The poem describes a speaker who takes a boat out on a lake one summer evening and feels happy and confident as he admires the beautiful natural scenery. However, he suddenly sees a huge, dark mountain on the horizon which seems to tower over him and pursue him. Frightened, he turns back to shore and is left feeling alone and troubled, with the powerful image of the mountain lingering in his mind. The encounter changes his perspective on nature from something pleasant to something more immense and unsettling.

1. The Prelude by Wordsworth

2. About the poet
• William Wordsworth was a Romantic poet
• Romantic poets focused on nature and human emotion

3. What is the poem about?
• The poem is about the speaker finding a boat and taking it out on the
lake
• The speaker is happy, self-assured and admires the beautiful scene
• The speaker sees a mountain on the horizon and becomes afraid of its
size and power.
• He turns the boat around and goes home – but his views have
changed.

4. Structure
• Uses the form of an epic poem – long pieces of writing
about exciting action-packed heroic events – but here
Wordsworth is describing something more ordinary
• Free verse – Often used in epic poems about mighty
subjects but here describes a personal journey
• Uses iambic pentameter
• Uses first person narrative – makes it sound more personal
and we hear the speaker’s thoughts and feelings
• Enjambment – Overflow of powerful feelings

5. St1
One summer evening (led by her) I found
A little boat tied to a willow tree
Within a rocky cove, its usual home.
Straight I unloosed her chain, and stepping in
Pushed from the shore. It was an act of stealth
And troubled pleasure, nor without the voice
Of mountain-echoes did my boat move on;
Personification of nature “her”
Boat also
personified
as “her” –
Image of the
boat being
trapped
Happy rural
image
It seems
familiar to
him
Narrator
appears
confident
Oxymoron –
Narrator’s guilt
Narrator feels like he
is doing something
wrong. This is the
first clue that
something is wrong

6. St2
Leaving behind her still, on either side.
Small circles glittering idly in the moon,
Until they melted all into one track
Of sparkling light. But now, like one who rows,
Proud of his skill, to reach a chosen point
With an unswerving line, I fixed my view
Upon the summit of a craggy ridge,
Nature, idea of leaving it
behind Metaphor –
Natural, positive
image of the
moon
“glittering”
“sparkling”
“melting” –
visual imagery
Narrator
seems
arrogant here.
He won’t feel
like this later
Highest point of a mountain – Or the point or time at which something is at its
most successful or intense – perhaps narrator feels success / proud of stealing
the boat and viewing these natural sights

7. The horizon's utmost boundary; far above
Was nothing but the stars and the grey sky.
She was an elfin pinnace; lustily
I dipped my oars into the silent lake,
And, as I rose upon the stroke, my boat
Went heaving through the water like a swan;
When, from behind that craggy steep till then
The horizon's bound, a huge peak, black and huge,
Emptiness contrasts with his description of the horizon on line 22. The
appearance of the mountain is more shocking
Metaphor
comparing
the boat to a
fairy boat –
makes it
seem
magical and
out of this
world
The peace of
nature
Simile –
Sounds
graceful and
confident, in
control – This
simile
contrasts
with the next
line: The
volta

8. When, from behind that craggy steep till then
The horizon's bound, a huge peak, black and huge,
As if with voluntary power instinct,
Upreared its head.
A mountain
appears on the
horizon – the
language
changes now
and becomes
darker and
more
threatening
The Volta: Turning point of the poem. Change in
tone. The simple word is emphasised by being at
the start of the line and by the use of the caesura

9. Upreared its head. I struck and struck again,
And growing still in stature the grim shape
Towered up between me and the stars, and still,
For so it seemed, with purpose of its own
And measured motion like a living thing,
Strode after me. With trembling oars I turned,
And through the silent water stole my way
Back to the covert of the willow tree;
There in her mooring-place I left my bark, -
The mountain is personified as an ugly image. It
contrasts with the earlier images of the boat “swan”
As he rows away from the
mountain, more of it
comes into view. The
mountain is getting bigger
and starts to sound like a
nightmare.
Bad, ugly. Negative view of
the mountain
Sounds
intimidating and
powerful. The
sibilance creates a
sinister mood.
Simile – Mountain
seems alive and calm
and in control wheras
narrator seems scared
“trembling”
He feels guilty
and wants to
hide away.

10. And through the meadows homeward went, in grave
And serious mood; but after I had seen
That spectacle, for many days, my brain
Worked with a dim and undetermined sense
Of unknown modes of being; o'er my thoughts
There hung a darkness, call it solitude
Or blank desertion. No familiar shapes
Remained, no pleasant images of trees,
Of sea or sky, no colours of green fields;
But huge and mighty forms, that do not live
Like living men, moved slowly through the mind
By day, and were a trouble to my dreams.
This event has a big
impact on him –
“grave” is negative
and means serious.
Reminds him of his
own mortality in the
face of nature
Lasting impact
of the event
Doesn’t understand
what has seen, can’t
really describe it
Metaphor – The narrator is
left feeling alone and
unsettled
Repetition of no –
Shows the contrast
with how he feels
now 

11. No familiar shapes
Remained, no pleasant images of trees,
Of sea or sky, no colours of green fields;
But huge and mighty forms, that do not live
Like living men, moved slowly through the mind
By day, and were a trouble to my dreams.
Narrator no longer
thinks nature is
beautiful, he has
learnt that it is more
important/powerful
than that.
Simile – Nature is
described as
powerful and is
compared to human
beings. Someone
who can influence
our lives.
Finishes with an unsettling image. Contrasts
with the mood and tone at the beginning of
the poem.

12. Imagery
• Wordsworth effectively describes the night-time atmosphere with his
choice of images
“Small circles glittering idly in the moon,
Until they melted all into one track
Of sparkling light”

13. Imagery
• But gentle moonlight becomes darkness as the poet-narrator’s state
of mind becomes troubled by the end of the extract:
• “…o’er my thought There hung a darkness, call it solitude Or blank
desertion. No familiar shapes Remained, no pleasant images of trees,
Of sea or sky, no colours of green fields.”
• This is imagery that could be associated with gothic (sinister or
grotesque) tales, nightmares or even horror.

14. Imagery
• Wordsworth continues with this imagery
“But huge and mighty forms, that do not live
Like living men, moved slowly through the mind
By day, and were a trouble to my dreams.”
• Personification is also used by Wordsworth: he refers to the boat as “her” (which
is quite common in literature from that historic period) and the mountain peak
comes alive and chases him:
“…a huge peak, black and huge,
As if with voluntary power instinct,
Upreared its head… For so it seemed, with purpose of its own
And measured motion like a living thing,
Strode after me.”

15. Themes
• Nature: Humanity is part of nature and sometimes we can be made
to feel very small and insignificant by the natural world.
• Loneliness: Wordsworth is often on his own throughout The Prelude
and this is important to him. He can think more clearly and is more
affected by events and places as a result.
• The night: The poem seems to suggest that you can sometimes
experience feelings and events more clearly at night, perhaps due to
loneliness.