Hey, does anybody know if Lucy in Wordsworth's poems is a real person or not?
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Hey, does anybody know if Lucy in Wordsworth's poems is a real person or not?
From Wikipedia, always making things simple :D:
Quote:
The poems were written during a short period while the poet lived in Germany. Although they individually deal with a variety of themes, as a series they focus on the poet's longing for the company of his friend Coleridge, who had stayed in England, and his increasing impatience with his sister Dorothy, who had travelled with him abroad. Wordsworth channeled his frustrations into an examination of unrequited love for the idealised character of Lucy, an English girl who has died young. The idea of her death weighs heavily on the poet throughout the series, imbuing it with a melancholic, elegiac tone. Whether Lucy was based on a real woman or was a figment of the poet's imagination has long been a matter of debate among scholars. Generally reticent about the poems, Wordsworth never revealed the details of her origin or identity. Some scholars speculate that Lucy is based on his sister Dorothy, while others see her as a fictitious or hybrid character. Most critics agree that she is a literary device upon whom he could project, meditate and reflect.
While studying Wordsworth and Lucy Gray we were told that something similiar happening to a little girl.