Daffodils /William Wordsworth

"I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud" (also commonly known as "Daffodils" or "The Daffodils") is a poem by William Wordsworth. It was inspired by an April 15, 1802 event in which Wordsworth and his sister, Dorothy, came across a "long belt" of daffodils. Written in 1804, it was first published in 1807 in Poems in Two Volumes, and a revised version was released in 1815, which is more commonly known. It consists of four six-line stanzas, in iambic tetrameter and an ABABCC rhyme scheme. It is usually considered Wordsworth's most famous work. In the "Nation's Favourite Poems", a poll carried out by the BBC's Bookworm, "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud" came fifth. Well known, and often anthologised, "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud" is commonly seen as a classic of English romanticism within poetry, although the original version was poorly reviewed by Wordsworth's contemporaries.

"Daffodils" (1804)

I WANDER'D lonely as a cloud

That floats on high o'er vales and hills,

When all at once I saw a crowd,

A host, of golden daffodils;

Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine

And twinkle on the Milky Way,

They stretch'd in never-ending line

Along the margin of a bay:

Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced; but they

Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:

A poet could not but be gay,

In such a jocund company:

I gazed -- and gazed -- but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:

For oft, when on my couch I lie

In vacant or in pensive mood,

They flash upon that inward eye

Which is the bliss of solitude;

And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.

By William Wordsworth (1770-1850).

Man and Nature in 'The Prelude' /William Wordsworth.

William Wordsworth (1770 - 1850)

'The Prelude' is important in giving one of the most succinct of Wordsworth's accounts of the development of his attitude to Nature - moving from the animal pleasure of childhood through adolescent passion for the wild and gloomy to adult awareness of the relation of our perception of the natural world; but its poetic interest lies in its brilliant combination of the lyric and the meditative, the exaltation of reminiscence into poetry through the proper handling of 'Relationship and Love'.

Nature in Wordsworth's poetry is not regarded as a background for his pictures of men, nor as a mere mirror refecting the feelings of man, but rather as a wonderful power around us calming and influencing our souls. An essentially Wordsworthian feature of his treatment of Nature is his intense spirituality revealed in these lines of 'Tintern Abbey'-

'She can so inform the mind that is within us, so impress, with quietness and beauty, and so feed with lofty thoughts...'

Similar idea is beautifully and effectively expressed in these lines of Book I of 'The Prelude'-

'The immortal spirit grows
like harmony in music.
There is a dark invisible workmanship
that reconciles
Discordant elements, makes them cling together
in one society.'

According to Wordsworth, the best in man comes out during his companionship with Nature. Infact, Nature has the power to draw out from within us those hidden powers that go to build what we essentially are! Wordsworth's strong conviction that 'the child is the father of man' is an extension of his feelings for Nature. He felt that he owed what he was in maturity to his childhood, spent in the free natural surroundings of hills, groves and streams. Thus, Wordsworth had developed from passive admiration of Nature to the possession of an active creative power induced by Nature.


Wordsworth insists that through contact with Nature, the heart is exalted and made happy. Such happiness and exaltation is moral and in such a moral condition the heart can do no wrong. 'Wordsworthian Nature and Worsworthian Man appear akin.'