During my son's bar mitzvah (I'm not Jewish, but my wife is, and our children are) I read this poem in synagogue. It still moves me, perhaps more than any other Wordsworth piece. https://klsonline.org/the-child-is-father/
In a funny passage (I don't remember which book it's in), Bertie Wooster tries vainly to explain to someone (Tuppy Glossop, perhaps) how the child Gussy Finknottle is father of the adult Gussy Finknottle.
"Days... / Bound each to each by natural piety" suggests, in light of later thought anyway, concern about the continuity of the "I" as something more substantial than a grammatical fiction. Or--not quite the same thing--a way to protect the identity formed as a child while wandering the countryside. Inadequate as philosophy, perhaps, but maybe best seen as a personal myth of the sort described in Charles Taylor's "Cosmic Connections," myths that hover in the interspace between private epiphany and shared reality.
Those look like interesting articles you've linked, Sally. I appreciate the research!
Line 6 is actually a dimeter (fitting that the shortest and longest lines should be, respectively, in reference to death and the stretching out of days).
Thanks for that clear elucidation of the deceptively simple lyric and especially the connections with the wondrous Intimations Ode. Hard to understand that emotional “natural piety” finding fulfillment in Church of England orthodoxy, no? Odd how good W can be and also how prosaic, breathless, and, ripe for parody and bad imitation. (I can’t think of another good poet who has inspired so much bad poetry in others.) As you and Jody Bottum have demonstrated before, poetry is usually philosophical with “dubious success” and Raysor’s assessment (“cloudy and baffling metaphysical idealism”) has, of course, precedent in Byron’s witty judgements in Don Juan:
“So that their plan and prosody are eligible,
Unless, like Wordsworth, they prove unintelligible.”
“Thou shalt believe in Milton, Dryden Pope;
Thou shalt not set up Wordsworth, Coleridge, Southey;
Hmm. I think I was corrected somewhere in school when I pronounced "Southey" as came naturally to me and apparently to Byron. I was told that it should be "suthy," with the "u" as in "sultry." What a shame I can't go back and bring Byron to that teacher's attention.
During my son's bar mitzvah (I'm not Jewish, but my wife is, and our children are) I read this poem in synagogue. It still moves me, perhaps more than any other Wordsworth piece. https://klsonline.org/the-child-is-father/
Excellent and interesting analysis.
In a funny passage (I don't remember which book it's in), Bertie Wooster tries vainly to explain to someone (Tuppy Glossop, perhaps) how the child Gussy Finknottle is father of the adult Gussy Finknottle.
"Days... / Bound each to each by natural piety" suggests, in light of later thought anyway, concern about the continuity of the "I" as something more substantial than a grammatical fiction. Or--not quite the same thing--a way to protect the identity formed as a child while wandering the countryside. Inadequate as philosophy, perhaps, but maybe best seen as a personal myth of the sort described in Charles Taylor's "Cosmic Connections," myths that hover in the interspace between private epiphany and shared reality.
Those look like interesting articles you've linked, Sally. I appreciate the research!
Line 6 is actually a dimeter (fitting that the shortest and longest lines should be, respectively, in reference to death and the stretching out of days).
I suppose I was hearing more of a stress on "or," but I think you're right. And that's a great observation.
Thanks for that clear elucidation of the deceptively simple lyric and especially the connections with the wondrous Intimations Ode. Hard to understand that emotional “natural piety” finding fulfillment in Church of England orthodoxy, no? Odd how good W can be and also how prosaic, breathless, and, ripe for parody and bad imitation. (I can’t think of another good poet who has inspired so much bad poetry in others.) As you and Jody Bottum have demonstrated before, poetry is usually philosophical with “dubious success” and Raysor’s assessment (“cloudy and baffling metaphysical idealism”) has, of course, precedent in Byron’s witty judgements in Don Juan:
“So that their plan and prosody are eligible,
Unless, like Wordsworth, they prove unintelligible.”
“Thou shalt believe in Milton, Dryden Pope;
Thou shalt not set up Wordsworth, Coleridge, Southey;
Because the first is crazed beyond all hope,
The second drunk, the third so quaint and mouthy”
Hmm. I think I was corrected somewhere in school when I pronounced "Southey" as came naturally to me and apparently to Byron. I was told that it should be "suthy," with the "u" as in "sultry." What a shame I can't go back and bring Byron to that teacher's attention.
So glad you mentioned the quotation in “Surf’s Up” — a fantastic song, and timely given Brian Wilson’s recent passing.