland murmur. He wants to see the steep and lofty cliffs that rise up from the ground. He talks about how the day has come for his return to this wonderful spot. He loves the way that the cottages are, “Mid groves and copses; these pastoral farms, green to the very door.” He loves the way that the greenery goes up to the very doors of the little cottages, and also the way that the wreaths of smoke from the fires in the cottages are sent up in silence from among the trees.
He has had a long absence from these ‘beauteous forms’. In the midst of the stress and noise of towns and cities, in hours of weariness, his only resorts were the memories of this wonderful place. With that memories he was immediately refreshed. Then, all the weary weight of this unintelligible world was lifted from him. He was being lead by his affections for this place, which in turn affected his thoughts and acts. Those memories were like daylight in the darkness of the world. When he could stand the world no longer, he turned his thought to the place he loves. He talks about how he often turns his spirit to this wondrous place, and the repetition of ‘spirit; turned to thee’ emphasizes that this beautiful area is incredibly important to him, it always refreshes him.
Wordsworth proceeds indicating the evolution of his attitude to nature. This he does in three stages. The first stage may be called the infant or childish stage. He compares himself, in this stage, to a roe sporting gaily among the mountains. All his senses seemed to be busy to take in the pleasure. The important point to be noticed about this stage is that it was not love of nature that urged him to seek her company. He approached nature as a refugee. He wanted to escape from some thing. Critics identify this something as the “fear to lose humanity”. The cruel deeds of men witnessed during the French Revolution repelled and disgusted him. Nature offered him a good shelter.
The second stage is that of adolescence. He started to love nature passionately during this period. He could not imagine him to be apart form nature. He was able to hear the music of nature. However, it was the external loveliness of the nature that influenced him.
………………The sounding cataract
Haunted me like a passion: the tall rock,
The mountain, and the deep and gloomy wood,
Their colours and their forms, were then to me
An appetite; a feeling and a love,
That had no need of a remoter charm,
By thought supplied, nor any interest
Unborrowed from the eye……….
The ‘eye’ represents all the senses. The colours and shapes of things made an overwhelming, all-absorbing demand on his mind. The roar of the water-fall, the high rock, and the thick wood gave him the milk of delight. He describes his pleasure at this stage as “dizzy raptures” and “aching joys”. It implies that the pleasure was so intense.
The third stage was free from the “aching joys” and “dizzy raptures”. Here, he began to feel the presence of something that linked up all things in the universe. He believed that the universal soul animated all things and that it was present in every atom of the universe. He perceives that Man and Nature are one and the same thing. His pantheistic belief that God is an omnipresent force of nature and dwells in everything in the universe is organized here.
In the concluding stanza, he talks about how he would love to take his dear sister, Dorothy Wordsworth across his knowledge about the nature. Wordsworth finds an echo of his own feelings of the past in the eyes of his sister. She is now in the stage of experiencing the aching joys and dizzy raptures. Wordsworth advices her to be sincere in her trust to nature. Then nature would help her to relieve her of all her pain, and would act as a healing balm to her mind. The poem is concluded with a prayer to nature for her sake. If ever, she is destined to suffer, she would call to mind how her brother instilled in her the faith that Nature would offer a healing balm to all the miseries in life.
Wordsworth begins his poem talking about how five years have passed since he visited this magical place. He longed to visit the waters from the mountain springs, to hear their soft inland murmur. He wants to see the steep and lofty cliffs that rise up from the ground. He talks about how the day has come for his return to this wonderful spot. He loves the way that the cottages are, “Mid groves and copses; these pastoral farms, green to the very door.” He loves the way that the greenery goes up to the very doors of the little cottages, and also the way that the wreaths of smoke from the fires in the cottages are sent up in silence from among the trees.
He has had a long absence from these ‘beauteous forms’. In the midst of the stress and noise of towns and cities, in hours of weariness, his only resorts were the memories of this wonderful place. With that memories he was immediately refreshed. Then, all the weary weight of this unintelligible world was lifted from him. He was being lead by his affections for this place, which in turn affected his thoughts and acts. Those memories were like daylight in the darkness of the world. When he could stand the world no longer, he turned his thought to the place he loves. He talks about how he often turns his spirit to this wondrous place, and the repetition of ‘spirit; turned to thee’ emphasizes that this beautiful area is incredibly important to him, it always refreshes him.
Wordsworth proceeds indicating the evolution of his attitude to nature. This he does in three stages. The first stage may be called the infant or childish stage. He compares himself, in this stage, to a roe sporting gaily among the mountains. All his senses seemed to be busy to take in the pleasure. The important point to be noticed about this stage is that it was not love of nature that urged him to seek her company. He approached nature as a refugee. He wanted to escape from some thing. Critics identify this something as the “fear to lose humanity”. The cruel deeds of men witnessed during the French Revolution repelled and disgusted him. Nature offered him a good shelter.
The second stage is that of adolescence. He started to love nature passionately during this period. He could not imagine him to be apart form nature. He was able to hear the music of nature. However, it was the external loveliness of the nature that influenced him.
………………The sounding cataract
Haunted me like a passion: the tall rock,
The mountain, and the deep and gloomy wood,
Their colours and their forms, were then to me
An appetite; a feeling and a love,
That had no need of a remoter charm,
By thought supplied, nor any interest
Unborrowed from the eye……….
The ‘eye’ represents all the senses. The colours and shapes of things made an overwhelming, all-absorbing demand on his mind. The roar of the water-fall, the high rock, and the thick wood gave him the milk of delight. He describes his pleasure at this stage as “dizzy raptures” and “aching joys”. It implies that the pleasure was so intense.
The third stage was free from the “aching joys” and “dizzy raptures”. Here, he began to feel the presence of something that linked up all things in the universe. He believed that the universal soul animated all things and that it was present in every atom of the universe. He perceives that Man and Nature are one and the same thing. His pantheistic belief that God is an omnipresent force of nature and dwells in everything in the universe is organized here.
In the concluding stanza, he talks about how he would love to take his dear sister, Dorothy Wordsworth across his knowledge about the nature. Wordsworth finds an echo of his own feelings of the past in the eyes of his sister. She is now in the stage of experiencing the aching joys and dizzy raptures. Wordsworth advices her to be sincere in her trust to nature. Then nature would help her to relieve her of all her pain, and would act as a healing balm to her mind. The poem is concluded with a prayer to nature for her sake. If ever, she is destined to suffer, she would call to mind how her brother instilled in her the faith that Nature would offer a healing balm to all the miseries in life.
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