Wednesday, February 12, 2014

Critically evaluate the poem Lucy– William Wordsworth



          William Wordsworth was poet of nature and one of pioneers of the Romantic Movement in England. He had brought in a new trend in poetry-stressing the need for a return to nature and simple mode of poetic communication.  He had an exceptional influence on the development of English literature.
          These two poems have been taken form a group of five poems where Wordsworth has written about his love for Lucy. We do not know who Lucy was. But it is likely that the poems speak of a real experience of young love for a girl who died suddenly. The poet’s love is very tender and since and the loss is felt very deeply.

          We have two different Lucy poems. In the first, the poet has compared Lucy with the living girl. The poet has described her beauty and his love for her. While the second poems reveals the poet’s universal appeal for supernatural love for Lucy. The poet feels a great shock when Lucy died. But then he concludes she has been turned to into nature.  She is living each and every aspect of Nature.  This philosophical and sublime conception of love for nature provides the poet a force to live, a spirit to survive, a stream for guidance. 

          The first poem begins with the description of Lucy. The poet gives some details of Lucy’s life. In the first stanza, the poet describes the place where Lucy lived an isolated life.  It was a place near by a small river Dove. She lived into an unknown place. A few people went there. As a few people had seen, none appreciated her beauty and hardly anybody loved her.
          The second stanza provides more deloit to her beauty. Here the poet compares her with a ‘violet’ and a ‘star’. Through these symbols, the poet says that she has the beauty and delicacy of a flower and the dignity and permanent glory as a star. For the poet, she is unique as a star, shining above in the sky. As he says,
“Fair as a star, when only one.
Is shining in the sky.”

          There was no difference to the poet till she lived unknown and unpraised. As he himself loved her, appreciated her and knew her. But the difference comes when she was not seen at all. As Lucy is dead, the poet is somewhat unhappy. He felt shock as his sincere love and the source of inspiration was gone. We feel poet’s different kind of feelings, when he say,  
“But she is in her grave, and, oh,
 The different to be.

          In the second poem, the poet is still remembering her and also praising her, but now he is turned to into an object from a subject. Here the earthly matters and affection or ‘indifference’ of the people do not have longer importance. These all things are related to living one. When one is dead, he is far from every earthly fears, same has been done to the poet himself. He says, “I had no human fears.”  
          The Poet uses such words like ‘feel’, ‘touch’, ‘hear’, ‘see’ which are usually related to living creatures, but now they are meaningless in respect of Lucy. As he says,
No motion has she now, no force;  
she neither hear nor sees.”

          Yet the poet is not ready to say her ‘dead’ instead he feels it more correct to says that ‘she having some different life’ which is far from ‘earthy fears’. Now, she has got a universal and eternal appeal as she is turned into Nature. Sadness is no longer as the poet has no fear to lose Lucy. The poet is now again with Lucy and Lucy is again with him, moving eternally in the process of life. Now, he is enjoying divine company of Lucy into the form of nature
 “Rolled round in earth’s diurnal course,
With rocks, and stones, and trees.

          As noted earlier, Wordsworth believed in simplicity of expression in poetry. So there is no over use of rhyme, rhythm or other high poetic technique. Yet it is not that the poet does not use poetic technique such as alliteration, rhyme, rhythm etc. He has tried to bring musicality through alliteration.
1. A Slumber did my Spirit Seal.
2. Rolled round in earth’s diurnal course.
          The poem has remarkable rhyming word at the end of the line such as,
Dove-love, seal-feel, fears-years. Eye-sky, be-me.
          Moreover, the use of article ‘A’ and expression like ‘oh’ increase the charm and intensity of ‘Lucy Poems’. The tone of this poem is also the mixture of both pleasing and tragic feeling. In the first two stanzas, the poet is happy while in the third stanza he looks very sad as Lucy is dead. This is also a specify style of Wordsworth.

          This way, ‘Lucy’ is the super lyrical poem based on nature by Wordsworth. It is a philosophical and sublime conception of love for nature. It is also a symbolic description of the form and function of nature in a simple human shape. It shows poet’s supernatural love for nature.
          ‘Lucy Poems’ suggest for Wordsworth, Lucy was unique. For him nature is not only creations of God like the mankind but he loved nature more than anything else. It shows his highest quality as nature poem. Edward Albert says about Lucy poems,
“Sometimes he does touch on
intimate emotions, but the he
tends to be restrained, hinting
at rather than proclaiming the
 passions that he feels the series
of Lucy poems are typical of
their kind.”  

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