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“The World Is Too Much with Us”

“The World Is Too Much with Us”. William Wordsworth. Wordsworth & Romanticism. Wordsworth (1770-1850) is one of the founders of Romanticism : b egins in the last half of the 18 th century (late 1700s)

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“The World Is Too Much with Us”

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  1. “The World Is Too Much with Us” William Wordsworth

  2. Wordsworth & Romanticism • Wordsworth (1770-1850) is one of the founders of Romanticism: • begins in the last half of the 18thcentury (late 1700s) • is a reaction to (1) Industrial Revolution, or dependence on machines, factories, technology, and (2) The Age of Enlightenment, or scientific and rational ways for examining the world. The Romantics felt that these radical changes in the world – the way it worked and the way we perceived it – left out the emotional, spiritual, and artistic/aesthetic aspect of life. • represents attempt to recapture spiritual connection to life and to the world around us by returning to/reconnecting with nature

  3. Another Sonnet! • Although we are roughly 200 years past Shakespeare and Donne, Wordsworth, too, utilizes the sonnet form. • “The World Is Too Much with Us” is an Italian/Petrarchan sonnet with rhyme scheme abbaabbacdcdcd • I’ll analyze how deviations in form and meter in the first 9 lines of the poem (essentially the octave) reveal the main problem in the “world” of the poem – a weakening of human spiritual strength due to reliance on material possessions rather than communion with Nature.

  4. Metrical Deviations • Not written in perfect iambic pentameter • “Getting | and spend |ing, we|laywaste |our powers” (l. 2) • A trochee immediately emphasizes the verb “get” – suggests accumulation, consumption, & obsession with material things • A spondee emphasizes our “lay[ing] waste” to our natural “powers” by indulging in this materiality. Waste is usually associated with rampant consumption where we have more than we need. Here it takes on two meanings – noun and verb (to destroy). (Powers is usually scanned as one word in older poetry.) • Together these deviations show we have been thrown off balance by the material world and have destroyed something important by not seeking the answers in Nature.

  5. Metrical Deviations Cont’d. • “We have |given| our hearts |away,| a sor|didboon!” (l. 4) • An extra iamb! Emphasizes our heart as a “gift” (boon) – a material object. • Extra emphasis is placed on this “giving” away through the trochee of foot 2. Perhaps it is this giving away of our heart that makes it “sordid.” Involving our heart in the cycle of getting, giving, and spending corrupts it. • Extra iamb also indicates that we are out of rhythm (with iambic pentameter, also Nature) because we indulge in this materiality. “We” are to blame for lacking emotional/spiritual strength – crux of the problem.

  6. Metrical Deviations Cont’d. • “For this, | for ev |erything,| we are |out of tune;” (l. 8) • We have five feet here, but the last is an amphimacer (stress, unstress, stress). The fact that we are “out of tune” is emphasized by this foot in terms of length and stresses. Here again is the main problem – we are not in communion, in rhythm, in sync with Nature.

  7. The Volta • “It moves |us not.| –GreatGod!...” (l. 9) • The volta is highly emphasized in this poem by: (1) it’s form as a spondee; (2) the word choice, which in Wordsworth’s time amounted to the same thing as a swear word; (3) overemphasized punctuation through the period, long dash, and the exclamation point surrounding the spondee. • This is a highly stressed moment in the poem literally shown by stresses and word choice. The punctuation enact two caesurae – one occurs before the spondee (period & dash) and one occurs after the spondee (exclamation point). These pauses isolate this moment of pain, perhaps showing hesitancy in coming to terms with both the problem and its solution.

  8. The Volta Cont’d • The volta, instead of occurring between lines 8 and 9, occurs in the middle of line 9: • Represents belated shift from octave (problem: we are too materialistic and divorced from nature) to sestet (solution: I’ll return to nature through rejection of Christian civilization and acceptance of Pagan mythology).

  9. Discussion Question • An important thematic question relates to the gender issues in the poem: • How should we make sense of the maternal imagery of the sea’s “bosom” and a Pagan “suckled” in relation to the male figures in the poem of Proteus and Triton?

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