Wordworth's 'Daffodils'

[sirgalahad]

Just as an opening gambit, is anyone interested in commenting on Ww's 'Daffodils'. I am specifically interested in hearing anyone's views on the opening line: 'I wondered lonely as a cloud'. I mean, is this a good simile or not? It's a poem I have frequently taught for various reasons, but this simile..well, what do you think?

[Eva Marina]

I think it's a really beautiful line to start off with, and although we just went over this poem in my English class, I'm failing to remember anything she said about it....
I've taken it to mean that, as a cloud, the speaker is being distanced from reality (earth) in his (or her) loneliness.
To be honest, I'm confused as to how a cloud could be lonely with all the others in the sky, unless it was one of those days when there are hardly any clouds at all.
Overall, I think it's a good simile, very poetic :D for lack of a better word. Beautiful poem, too.

[sirgalahad]

Thanks for your input! Yes, I had never really though about Ww using clouds as a distancing technique but that makes sense. But you're also right about clouds not really being suggestive of a sense of human loneliness because a cloud doesn't ordinarily wander about on its own, does it!?
And, of course, Ww wasn't actually alone at all, was he? I mean, he was actually walking the hills with his sister! So, all in all, poetic licence! But should we tolerate such dishonesty?!

[IrishCanadian]

hahaha no way! the poem should be banned! Just kidding. I always loved that poem. But one day I actually did once come upon a crowed / a host of golden daffodils. Actually there were daisies. But the next time I read that poem my heart did dance with them in the bliss if solitude. Ah life is a wanderful thing. I'm glad we have people like Wordsworth to tell us so.

[Literaturebestb]

Just as an opening gambit, is anyone interested in commenting on Ww's 'Daffodils'. I am specifically interested in hearing anyone's views on the opening line: 'I wondered lonely as a cloud'. I mean, is this a good simile or not? It's a poem I have frequently taught for various reasons, but this simile..well, what do you think?
The use of the word "cloud" in the first line of the poem, I believe highlights the physical location of Wordsworth whlie he searched for some sort of catharsis- he was on a hill over looking the world as a cloud while searching for emotional release. In the few of his poems that I read he spoke a lot about finding emotional release from reflecting upon the emotions that nature evoked in him during times of solitude or states of physical loneliness.

[Eva Marina]

I'm not really sure what you mean by 'physical location' by using the word 'cloud'. The part about the cloud has been a bit confusing for me. If anyone could clarify it, I would really appreciate it :brow: :nod:

[pan_is_dead]

No.................

[pan_is_dead]

I think it's a simile.

[ms. spontaneous]

the last two paragraphs n the poem would be my favorite.
"A poet could not but be gay
In such a jocund company"
seeing such imaginative sights and being inspired to write new things. for a writer needs inspiration to write anything.
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.

when WW is lying at home, he can think back to the wonders he saw and it can take him once again to a new world. imagination is what the mind has to see new things everyday.
the part about the inward eye as solitude, such privacy, no one can know what a person is thining without them expressing it. having something so private like your mind is a rare thing and its beautiful.

[Xamonas Chegwe]

Just as an opening gambit, is anyone interested in commenting on Ww's 'Daffodils'. I am specifically interested in hearing anyone's views on the opening line: 'I wondered lonely as a cloud'. I mean, is this a good simile or not? It's a poem I have frequently taught for various reasons, but this simile..well, what do you think?

Did anyone know that Wordsworth wrote another similar poem? One in which he wandered lonely as a cloud? I like that one better. :D

[dakria]

Hi!
11 July I've the last part of my graduate's exam and I'll talk about WW 'I wandered lonely as a cloud' in English and about Novalis in German. All about Romanticism.
I need a poem's explanation and WW point of view about nature.
I've alredy found something on this forum, but if you know about other links or explanations, help me please.
Bye!

Dakria from Italy

ps. Sorry for the bad English! ;)

[mono]

Hi!
11 July I've the last part of my graduate's exam and I'll talk about WW 'I wandered lonely as a cloud' in English and about Novalis in German. All about Romanticism.
I need a poem's explanation and WW point of view about nature.
I've alredy found something on this forum, but if you know about other links or explanations, help me please.
Bye!

Dakria from Italy

ps. Sorry for the bad English! ;)
Hello, dakria, welcome to the forum; and, do not worry, your English sounds wonderful. :)
Firstly, to cite the whole poem, 'I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud' --

I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud

I wandered 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 stretched 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.
Once a reader gets past some of the difficult language of Wordsworth's era, the poem may read relatively simply, though reading it in a non-native language - yikes! For example, I could never imagine myself attempting to read Petrarch or Dante in original Italian. :eek2:
The central words throughout the whole poem relies mostly upon 'lonely,' 'solitude,' and, most of all, 'perception.' Though the word itself, 'perception,' never appears in the poem, all four stanzas revolve entirely around the cloud's perception of its surroundings; the cloud takes in everything, and nearly feels overwhelmed with beauty - the daffodils, the stars, the ocean waves, etc. The daffodils, themselves, and I feel unsure why, seem the aesthetic items for comparison; everything, the stars and ocean waves seem the comparing objects that do not quite match the beauty of the perceived daffodils.
In the last stanza, Wordsworth brings himself out of the perception of the cloud, and more into his human origin. The remembrance of the daffodils, to him, persist as an immense comfort to his solitude, hence the line 'the bliss of solitude.'
I hope I have helped, dakria, and wish you luck! ;)

[Asa Adams]

I agree with Mono, though I would say that whether WW is percieving everything as a cloud is arguable. However the lack of a coma after the I wandered would makes it clear that everything is percieved by a cloud. For example: I wandered, lonely as a cloud. This would then suggest that the narrative is indeed a clouds perspective. Therefore, it would be considered Presonification.

[dakria]

hi!
Petrarca and Dante works are difficult to understand for italian people too, 'cause it's old italian, vulgar(or vernacular(?)) and sometimes Latin.
However, I've found W.W. poem very easy to translate, and I've tried to do it drawing on his romantic point of view.
I'm finishing my work with :crash: 'Power Point',then I must study everything. :brickwall
Everything you wrote will help me a lot! :thumbs_up ;)
Thanks!
:D

[sybilline]

It's really a lovely poem. It reminds me of these few lines in "Frost at Midnight" by Coleridge :

But thou, my Babe ! shalt wander like a breeze
By lakes and sandy shores, beneath the crags
of ancient mountain, and beneath the clouds
Which image in their bulk both lakes and shores
and mountain crags ... (l. 54 - 58)

Lightness, reflexivity and a kind of vital principle pervade the atmosphere of these lines, which we can find out in "The Daffodils". Sybilline.

[sybilline]

Asa is right I think, and it is the whole charm of the poem to make us feel as the poet's, who conveys his love of nature through this particular perspective.