At Rydal Mount

Rydal Mount House

The Garden

Another spacious and more comfortable dwelling where Wordsworth spent more than thirty seven years of his life is the house on a hill called "Rydal Mount" on the outskirts of Ambleside, from where one can have a fine view of the lakes, Rydal Water and Grasmere Lake surrounded by hills and valleys. Wordsworth led a very frugal life in his humble residence of Dove Cottage in  1808. Due to lack of sufficient  accommodation he moved to Allan Bank in 1810 at the north end of Grasmere. The poet disliked the damp and humid place and moved to the parsonage at Grasmere. His two children  Catherine and Thomas died in the same year1812. The poet, unable to stay there with his loss of beloved children, shifted his  residence to Rydal Mount in 1813. He took this on rent from Lady Diana de Fleming of Rydal Hall. This house is very spacious with four bed rooms, a study room and a kitchen. Wordsworth wrote many poems here and revised his earlier works.Though  Wordsworth passed away in 1850, his family continued to live here till 1859, the year of Mary Hutchinson's death. Wordsworth's great-great grand daughter Mary Henderson purchased this property in 1969 and since then has been managed by the descendants of Wordsworth's family. Here we can see the portraits of Wordsworth's family as well as many of his manuscripts. In the room at the entrance there are many published books and works on Wordsworth. My younger daughter, sensing my zeal, bought a copy of the "Prelude"and gifted it to me by which my long cherished desire of owning the masterpiece has been  been fulfilled. Later when I expressed my desire to meet the descendants of Wordsworth's family, the lady near the counter informed me that they had gone to London to spend their vacation.

Drawing Room

Dining Room

St. Mary Church

Inside View of St.Mary Church

 The main attraction of this house is the garden in a spacious area of four acres. Wordsworth, interested in landscape gardening, planted many varieties of herbs, flower plants and trees. Even now nearly twenty-six varieties of plants are seen. It is a very colorful garden with flowers like daffodils, blue bells, rhododendrons etc. The poet liked Nature in her wild and natural state and so he preserved the touch of wilderness with clumps of thickly grown bushes and trees and with a steep slope down providing a view of the distant lakes. In stead of sitting in his study room, he preferred to sit on the wooden bench on the elevated mound in midst of Nature and put down his poetic feelings as if he got instant communication with Nature. His beloved daughter, Dora, inherited some of the poetic qualities of her father and wrote a traveller's journal. At the age of 39 she married Edward Quillinan much against her father's wishes in 1843. Unfortunately she died in the prime of her youth due to Tuberculosis  in 1847. This tragic incident affected the old poet very much and later he could not write much.

Mary Hutchinson

Rydal Mt. Garden

In her memory Wordsworth planted hundreds of daffodils in a field near St.Mary's Church. The chapel of St.Mary is just a few yards away from Rydal Mount. Wordsworth used to visit this church often and also acted as church warden from 1833 to 1834. In 1838 Wordsworth was conferred with honorary doctorate  by Durham University in and by the Oxford University in 1839. He was given a civil pension of 300 pounds a year by the Government and was honored with the prestigious position  as Poet Laureate of England in 1843 after Robert Southey's  death.


 As a tireless walker Wordsworth used to undertake long walking tours around the lakes and hills and  recorded his observations and knowledge about the Lake District in his prose book "Guide to the Lakes". Many critics think that his shorter poems have more poetic appeal to the readers as they seem to be more spontaneous and creative without any prosaic and tiresome passages. But to get at the true spirit of Wordsworth's poetry and enjoy the majestic rhythm of his verse, one should have patience to read his long poems like "Tintern Abbey", "Prelude"and "Excursion". In his sonnets also one can find diversity, personal feelings and reflections on various themes and incidents. Just like Nature his poetry is simple and plain without any artificial beauty and is as bare as a rocky mountain with crystal-clear springs here and there, dotted with pretty clusters of wild flowers peeping through unexpected corners. As W.H. Hudson says "Wordsworth finds a never failing principle of joy in Nature" and added spiritual beauty to her natural beauty. As Matthew Arnold said," (When inspired) Nature Herself seems... to take the pen out of his hand and to write for him with Her own bare, sheer, penetrating power." In his letter to Lady Beaumont in 1807, Wordsworth wrote:"to be incapable of a feeling poetry, in my sense of the word, is without love of human nature and reverence for God."  How true of his own feelings and of his poetry!

 Dr. Thomas Arnold, father of Matthew Arnold, after visiting Rydal Mount described the abode of Wordsworth in glowing terms. " No where on earth have I seen a spot of more perfect and and enjoyable beauty." A visit to Rydal Mount really gives us a clear idea about Wordsworth's love for Nature and his attachment to his native rural surroundings.

Dora Wordsworth

Dora's Field

 Let me conclude my article with the following sonnet composed by me when my younger daughter apprised me of her first visit to Grasmere, --- a fitting tribute to this great lover of Nature and humanity.


                              "Dear Daughter! Blest art thou indeed to see
                               The holy dwelling of the eminent bard
                               Of Nature born in Nature's lap, and trod
                               On grassy plains surrounded by the valleys green;
                               Grasmere, the very sound evokes untarnished beauty
                               With country pleasures still alive unscarred
                               By urban ways; a real pastime you had;
                               The clear blue sky and lakes with verdant scene 
                               May flash upon your visionary mind 
                               Cute daffodils, Reaper's Song and Leech-Gatherer's skill
                               The slopes of Rydal Mount and Alfoxden
                               Where the noble poet enjoyed and bliss did find 
                               The rural hospitality you tasted with thrill
                               A feast indeed-- no doubt-- beyond pollution's ken.


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                                                                                                                                                                              October 20, 2013,                                              SOMA SESHU G.

           

A Brief Note On William Wordsworth (1770-1850)

William Wordsworth (1770-1850)

Lake District

                                                                         



  Dear readers,
                         I thought it would be more fitting to acquaint you with some important information about
   William Wordsworth before describing his place of residence as the surroundings he selected for his
   dwelling, are closely connected with his views about nature ans his peaceful way of life. Besides you
   may get some useful lessons for your own lives too.

                       William Wordsworth is familiar to most of us as a nature poet who brought in a surprising   and revolutionary change in English Poetry when he propounded the theory that poetry should be written in "a selection of the real language of men in a state of vivid sensation" on familiar and common themes. His preface to the second edition of "The Lyrical Ballads" in 1802 sums up his poetic philosophy. Next as a champion of liberty and democracy he supported French Revolution( 1789-99) but was later  disappointed with the after effects of indiscriminate killings and lawless anarchy that followed. In his poem,"Ode to Duty"'  he praises duty as the cosmic moral order: "Thou dost preserve Stars from wrong/ And the most ancient Heavens, through Thee, are fresh and strong." Though Duty is seen as a "Stern  Law Giver, she is "the Godhead's most benignant grace". The poet is vexed with lawless freedom and humbly appeals to her guidance."I supplicate for thy control/ Me this unchartered freedom tires/I feel the weight of chance desires." Wordsworth's sister, Dorothy, gave him moral support and helped him in overcoming his sense of depression and find solace and faith in Nature. Wordsworth in his poem "Tintern Abbey" says of his sister : " She gave me eyes, she gave me years/ And humble cares, delicate fears / A heart, the fountain of sweet tears / And love, and thought, and joy.  He rebelled against mere bookish knowlege(nowadays information or data from electronic devices) and stressed on individual feelings and experiences.

                                                               " One impulse from a vernal wood
                                                                  May teach you more of man
                                                                  Of moral evil and good
                                                                  Than all the sages can." (The Tables Turned)
                                                         
                   During his long poetic vocation that spans more than fifty years, he repeatedly advocated the
the need for cultivating a harmonious relationship with Nature and denounced the harmful effects of industrial urban atmosphere and sophisticated life style.

                                                             "  The world is too much with us: late and soon
                                                                Getting and spending we lay waste our powers:
                                                                 Little we see in Nature that is ours." (The world is too
                                                                                                                             much with us)

                  Wordsworh is decidedly the first poet who revealed and himself deeply felt the spiritual
 identity between God, Nature and Man. He says that nature is the outer garment of God and the pervading spirit in Nature is a purer manifestation of the  Creator. So man can seek guidance from Nature to tread on the right path to make himself and the society live in a happy and peaceful way. He found the spirit of joy and tranquility in the objects of Nature. The person who has close connection with Nature will imbibe the  same
.

                                                            "A spirit that impels
                                                             All thinking things, all objects of all thought
                                                             And rolls through all things."                    (Tintern Abbey)
                                      
                                                           "Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns
                                                             And the round ocean and the living air
                                                             And the blue sky, and in the mind of man." (Tintern Abbey)

                Wordsworth looked upon Nature not only as object of joy, beauty and spiritual purity, but also
 as a moral teacher guiding him whenever he is in a crisis to show him the right path.

                                                             "Come forth into the light of things
                                                               Let Nature be your teacher ....
                                                               Come forth, and bring with you a heart
                                                               That watches and receives."(The Tables Turned)
                                                                  
                                                             ".Nature never did betray
                                                               The heart that loved her: 'tis her privilege,
                                                               Through all the years of this, our life, to lead
                                                               From joy to joy." (Tintern Abbey)

           Matthew Arnold  rightly said " moral truth is transmuted by him(Wordsworth) into the purest      poetry." John Stuart Mill called Wordsworth's poetry as "the very culture of feeling."


         Wordsworth thought that primary education is the key to help the poor working class free from        poverty, ignorance and the slavery of industrial atmosphere. He took keen interest in the planning and design  of various gardens in his local area. He thought that his role as a poet should be to guide the society on righteous lines.In one of his letters he says;" Every great poet is a teacher, I wish to be considered as a teacher or nothing at all."  In his later years he realized the values of traditional restraint and religious training which provide a sense of direction for a disciplined and well-organized.

        Wordsworth tried to versify his literary autobiography or the growth of a poet's mind with an ambitious design on a grand scale of epic proportions with the title"The Recluse" in three parts. For that as an introduction he wrote a lengthy poem running into twelve books with a simple title "A Poem to
Coleridge" between 1798 and 1805. This poem was later published by his wife Mary Hutchinson after his 
death with the title "The Prelude" in 1850. Coleridge praised it as "an orphic song indeed / A song divine 
of high and passionate thoughts / To their own music chanted." Of the the main poem "The Recluse",
only the second part in nine books, with the title"The Excursion" was published in 1814.

        As an admirer of Milton's sonnets, he was impressed by their 'dignity, simplicity and majestic harmony" and himself composed more than 500 sonnets during his long poetic career.on various  topics extending the range of the sonnet to include social, religious topics and beauty of  Nature.In the majestic and solemn march of the blank verse, Wordsworth comes next to Milton. So there is no wonder that the famous critic and poet, Mathew Arnold ranked Wordsworth next to Shakespeare and Milton in poetic quality and calibre.

    Wordsworth's poetry has universal relevance, especially in this modern age which has been struggling on    the brink of destruction because of its own misdeeds, that is, over-exploitation and pollution of natural      resources.If we care to listen to the words of this poet of Nature, may be we too will feel that intimacy with  Nature and experience spiritual kinship and find out a way out of this perplexing maze of man-made  impending disaster.  
                                       ***************************** 
      3rd October, 2013                                                                      Somaseshu  Gutala