The Prelude Analysis

Question 1

“cottage windows through twilight blaz’d”

Answer 1

• Begins with reminiscent tone – establishing point of view

- Lights and ‘cottage’ create warmth, also natural wordl more alluring then domestic

Question 2

“I headed not the summons’

Answer 2

• ‘Not the summons’ suggestive of personal revolt against perceived tyranny of domestic sphere
• w/ triumph resultant of ability to resist ‘summons’ of mundanity

Question 3

“Time of rapture…wheel’d…like an untried horse”

Answer 3

• heightened appreciation of natural world – compare happiness of friends to his ‘rapture’
• evoking intense joy, euphoria – intensity due to connection to nature
• wheel’d’ to convey the pace and physical exuberance of their games
• simile ‘like an untired horse’ highlights his feelings of liberation and independence

Question 4

“Hiss’d along polish’d ice”

Answer 4

• through sibilance, impressively recreates joyous memories within readers minds
• ability to recall memory, emphasises powerful affinity with nature
• intensity of emotions reflect romantic ideal of children in state of innocence, oblivious to risks of skating upon a pond

Question 5

“Tinkled…Alien sound of melancholy”

Answer 5

• Tone increasingly serious towards closing fo poem, marking change of Word from child – adult
• Natural world, less benevolent and passive – use of euphemistic, unthreatening ‘tinkled’ to ominous ‘alien sounds’ – symbolic of awareness of extreme natural force of lfe and death