The son of an attorney, William Wordsworth studied at Hawkshead Grammar School and St. John's College Cambridge (B.A. 1791) before traveling in France (1791-92). In 1794 he received a legacy of #900 which enabled him to live independently; about 1795 he met Coleridge, with whom he collaborated on Lyrical Ballads (1798) and traveled in Germany (1798-99). In 1799 Wordsworth retired to Grasmere where he spent the remainder of his life, supported in his later years by a place in the Stamp Office and a government pension. In 1843 succeeded Robert Southey as Poet Laureate.
TEXT RECORDS:
1794 ca.A Night on Salisbury Plain.
1798The Female Vagrant.
1799 ca.Adventures on Salisbury Plain.
1800The Oak and the Broom, a Pastoral.
1802Stanzas written in my Pocket-Copy of Thomson's Castle of Indolence.
1805 ca.The Prelude.
1807I am not one, &c.
1807Miscellaneous Sonnets 18. ["The world is too much with us; late and soon."]
1807Ode to Duty.
1807Resolution and Independence.
1810Letter to Mathetes.
1815Essay Supplementary to the Preface.
1815Preface to Poems.
1815The White Doe of Rylstone.
1815The White Doe of Rylstone. Canto II.
1815The White Doe of Rylstone. Canto III.
1815The White Doe of Rylstone. Canto IV.
1815The White Doe of Rylstone. Canto V.
1815The White Doe of Rylstone. Canto VI.
1815The White Doe of Rylstone. Canto VII.
1815White Doe of Rylstone: Dedication.
1816Letter to Robert Southey; on Spenser's Stanza.
1820Artegal and Elidure.
1822Desultory Stanzas upon receiving the preceding Sheets from the Press.
1822Ecclesiastical Sketches XXV. Missions and Travels.
1822Engelberg.
1822Processions. Suggested on a Sabbath Morning in the Vale of Chamouny.
1822[Effusion in presence of the Painted Tower of Tell, at Altdorf.]
1827["Scorn not the Sonnet."]
1829 ca.[To Catherine Grace Godwin; on the Spenserian Stanza.]
PUBLICATIONS:
An evening walk: an epistle in verse. 1793.
Descriptive sketches in verse. 1793.
Lyrical ballads. 1798, 1800.
Poems in two volumes. 1807.
The excursion, being a portion of the Recluse: a poem. 1814.
Poems. 2 vols, 1815.
The white doe of Rylstone. 1815.
Peter Bell: a tale in verse. 1819.
The waggoner: a poem, to which are added sonnets. 1819.
The miscellaneous poems. 4 vols, 1820.
The river Duddon: a series of sonnets; Vaudracour and Julia, and other poems, to which is annexed A topographical description of the country of the lakes. 1820.
A description of the scenery of the lakes in the north of England. 1822.
Ecclesiastical sketches. 1822.
Memorials of a tour on the Continent, 1820. 1822.
Poetical works. 5 vols, 1827.
Poetical works. 4 vols, 1832.
Yarrow revisited, and other poems. 1835.
Poetical works. 6 vols, 1836.
The sonnets. 1838.
England in 1840! 1840?
Poems, chiefly of early and late years, including the Borderers. 1842.
Poems. 1845.
Poetical works. 7 vols, 1846.
The prelude, or growth of a poet's mind; an autobiographical poem. 1850.
The recluse. 1888.
Letters of the Wordsworth family, ed. W. Knight. 3 vols, 1907.
The letters of William and Dorothy Wordsworth, ed. Ernest de Selincourt. 5 vols, 1935-39; revised by Chester L. Shaver, 4 vols, 1967-78.
Poetical works, ed. Ernest de Selincourt and Helen Darbishire. 5 vols, 1940-49.
Prose works, ed. W. J. B. Owen. 3 vols, 1974.
The Cornell Wordsworth, ed. Stephen Parrish. 1975- .
Complete poems, ed. John O. Hayden. 2 vols, 1976.
PROFILE AND
ASSOCIATES:
English
Anglican
Hawkshead School
St. John's College Cambridge
Bachelor of Arts
Poet Laureate
courtier
poet
The Morning Post
The Champion
The Friend
Literary Souvenir
Pledge of Friendship
The Keepsake
The Casket
Anna Laetitia Barbauld
Bernard Barton
Thomas Beddoes
Rev. William Lisle Bowles
Rev. Henry Francis Cary
Henry Nelson Coleridge
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
Joseph Cottle
Allan Cunningham
Humphry Davy
Thomas De Quincey
John Edwards
Barron Field
Robert Pearse Gillies
Catherine Grace Godwin
Benjamin Robert Haydon
Felicia Hemans
James Hogg
William Howitt
Charles Lamb
Edward Moxon
Amelia Opie
Edward Quillinan
Henry Crabb Robinson
Samuel Rogers
Sir Walter Scott
William Sotheby
Robert Southey
Thomas Noon Talfourd
John Thelwall
Alaric Alexander Watts
John Wilson
REFERENCE:
DNB; NCBEL; CBEL (3rd ed); DLB.
Poetical Register for 1803 (1804); "Critical Notices: Lyrical Ballads" Literary Magazine and American Register [Philadelphia] 1 (February 1804) 336-41; "Wordsworth" Philadelphia Repository and Weekly Register 4 (17 March 1804) 86; Peter L. Courtier, ed., Lyre of Love (1806); "Absurdities: Wordsworth" The Ordeal [Boston] (14 January 1809) 29-32; "Wordsworth's Poems" Port Folio [Philadelphia] S3 1 (March 1809) 256-58; "The Bards of the Lake" The Satirist 5 (December 1809) 548-56; Biographical Dictionary of Living Authors (1816); "Mr. Wordsworth" The Champion (28 May 1814) 174-75; "Mr. Wordsworth's Poetry" The Champion (25 June, 9 December 1815) 205-06, 398; "Modern Poets: Wordsworth" Scourge 10 (October-November 1815) 266-75, 341-44; "On the Habits of Thought inculcated by Wordsworth" Blackwood's Magazine 4 (December 1818) 257-63; "Letters from the Lakes" Blackwood's Magazine 4 (January 1819) 397-404; "Memoir of William Wordsworth" New Monthly Magazine 11 (February 1819) 48-50 [portrait]; "Living Authors: Wordsworth" London Magazine 1 (March 1820) 275-85; "Lake School of Poetry" New Monthly Magazine 14 (October 1820) 361-68; Thomas Noon Talfourd, "On the Genius and Writings of Wordsworth" New Monthly Magazine 14 (November-December 1820) 498-506, 648-55; "Wordsworth and the Lake School" Monthly Magazine 50 (November 1820) 307-10; Henry Nelson Coleridge, "On Wordsworth's Poetry" Etonian Nos. II, III (1820); George Milner, "On the Genius and Writings of Wordsworth" Imperial Magazine 3 (July 1821) 598-602; "Observations on Lord Byron and Wordsworth" Imperial Magazine [Liverpool] 3 (November-December 1821) 978-83, 1016-24, 1113-15, 1118-22, 1122-24 (1822) 416-39, 628-50; "The Distressed Poets, or Immortality in Embryo" New Hibernian Magazine 2 (1821) 10-15; "William Wordsworth" La Belle Assemblee NS 26 (November 1822) 440-43; "William Wordsworth" Ladies' Monthly Museum S3 15 (May 1822) 259-66; "Letter from William W-dsw-th, Esq. to Robert S-th-y" Literary Speculum 1 (February 1822) 230-38; F. W. P. Greenwood, "Wordsworth's Poems" North American Review [Boston] 18 (April 1824) 356-71; "On the Poetical Writings of Wordsworth" Literary Speculum 1 (May 1822) 433-34 [portrait]; "Wordsworth" Mirror of Literature 3 (1824) 375-77; "Poetical Works of Wordsworth" United States Literary Gazette [Boston] 1 (1 December 1824) 245-49; "On the Genius and Poetry of Wordsworth" Literary Magnet 3 (1825) 26-29, 67-72, 156-60; William Hazlitt, Select British Poets (1824); Robert Watt, Bibliotheca Britannica (1824); "Genius of Wordsworth" Literary Magnet 3 (1825) 26-29, 67-72, 156-60; William Hazlitt, "Mr. Wordsworth" in Spirit of the Age (1825); "Poetical Works of Wordsworth" Atlantic Magazine 2 (March-April 1825) 334-48, 419-35; "William Wordsworth" Nepenthes No. 45 (1825) 376-77; "Living Poets: Wordsworth" Literary Magnet NS 1 (1826) 17-22, 68-76; Living Poets of England: Specimens of the Living British Poets (1827); "Mr. Wordsworth" The Athenaeum (19 February 1828) 113-15; "On the Genius of Wordsworth" Literary Chronicle 10 (15 March 1828) 170-71; "Campbell and Wordsworth" Philadelphia Album 3 (28 January 1829) 275; Chauncy Hare Townshend, "Essay on the Theory and Practice of Wordsworth" Blackwood's Magazine 26 (September-December 1829) 453-63, 593-609, 774-88, 894-910; George B. Cheever, Studies in Poetry ... Elegant Extracts (1830); "Literary Characters: Mr. Wordsworth" Fraser's Magazine 3 (June 1831) 557-66; William Maginn, "Gallery of Literary Characters: William Wordsworth, Esq." Fraser's Magazine 6 (October 1832) 313 [portrait]; "Wordworth's Poetical Works" Fraser's Magazine 6 (November 1832) 607-25; The Georgian Era: Memoirs of the most Eminent Persons (1832-34); Allan Cunningham, "Literature of the last Fifty Years" The Athenaeum (26 October 1833) 718; Robert Aris Willmott, "The Poet Wordsworth and Professor Smyth" in Conversations at Cambridge (1836) 235-52; "William Wordsworth" Southern Literary Messenger [Richmond] 3 (December 1837) 705-11; S. C. Hall, in The Book of Gems (1838); Thomas De Quincey, "Literary Reminiscences" (1839; in Works 1889-90); Robert Chambers, Cyclopaedia of English Literature (1844); R. H. Horne, in New Spirit of the Age (1844); George Gilfillan, in Gallery of Literary Portraits (1845) [portrait]; William Howitt, Homes and Haunts of the ... British Poets (1847); Gentleman's Magazine NS 33 (1850) 1 668; Christopher Wordsworth, Life of William Wordsworth (1851); David Macbeth Moir, Poetical Literature of the Past Half-Century (1851; 1856) 66-83; Allibone, Critical Dictionary of English Literature (1858-71; 1882); William Jerdan, in Men I have Known (1866) 474-86; The English Poets, ed. Thomas Humphry Ward (1880); Maclise Gallery (1898); Moulton, Library of Literary Criticism (1901-05); Florence MacCunn, Sir Walter Scott's Friends (1909) 418-40; George Mclean Harper, William Wordsworth: his Life, Works, and Influence (1916); Reschke, Die Spenserstanze (1918) 21-27; Annabel Newton, Wordsworth in Early American Criticism (1928); Abbie Findlay Potts, "The Spenserian and Miltonic Influence in Wordsworth's 'Ode' and 'Rainbow' Studies in Philology 29 (1932) 607-16; Venn and Venn, Alum. Cant. (1940-54); Alice Comparetti, ed. The White Doe of Rylstone (1940); E. Wayne Marjarum, "Wordworth's View of the State of Ireland" PMLA 55 (1940) 608-11; Charles E. Mounts, "The Influence of Spenser on Wordsworth and Coleridge" (Diss., Duke University, 1941); Charles E. Mounts, "The Place of Chaucer and Spenser in the Genesis of Peter Bell" Philological Quarterly (1944) 108-15; J. V. Logan, Wordsworth Criticism: A Guide and Bibliography (1947); Mary Moorman, William Wordsworth: a Biography (1957, 1965); E. F. Henley and D. H. Stam, Wordsworthian Criticism 1945-59 (1960, 1965); Renwick, OHEL (1963); Geoffrey H. Hartman, Wordsworth's Poetry 1787-1814 (1964); Morris Marples, Romantics at School (1967); J. C. Maxwell, "Milton in Wordsworth's Praise of Spenser" Notes and Queries NS 15 (1968) 22-23; J. C. Maxwell, "Milton in Wordsworth's Praise of Spenser" Notes and Queries NS 15 (1968) 22-23; T. J. Gilchrist, "Spenser and Reason in the Conclusion of 'Salisbury Plain'" ELN 7 (1969) 11-18; Everard H. King, "Beattie's Minstrel: its Influence on Wordsworth" Studies in Scottish Literature 8 (1970) 3-29; J. C. Maxwell, "An Echo of Spenser in The White Doe of Rylestone" Notes and Queries NS 17 (1970) 300; Thomas J. Roundtree, "Wordsworth and Beattie's Minstrel" South Atlantic Quarterly 69 (1970) 257-63; A. N. L. Munby, Sale Catalogues of Libraries of Eminent Persons (1971-75); N. Stephen Bauer, "Early Burlesques and Parodies of Wordsworth" JEGP 74 (1975) 533-69; C. L. and A. C. Shaver, Wordworth's Library: a Catalogue (1979); Samuel E. Schulman, "The Spenser of the Intimations Ode" Wordsworth Circle 12 (1981) 31-35; Samuel E. Schulman, "The Spenserian Enchantments of Wordsworth's 'Resolution and Independence' Modern Philology 79 (1981-82) 24-44; Everard H. King, "Wordsworth and Beattie's Minstrel" REAL: the Yearbook of Research in English and American Literature 3 (1985) 131-62; Samuel E. Schulman, "Wordsworth's Salisbury Plain Poems and Their Spenserian Motives" JEGP 84 (1985) 221-42; Stephen Gill, William Wordsworth, a Life (1989); F. B. Pinion, A Wordsworth Chronology (1988); Spenser Encyclopedia, "Wordsworth" (1990) 735-37; Chadwyck-Healey English Poetry Database (1995); Duncan Wu, Wordsworth's Reading (1996); David Fairer, "Wordsworth and the School of Warton" in Ribeiro and Basker, eds, Tradition in Transition (1996) 314-38.
COMMENTARY RECORDS
for William Wordsworth:
BIOGRAPHY RECORDS
for William Wordsworth:
AUTHOR AS CRITIC:
(commentary records)