Wordsworth - Rural Life/ Rustic Characters Flashcards
Michael
- Reason for idealising rustic characters and the common man
“Not verily/ For their own sakes, but for the field and hills/ Where was their occupation and abode”
Michael
- Elevating Michael
“Unusual strength… more than ordinary men”
Michael
- Found in the rural life
“The pleasure which there is in life itself”
Michael
- Given lives to their son Luke - all member of family are hard working
- WW suggests that even though they are not necessarily happy this is better than a life of indulgence in the corrupt city
“The couple neither gay perhaps/ Nor cheerful, yet with objects and with hopes,/ Living a life of eager industry”
Michael
- WW immortalising this symbol - means his poem is a lighthouse guiding people to the more fulfilling and sustained way of life - enticing others to life a life of simplicity
Cottage named “The evening star” after the “famous” lamp which was a “symbol of life” for many
Resolution and Independence
- Metaphor - movement exists but is different more divine perhaps like the gradual, barely noticeable morphing of clouds
- Elevates man as suggests he is apart of nature - which is God-like for WW
“Motionless as a cloud the old man stood”
Resolution and Independence
- The leech gatherers words were despite speaking “feebly”
“Above the reach of ordinary men”
Resolution and Independence
- No longer feels sorry for himself due to his life being riddled with financial insecurity
“From some far region sent, / To give me human strength by apt admonishment”
Resolution and Independence
- Been given hope that he was previously
“By my help and stay secure; I’ll think of the Leech-gatherer of the lonely moor”
Written in London September 1802
- Romantic qualities he yearns for
“Plain living and high thinking are no more”
The Ruined Cottage
- First seeing the Peddlar
- Shows Wordsworth’s admiration for “lowly life” as he places positive connotations onto it
“With instantaneous joy I recognised / That pride of Nature and of lowly life”
The Ruined Cottage
- Once Robert leave the home it is empty
- Home for Margret was as much Robert as it was the cottage
“Four naked walls”
The Ruined Cottage
- When we die we are forgotten
- “Good” - like WW Peddlar believed these rustic characters to be essentially good people
- Reason for immortalising poetry
“His particular nook of earth/ Dies with him…even of the good is no memorial left”
The Ruined Cottage
- WW describing Peddlar
- Power in being able to tell stories
“He had rehearsed/ Her homely tail with such familiar power”
“Not verily/ For their own sakes, but for the field and hills/ Where was their occupation and abode”
Michael
- Reason for idealising rustic characters and the common man
