according to Wordsworth what should be the theme and subject matter?

                  

Assignment                                                                                                                                   

Name: Maheta Arati R.

Roll No: 3

Class    : M.A.-1

Semester: 1

Paper: 3(Literary Theory& Criticism)

Topic: According to Wordsworth what should be the theme & subject matter of poetry?

Submitted To: Dilip Barad & Department of English

        Maharaja Krishnakumarsinhji Bhavnagar University

                                What is poetry?

    Poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful feeling.

           Wordsworth’s enormous poetic legacy rests on a large number of poems written by him. But the themes that run through Wordsworth’s poetry remained consistent throughout. Even the language and imagery he used to embody those themes, remained remarkably consistent. They remained consistent to the canons Wordsworth had set out the Preface to Lyrical Ballads. In his second edition of the Lyrical Ballads (1802),he wrote Preface to defend himself form negative reviews.

                                  Wordsworth argued that poetry should be written in the real language of common man, rather than in the lofty and elaborate diction that were then considered“poetic”.He believed that the first principal of poetry should be pleasure and so the chief duty of poetry is to provide pleasure through a rhythmic and beautiful expression of feeling. All human sympathy, he asserted, is based on a subtle pleasure principal that is “the naked and native dignity of man.’’

                   In the ‘’Advertisement’’ to the 1798 edition  of Lyrical Ballads, Wordsworth and Coleridge state that the poems in the collection were intended as a deliberate experiment in style and subject matter.Wordsworth elaborated on this idea in the ‘’Preface” to the 1800and1802 edition which outline his main ideas of a new theory of poetry.Wordsworth explained his poetical concept:

                       “The majority of the following poems are to be considered as experiments. They were written chiefly with a view to a ascertain how far the language of conversation in the middle and lower classes of society is adapted to the purpose of poetic pleasure’’.

If the experiment with vernacular language was not enough of a departure from the norm, the focus on simple, uneducated country people as the subject of poetry was a signal of shift to modern literature. One of the main themes of “Lyrical Ballads” is return to the original state of nature, in which man led a purer and more innocent existence. Wordsworth subscribed to Rousseau’s belief that man was essentially good and was corrupted by the influence of society. This may be linked with the sentiments spreading though Europe just prior to the French Revolution.

 Wordsworth rejecting the classical notion that poetry should be about elevated subject and should be composed in a formal style; Wordsworth instead championed more democratic themes the lives of ordinary men and women, farmers, paupers, and the rural poor. In the “preface’’ he also emphasizes his commitment to writing in the ordinary language of people, not a highly crafted poetical one. True to traditional ballad form, the poems depict realistic characters in realistic situations, and so contain a strong narrative element.

  Brief review Wordsworth views on the ‘Theme’& Subject matter of poetry:

v subject matter of poetry

1) Object

The principle object then proposed in these poems was to choose incidents and situations from common life, and to relate and describe them throughout, as far as possible in a selection of language  really used by men, and at the same time ,to throw over them a certain coloring of imagination, whereby ordinary things should be presented to the mind in an unusual aspect; and further and above all, to make these situations and incidents interesting  by tracing in them, truly thought not ostentatiously the primary laws of our  nature: chiefly as regards the manner in which we associate ideas in a state of excitement.

       2)   Humble and rustic life

Humble and rustic life was generally chosen, because in that condition the essential passions of the heart find a better soil in which they can attain their maturity, are less under restraint. Speak a plainer and more emphatic language, because in that condition of life our elementary feelings co-exist in a state of greater simplicity and consequently may be more accurately contemplated and more forcibly communicated; because the manners of rural life   germinate from these elementary  feelings and from the necessary character of rural occupations are more easily comprehended and more durable and lastly, because in that condition the passions of men are incorporated with the beautiful and permanents forms of nature.

             3)   Language (style of poetry)

 The language, too of these men has been adopted purified indeed from what appear to be its real defects ,from all lasting  and rational causes of dislike and disgust because such men communicate with the best objects from which the best part of language is originally derived; and because from their rank in society and the sameness and narrow circle of their intercourse, being less under the influence of social variety, they convey their feelings and notions in simple and elaborated expressions.

        The function of poetry According to Wordsworth.

 According to Wordsworth ‘Poetry is the breath and finer spirit of all knowledge, the impassioned expression that is in the countenance of all science.’  Poetry is like morning star which throws its radiance through the gloom and darkness of life. The poet is a teacher and through the medium of poetry he imparts moral lessons for the betterment of human life. Poetry is the instrument for the propagation of moral thoughts.Wordsworth’s poetry does not simply delight us but it also teaches us deep moral lessons and brings home to us deep philosophical truth about life and religion.Wordsworth believes that a poetry of revolts against moral ideas is a poetry of revolts against life or poetry of indifference towards moral ideas is a poetry of indifference towards life.

 Thus Wordsworth‘s view on poetical style are the most revolutionary of all idea in his Preface. He discarded the gaudiness and inane phraseology of many modern writers. He insists that his poems are written in ‘selection of language of men in a state of vivid sensation’. His views of poetic diction can be summed up as ‘there neither is nor can be any essential difference between the language of prose and metrical composition.