Wordsworth vs. Whitman

**Shea** · 01-22-2004, 05:36 PM

Before we began studying Wordsworth, I groaned because my instructor said he was the precursor to Whitman, whom I loath. But as I've been reading, I really enjoy his poetry! I connect more with it. Especially the poem "Michael", where the perfect pleasant rural life is ruined by the city.

Wordsworth seems to have this thing about the elderly, as if he's trying to hang on to old ways because he is afraid of the new scientific advancements. But discovering this attribute was like learning about myself! I love spending time with the elderly just to hear their stories. Too many times I find myself wishing I was raised among a generation that held more of their values.

I have no use for Whitman however, I found him to be very presumptuous (sp?) and more inclined to break values than anything else.

**piquant** · 01-22-2004, 05:51 PM

I love Whitman. I wish you could share my enjoyment. I think I love him because he is so deliciously insane. I am averyone, I am everything, I contradict myself, I sound my barabaric yawp. I picture him diry and earth, with a beard full of leaves.

But then again, I know very little of Wordsworth. Maybe I would like him better if I knew more about him. A lot of people feel the way you do about Whitman, but that's what attracks me to him.

**Shea** · 01-22-2004, 06:08 PM

Hee hee, I really don't mind the earthy image, but I didn't like his egotism.

**Sindhu** · 01-23-2004, 04:09 AM

Shea, I shared a lot of the feelings you mention with regard to Wordsworth's poetry initially and I still have a certain respect for SOME of his portrays of a by gone generation and era. But I felt later that this attitude was more than tinged with unbearable egotism ( Yes, I know you mentioned that in relation to Whitman, but beleive me, Wordsworth has his fair share!

)
Have you read The Old Cumbrland Beggar? If not, try it- I'd like to hear wat you think. I won't offer my opinion now

You can find the poem at www.bartleby.com/145/ww139.html
Sindhu.

**Shea** · 01-26-2004, 08:15 AM

Ok, I'll read it this afternoon after my classes.

**azmuse** · 01-26-2004, 10:10 AM

hope you don't mind my two cents: i think it was awful. the best images were when the toll-girl and post boy showed him love. aargh. the rest: it was like being told of flowers s-l-o-w-l-y fading away. at least show them fading!
this was the only line i liked:
"And thus the soul,
By that sweet taste of pleasure unpursued,
Doth find herself insensibly disposed
To virtue and true goodness."
this was ok:
"My neighbour, when with punctual care, each week
Duly as Friday comes, though pressed herself
By her own wants, she from her store of meal
Takes one unsparing handful for the scrip
Of this old Mendicant, and, from her door
Returning with exhilarated heart,
Sits by her fire, and builds her hope in heaven."
at least there's a picture, instead of hot air and wasted words. he could have built a poem with the last 2 lines - i really liked them, and at least they were passionate - and some good images; instead he wrote lofty, highflung crap. (ewwww.)

**azmuse** · 01-26-2004, 10:42 PM

plus it dragged...not very succint use of language. i kind of expect that, even in a long poem.

**piquant** · 01-26-2004, 10:44 PM

Well, based on this poem by Wordsworth, I'll have to strengthen my like for Whitman. Wordsworth and strike me, like Azmuse said, "lofty, high-flung crap."

If Whtiman was egotistic, it was from an all-ecompassing passion for life. He didn't have time to be lofty, he was to busy rolling around in the dirt, and shouting about how wonderful it was to do so.

How do you all feel about Allen Ginsberg? I think whitman was one of his major influences? At least they remind me of Whitman.

**Shea** · 01-28-2004, 09:00 AM

Sorry, I haven't been able to read The Old Cumberland Beggar, Sindu. (I will never take 5 classes in one semester again!

) I'll try to get to it this weekend. Now I'm off to decipher some Old English. I'm so worn out!

**Sindhu** · 01-29-2004, 01:25 AM

Poor you, Shea!

**atiguhya padma** · 01-29-2004, 08:31 AM

I am not a great fan of either poet. Whitman I feel is probably better of the two.

Wordsworth started quite well when he was working with Coleridge, although most of what is good in the Lyrical Ballads, if I remember correctly was Coleridge's.

Wordsworth's best stuff is probably in The Prelude. Intimations of Immortality is pretty good at times.

However, Wordsworth is really too twee. If he were alive today, you could imagine him writing ditties for birthday cards. He is by far the least significant of the major Romantic poets in my opinion (maybe he is significant in how much bad poetry he has inspired).

Atiguhya Padma

**Sindhu** · 01-29-2004, 11:57 PM

"twee" is THE word! And yes, the amount of bad poetry the man inspired is positively CRIMINAL!

**Helga** · 01-31-2004, 09:00 PM

I love Wordsworth, when I saw this forum I read everything I could find about Whitman and I don't like his work at all. I can´t even understand him, if someone could tell me about a really good poem by him that would be great. I've read a lot of Wordsworth and I love it. I can't see the similarity between the two so if someone wants to explain it...

**Shea** · 02-02-2004, 08:52 AM

I would have to agree with Azmuse about enjoying only parts of the poem, but I didn't think it was all that terrible. I wondered how accepted "The Old Cumberland Beggar" has been in certain circles (I guess that's how to describe it). I mean, it's one that wasn't included in my anthology, though there were about 50 other Wordsworth poems. I found "Michael" much easier to follow, though just as sentimental. Even a good poet has his bad moments.

But Whitman's celebrated work was "Song of Myself", which I loathed. I hated how he presumed to know what I felt, which was absolutely not on target. At least Wordsworth allowed me to have my own feelings about his philosophy.

However, Wordsworth is really too twee. If he were alive today, you could imagine him writing ditties for birthday cards. He is by far the least significant of the major Romantic poets in my opinion (maybe he is significant in how much bad poetry he has inspired).

Wordworth was at the beginning of the Romantic movement. All "movements" have there good artists and thier bad ones. Look at one of the first Romantic American writers, Washington Irving. Have you ever tried to read "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow"? That tends to be rather droll in several places.

Or look at the gothic movement. There were some very good writers, but then there were so many other tedious, menial writers that Jane Austen was getting so sick of them that she wrote Northanger Abbey to satirize them. Maybe you should satirize bad greeting card writers.

**Sindhu** · 02-03-2004, 12:45 AM

Originally posted by Shea

At least Wordsworth allowed me to have my own feelings about his philosophy.

In the beginning, perhaps. But towards the latter half of his career Wordsworth became totally didactic, pedantic and intolerant of disapproval to an unbeleivable extent. Coleridge must have get signs of the coming change when he attacked Wordsworth's poetical doctrines in Biographia Literaria- and he paid the price for his attack- Wordsworth saw to that all right!