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Study Guide
Prepared by Michael
J. Cummings..©
2010
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Title
Information
.......When
Wordsworth completed this work in 1804, he called it
simply "Ode," and
the poem carried this title when it was published in
1807. In 1815, when
the poem was republished, Wordsworth expanded the
title to "Ode: Intimations
of Immortality from Recollections of Early
Childhood." Intimations
means hints, inklings, or indirect suggestions. Most
readers and critics
today use the title "Intimations of Immortality"
when referring to the
poem.
Type
of Work
......."Intimations
of Immortality" is a lyric poem in the form of an
ode. A lyric poem presents
deep feelings and emotions rather than telling a
story; an ode uses lofty
language and a dignified tone and may contain
several hundred lines.
Composition
and Publication Information
.......Wordsworth
completed the first four stanzas of "Intimations of
Immortality" between
March and April of 1802. He completed the rest of
the poem by early 1804.
Longman, Hurst, Rees and Orme published the poem at
Paternoster Row, London,
in May 1807 as part of a collection of Wordsworth's
works,
Poems, in
Two Volumes.
Summary
of the Poem
.......The
entire earth—all its fields and streams and
trees—seemed like heaven to
me when I was a child. Now, however, as spring
begins to unfold its splendor,
I no longer perceive the world this way. True, there
is much beauty around
me: rainbows, roses, moonlight, sunlight, the
reflection of the stars on
evening waters. But these sights, magnificent as
they are, lack the full
glory of what I once saw.
.......At
this moment, while the birds sing and the lambs
frolic, my inability to
perceive the fullness of this glory makes me sad.
But the sounds of nature—the
wind and the waterfalls—cheer me as I realize all
the earth is happy, land
and sea. Even the beasts revel in the spirit of
spring. Shepherd boy, let
me hear your shouts of joy!
 .......You
creatures of the forest, I hear the calls you make
to one another, and
I hear the heavens laugh with you in your joy. I
feel your happiness—all
of it. How could I be sullen on such a fine May
morning. Children are picking
fresh flowers in a thousand valleys, the sun shines
brightly, and babies
leap in their mother's arms. But even amid all this
joy and wonder, there
is a tree and there is a field that speak to me of
something that is missing.
So, too, does the pansy at my feet. Where is that
heavenly glory I once
perceived?
.......When
we are born, our souls—which previously existed in
the celestial realm—go
to sleep momentarily. When they awake to the new
world around them, they
forget almost everything about their heavenly
existence. But a hint of
that existence remains in our souls even though the
world begins to enclose
us, like prison walls. Still, a growing boy can
perceive heavenly light.
But when he becomes a man, the light fades. Earth,
without malice, further
blinds him to the fullness of the glory he once knew
by exhibiting its
own glory. However, although the glory of nature is
not equal to heavenly
glory, it is a reflection of it
.......A
child of six, while enjoying the kisses of his
mother and the admiring
gaze of his father, already begins to plot out the
life he will lead and
the events he will take part in—a wedding, a
festival, a funeral—and prepares
himself for business, love, and strife. He may
foresee himself in many
roles in imitation of others, even down to the time
when old age overtakes
him.
.......The
outward appearance of a child belies the immensity
of his soul within.
That soul, that inner light, still perceives
something of the heavenly
presence, still fathoms something of the eternal
deep, even as we adults
labor in darkness to discover the truths of the
eternal realm. You, child,
are the best seer, prophet, and philosopher. But why
do you, with the memory
of the glories of heaven within you, press on so
urgently toward adulthood,
which dims your inner light and lays its earthly
burdens upon your back?
.......But
how heartening it is to know that at least a glimmer
of celestial light
yet lies within us as adults and manifests itself in
our natural surroundings.
I give thanks for my knowledge of how things are and
that nothing can entirely
eliminate the awareness in us of the immortal sea
that brought us to the
shore of life. So sing, birds, a joyous song of May.
Though the time will
come when the glories of spring's fields and flowers
will be forever gone
from us, we will not grieve; for we know that
greater glories await us
beyond death.
.......I
love the fountains, meadows, hills, and brooks—the
brilliance of a morning
sun and the beauty of a flower. But I know that the
flower is only a hint
of what is to come.
.
.
Ode:
Intimations of Immortality
From
Recollections of
Early Childhood
By William
Wordsworth
.
The
Child is Father of the
Man;
And
I could wish my days
to be
Bound
each to each by natural
piety.
This quotation from another
Wordsworth poem, "My Heart Leaps Up,"
appears before the first stanza of
"Intimations of Immortality." It
expresses the view that a child is
superior
to an adult in his or her appreciation
of the beauty of nature as a reflection
of the celestial realm.
There
was a time when meadow,
grove, and stream,
The earth,
and every common sight,
To
me did seem
Apparell'd
in celestial light,
The
glory and the freshness
of a
dream.
5
It
is not now as it hath
been of yore;—
Turn
wheresoe'er I may,
By
night or day,
The
things which I have
seen I now can see no more.
The
rainbow comes and goes, 10
And
lovely is the rose;
The
moon doth with delight
Look
round her when the heavens are bare;
Waters
on a starry night
Are
beautiful and fair; 15
The sunshine
is a glorious birth;
But yet
I know, where'er I go,
That
there hath pass'd away
a glory from the earth.
Now,
while the birds thus
sing a joyous song,
And while
the young lambs bound 20
As
to the tabor's sound,1
To
me alone there came a
thought of grief:
A timely
utterance2 gave
that thought relief,
And
I again am strong:
The
cataracts blow their
trumpets from the steep; 25
No
more shall grief of mine
the season wrong;
I
hear the echoes through
the mountains throng,
The
winds come to me from
the fields of sleep,
And
all the earth is gay;
Land
and sea 30
Give
themselves up to jollity,
And
with the heart of May
Doth
every beast keep holiday;—
Thou
Child of Joy,
Shout
round me, let me hear
thy shouts, thou happy 35
Shepherd-boy!
Ye
blessèd creatures,
I have heard the call
Ye to
each other make; I see
The
heavens laugh with you
in your jubilee;
My heart
is at your festival, 40
My
head hath its coronal,
The
fulness of your bliss,
I feel—I feel it all.
O
evil day! if I were sullen
While
Earth herself is adorning,
This
sweet May-morning, 45
And
the children are culling
On
every side,
In
a thousand valleys far and wide,
Fresh
flowers; while the sun shines warm,
And
the babe leaps up on
his mother's arm:— 50
I
hear, I hear, with joy I hear!
—But
there's a tree, of many, one,
A
single field which I have
look'd upon,
Both
of them speak of something
that is gone:
The
pansy at my feet 55
Doth
the same tale repeat:
Whither
is fled the visionary
gleam?
Where
is it now, the glory
and the dream?
Our birth
is but a sleep and a forgetting:3
The
Soul that rises with
us, our life's Star, 60
Hath
had elsewhere its setting,
And
cometh from afar:
Not
in entire forgetfulness,
And
not in utter nakedness,
But
trailing clouds of glory
do we come 65
From
God, who is our home:
Heaven
lies about us in
our infancy!
Shades
of the prison-house
begin to close
Upon
the growing Boy,
But
he beholds the light,
and whence it flows, 70
He
sees it in his joy;
The
Youth, who daily farther
from the east
Must
travel, still is Nature's priest,
And
by the vision splendid
Is
on his way attended; 75
At
length the Man perceives
it die away,
And
fade into the light
of common day.
Earth
fills her lap with
pleasures of her own;
Yearnings
she hath in her
own natural kind,
And,
even with something
of a mother's mind, 80
And
no unworthy aim,
The homely
nurse doth all she can
To
make her foster-child,
her Inmate Man,
Forget
the glories he hath known,
And
that imperial palace
whence he came. 85
Behold
the Child among his
new-born blisses,
A
six years' darling of
a pigmy size!
See,
where 'mid work of
his own hand he lies,
Fretted
by sallies of his
mother's kisses,
With
light upon him from
his father's eyes! 90
See,
at his feet, some little
plan or chart,
Some
fragment from his dream
of human life,
Shaped
by himself with newly-learnèd
art;
A wedding
or a festival,
A mourning
or a funeral; 95
And
this hath now his heart,
And unto
this he frames his song:
Then
will he fit his tongue
To dialogues4
of business, love, or strife;
But
it will not be long 100
Ere
this be thrown aside,
And
with new joy and pride
The
little actor cons another
part;
Filling
from time to time
his 'humorous stage'
With
all the Persons, down
to palsied Age, 105
That
Life brings with her
in her equipage;
As
if his whole vocation
Were
endless imitation.
Thou,
whose exterior semblance
doth belie
Thy
soul's immensity; 110
Thou
best philosopher, who
yet dost keep
Thy
heritage, thou eye among
the blind,
That,
deaf and silent, read'st
the eternal deep,
Haunted
for ever by the
eternal
mind,—5
Mighty
prophet! Seer blest! 6...115
On
whom those truths do rest,
Which
we are toiling all
our lives to find,
In
darkness lost, the darkness
of the grave;
Thou,
over whom thy Immortality
Broods
like the Day, a master
o'er a slave, 120
A
presence which is not
to be put by;
To
whom the grave
Is
but a lonely bed without
the sense or sight
Of
day or the warm light,
A
place of thought where
we in waiting lie; 125
Thou
little Child, yet glorious
in the might
Of
heaven-born freedom on
thy being's height,
Why
with such earnest pains
dost thou provoke
The
years to bring the inevitable
yoke,
Thus
blindly with thy blessedness
at strife? 130
Full
soon thy soul shall
have her earthly freight,
And
custom lie upon thee
with a weight,
Heavy
as frost, and deep
almost as life!
O
joy! that in our embers
Is
something that doth live, 135
That
nature yet remembers
What
was so fugitive!
The
thought of our past
years in me doth breed
Perpetual
benediction: not
indeed
For
that which is most worthy
to be blest— 140
Delight
and liberty, the
simple creed
Of
childhood, whether busy
or at rest,
With
new-fledged hope still
fluttering in his breast:—
Not
for these I raise
The
song of thanks and praise; 145
But for
those obstinate questionings
Of sense
and outward things,
Fallings
from us, vanishings;
Blank
misgivings of a Creature
Moving
about in worlds not
realized, 150
High
instincts before which
our mortal Nature
Did
tremble like a guilty
thing surprised:
But
for those first affections,
Those
shadowy recollections,
Which,
be they what they may, 155
Are
yet the fountain-light
of all our day,
Are
yet a master-light of
all our seeing;
Uphold us, cherish,
and have power to make
Our
noisy years seem moments
in the being
Of
the eternal Silence:
truths that wake, 160
To
perish never:
Which
neither listlessness,
nor mad endeavour,
Nor
Man nor Boy,
Nor
all that is at enmity
with joy,
Can
utterly abolish or destroy!
165
Hence
in a season of calm weather
Though
inland far we be,
Our
souls have sight of
that immortal sea
Which
brought us hither,
Can in
a moment travel thither, 170
And
see the children sport
upon the shore,
And
hear the mighty waters
rolling evermore.
Then
sing, ye birds, sing,
sing a joyous song!
And
let the young lambs bound
As
to the tabor's sound! 175
We
in thought will join
your throng,
Ye
that pipe and ye that play,
Ye
that through your hearts to-day
Feel
the gladness of the May!
What
though the radiance
which was once so bright 180
Be
now for ever taken from
my sight,
Though
nothing can bring back the hour
Of
splendour in the grass,
of glory in the flower;
We
will grieve not, rather find
Strength
in what remains behind; 185
In
the primal sympathy
Which
having been must ever be;
In
the soothing thoughts that spring
Out
of human suffering;
In
the faith that looks through death,
190
In
years that bring the
philosophic mind.
And
O ye Fountains, Meadows,
Hills, and Groves,
Forebode
not any severing
of our loves!
Yet
in my heart of hearts
I feel your might;
I
only have relinquish'd
one delight 195
To
live beneath your more
habitual sway.
I
love the brooks which
down their channels fret,
Even
more than when I tripp'd
lightly as they;
The
innocent brightness
of a new-born Day
Is
lovely yet; 200
The
clouds that gather round
the setting sun
Do
take a sober colouring
from an eye
That
hath kept watch o'er
man's mortality;
Another
race hath been,
and other palms7
are won.
Thanks
to the human heart
by which we live, 205
Thanks
to its tenderness,
its joys, and fears,
To
me the meanest flower
that blows can give
Thoughts
that do often lie
too deep for tears.
|
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Notes
|
1.
as to the tabor's
sound: Like the sound of a small drum.
2.
timely utterance:
The sounds of nature, such as wind and
waterfalls.
3.
Our birth . . . forgetting:
At birth, humans close their eyes to the
heavenly world from which they
came and begin to lose their memory of their
pre-existent abode.
4.
fit . . . dialogues:
Speak.
5.
eternal mind:
God.
6.
Mighty prophet! Seer
blest: The little child of line 126.
7.
palms: Palm leaves
worn as symbols of victory. |
Interpretation
.......Wordsworth's
poem expresses the view that the human soul exists
first in heaven. When
united at birth with a body, it brings with it
impressions of heaven, as
the following passage from the poem indicates:
The
Soul that rises
with us, our life's Star,
Hath had
elsewhere its setting,
And cometh
from afar:
Not in
entire forgetfulness,
And not in
utter nakedness,
But
trailing clouds of glory
These
“trailing clouds” remain
in a growing child as “intimations of immortality,” or
memories of his
celestial abode. However, when the child passes into
his adolescent and
teen years, his increasing exposure to the material
world and the beauty
of nature dims his memories of his heavenly beginning.
By the time he enters
adulthood, all but the merest recollection of his
previous existence disappears.
(In the ancient world, Plato believed that the human
soul existed before
birth in an incorporeal realm. Although it possessed
vast knowledge, its
memory of this knowledge failed after it united with a
body at birth. A
human being then occupied himself with restoring this
knowledge through
education.) Nevertheless, this faint memory is enough
to light for him
the path back to heaven:
Those
shadowy recollections,
Which, be
they what they
may,
Are yet the
fountain light
of all our day,
Are yet a
master light of
all our seeing
.
.
Themes
Children
See the Light
.......The
speaker of the poem maintains paradoxically that the
more a person ages—the
more educated and experienced he becomes—the less he
knows about heaven
and God. A very young child, on the other hand, is a
fountain of insight
and enlightenment about the supernal world. After
all, says the poem's
speaker, a child's soul is a recent arrival from
paradise. Memories of
his heavenly abode are still vivid to him. He still
sees the light of the
eternal God.
Faith
.......There
is in all of us a heavenly spark that can ignite the
fire of faith to support
us through troubled times, keeping alive the thought
of reuniting with
the Creator in the celestial realm.
Ennui
.......Humans
become jaded and world-weary after losing their
childhood innocence and
enthusiasm.
Meter,
Feet, and Line Length
.......Wordsworth
uses iambic feet throughout the poem. An iambic foot
(or iamb) consists
of a pair of syllables, the first one unstressed and
the second stressed.
For example, in the fifth line of the first stanza,
the first two syllables
(The GLOR) make up the first iambic foot, and
the second two syllables
(y AND) make up the second iambic foot. The
meter of the poem varies
from dimeter to hexameter. (A line with two iambic
feet makes up a dimeter;
three feet, a trimeter; four feet, a tetrameter;
five feet, a pentameter;
and six feet a hexameter.)
.......Below
is a graphic illustrating the iambic feet and meter
of each line in the
first stanza. Numbers appear above each iambic foot
in the lines on the
left. On the right is the name of the meter. Line 1
is in iambic pentameter,
line 2 in iambic tetrameter, line 3 in iambic
dimeter, and so on.
.........1...............2.................3.....................4......................5
There
WAS..|..a
TIME..|..when
MEAD..|..ow,
GROVE,..|..and
STREAM, |
Pentameter |
.........1................2...............3................4.
The
EARTH,..|..and
EV..|..ry
COM..|..mon
SIGHT, |
Tetrameter |
.....1..............2
To
ME..|..did
SEEM |
Dimeter |
......1..............2.............3...............4
Ap
PAR..|..elled
IN..|..cel
EST..|..ial
LIGHT, |
Tetrameter |
........1..............2.................3................4.................5
The
GLOR..|..y
AND..|..the
FRESH..|..ness
OF..|..a
DREAM. |
Pentameter |
..1.............2.............3.............4..................5
It
IS..|..not
NOW..|..as
IT..|..hath
BEEN..|..of
YORE; |
Pentameter |
........1....................2.............3
Turn
WHERE..|..so
E'ER..|..I
MAY, |
Trimeter |
.......1..............2
By
NIGHT..|..or
DAY, |
Dimeter |
..........1...............2.................3................4................5..............6
The
THINGS..|..which
I..|..have
SEEN..|..I
NOW..|..can
SEE..|..no
MORE. |
Hexameter |
Rhyme
.......The
poem uses end rhyme and internal rhyme. The pattern
of the end rhyme varies.
Note, for example, the difference between the
rhyming pattern of the first
stanza and that of the second.
There
was a time
when meadow, grove, and stream,
The earth,
and every common sight,
To
me did seem
Apparell'd
in celestial light,
The glory
and the freshness
of a dream.
5
It is not
now as it hath
been of yore;—
Turn
wheresoe'er I may,
By
night or day,
The things
which I have
seen I now can see no more.
The
rainbow comes and goes,
10
And
lovely is the rose;
The
moon doth with delight
Look
round her when the heavens are bare;
Waters
on a starry night
Are
beautiful and fair; 15
The sunshine
is a glorious birth;
But yet
I know, where'er I go,
That
there hath pass'd away
a glory from the earth.
Wordsworth
uses internal rhyme
sparingly but to good effect. Following are examples:
But
yet I know,
where'er I go (line 17)
Fallings
from us,
vanishings; 147 (line 147)
Which, be they
what
they may,
(line 155)
Though
inland far we be
(line 167)
.
Figures
of Speech
.......Examples
of figures of speech in the poem are the following:
Alliteration
Repetition
of a consonant
sound
From
God, who
is our home
(line 66)
Behold
the Child among his
new-born
blisses
(line 86)
See,
at his feet, some
little plan or chart,
Some
fragment
from
his dream of human life (lines 91 and 92)
Anaphora
Repetition of
a word, phrase,
or clause at the beginning of word groups occurring
one after the other
Ye
that pipe
and ye that play,
Ye that
through your
hearts to-day (lines 177-178)
Apostrophe
Addressing
an abstraction or a thing, present or absent, or
addressing an absent person
or entity
And
O ye Fountains,
Meadows, Hills, and Groves,
Forebode
not any severing
of our loves! (lines 192-193)
Metaphor
Comparison
between unlike things without using like, as, or
than
The
cataracts blow
their trumpets from the steep (line 25)
(Comparison
of waterfalls
to musicians)
The Soul
that rises with
us, our life's Star (line 60)
(Comparison
of the soul
to a guiding star)
Paradox
Contradictory
statement used to express a truth
Those
shadowy
recollections,
Which, be
they what they
may, 155
Are yet
the fountain-light
of all our day,
Are yet
a master-light
of all our seeing
(Shadows
are a source
of light)
Personification
Comparison
of a thing to a person
The
Moon doth with
delight
Look round
her when the
heavens are bare (lines 12-13)
(These
lines compare
the moon to a person experiencing delight)
Land and
sea
Give
themselves up to jollity
(lines 30-31)
(These
lines compare
the land and the sea to jolly persons)
Earth
fills her lap with
pleasures of her own;
Yearnings
she hath in her
own natural kind,
And, even
with something
of a mother's mind,
And no
unworthy aim,
The
homely nurse doth all
she can
To make
her foster-child,
her Inmate Man,
Forget
the glories he hath
known,
And that
imperial palace
whence he came. (lines 78-85)
(This
stanza compares
earth to a woman—in particular, to a
mother and a nurse)
Synecdoche
Substitution
of a part to stand for the whole, or the whole to
stand for a part
thou
eye
among the blind (line 112)
("Eye"
represents a child
who guides adults)
Study
Questions and Writing Topics
1.
Have you ever had "intimations of immortality"? If
so, explain the nature
of them.
2.
The poem says a child is a "Mighty prophet" (line
111). What does a child
foretell?
3.
Is conscience a form of inborn knowledge?
4.
In an essay, compare and contrast Plato's belief
in the pre-existence of
the soul with Wordsworth's belief on the same
topic.
.
 ..
.
. |
