William Wordsworth was an English poet born in 1770 who was orphaned as a teenager. He showed an early talent for poetry. As a young man, he traveled to France influenced by revolutionary ideals. He befriended Samuel Taylor Coleridge and the two worked on Lyrical Ballads together. Wordsworth found success with poems like "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud" and was named Poet Laureate late in life, dying in 1850. The poem describes the poet's chance encounter with a vast field of daffodils beside a lake and how their beauty brought him joy and remained a source of happiness in memory.

1. WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
 EARLY LIFE
 YOUNG POET
 LATER LIFE
 I WANDERED
LONELY AS A
CLOUD
(DAFFODILS)
 REFERENCE
CONTENT

2. • William Wordsworth was born on 7 April 1770 at
Cockermouth in Cumberland, England and was
orphan at the age of 15.
• He was the second of their five children and were
left in the care of different relatives.
• He did well at Hawkshead Grammar School—
where he wrote his first poetry.
• He went to study at Cambridge University. He did
not excel there, but managed to graduate in 1791.
• As a young man, Wordsworth developed a love of
nature, a theme reflected in many of his poems.
EARLY LIFE
WILLIAMWORDSWORTH(1770–1850)
BIOGRAPHY

3. • Wordsworth’s enthusiasm for the French
Revolution took him to France in 1791 and was a
supporter of the new government’s republican
ideals.
• During that time he had an affair with Annette
Vallon, who bore him an illegitimate daughter,
Caroline, in 1792.
• In 1794 he was reunited with his sister Dorothy,
who became his companion, close friend, moral
support, and housekeeper until her physical and
mental decline in the 1830s.
EARLY LIFE
WILLIAMWORDSWORTH(1770–1850)
BIOGRAPHY

4.  In 1795, Wordsworth met Samuel Taylor
Coleridge.
 The two became friends and together worked on
Lyrical Ballads (1798). The volume contained;
Coleridge's "Rime of the Ancient Mariner" and
Wordsworth's "Tintern Abbey"
 Romanticism take hold in English poetry.
 The same year, Wordsworth began writing “The
Prelude”, an epic autobiographical poem that he
would revise throughout his life.
BIOGRAPHYYOUNG POET
WILLIAMWORDSWORTH(1770–1850)

5.  While working on The Prelude, Wordsworth
produced other poetry, such as
"Lucy."
"I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud" and
"Ode: Intimations of Immortality."
 In 1802, he wed Mary Hutchinson, who gave birth
to the first of their five children in 1803.
BIOGRAPHYYOUNG POET
WILLIAMWORDSWORTH(1770–1850)

6. BIOGRAPHY
• The next few years were personally difficult for
Wordsworth.
 Two of his children died
 His brother was drowned at sea and
 Dorothy suffered a mental breakdown
• Wordsworth continued to produce poetry with
shorter forms of containing views of Man, Nature,
and Society; it made him the more eager to
succeed.
• He had reached a zenith of creativity between
1798 and 1808 and acclaimed literary figure by
1812.
LATER LIFE
WILLIAMWORDSWORTH(1770–1850)

7. BIOGRAPHY
• During his lifetime he refused to print The Prelude,
which he had completed by 1805.
• When Robert Southey died in 1843, Wordsworth
was named Poet Laureate.
• At the age of 80, he died on April 23, 1850, at his
home in Rydal Mount, Westmorland, England and
was buried in Grasmere churchyard.
• His wife published the much-revised Prelude that
summer.
LATER LIFE
WILLIAMWORDSWORTH(1770–1850)

8. POEM
I WANDERED LONELY AS A CLOUD
WILLIAMWORDSWORTH(1770–1850)

9. I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud
(The Daffodils)
William Wordsworth

10. Daffodils

11. I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud
I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o’er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils:
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

12. I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud
Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the milky way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

13. I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud
The waves beside them danced; but they
Outdid the sparkling waves in glee;
A poet could not but be gay;
In such a jocund company;
I gazed-and gazed-but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:

14. For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.
I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud

15. First Stanza
I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o’er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.
• The speaker describes how he walked around and felt as lonely as a
cloud. He doesn’t say, "walked around," but uses the much more
descriptive word "wandered"
• Suddenly ("all at once"), the speaker sees a group of daffodil flowers. We
tend to think of daffodils as "yellow," but he uses the more majestic-
sounding "golden."
• He calls them a "crowd," so they must be packed tightly together. Then
he elaborates on "crowd" by adding the noun "host." A host is just a big
group.
• He sees the daffodils beside a lake and underneath some trees. It’s a
breezy day, and the flowers "flutter" and "dance" on their stems.

16. Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the Milky Way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.
• The flowers stretch "continuously," without a break, like the stars in the
Milky Way galaxy, each daffodil gleaming like a star.
• They flowers line the shore ("margin") of a bay of the lake, which must be
a relatively large lake.
• The speaker takes in "ten thousand" dancing flowers at once. That’s a lot
of daffodils.
• The flowers "toss their hands" while dancing to the wind “sprightly" means
happily or merrily.
Second Stanza

17. The waves beside them danced, but they
Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:
A Poet could not but be gay,
In such a jocund company:
I—but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:
• The waves also dance in the breeze, but the daffodils seem happier than
the waves.
• The speaker now can’t help but feel happy, or "gay,". The flowers and
waves feel like companions to him.
• The repetition of "gaze" tells us that he kept looking at the flowers for a
long time.
• The word "wealth" expresses a more permanent kind of happiness.
Third Stanza

18. For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.
• He moves suddenly into the future, back from the lake and windy day.
• He is feeling "vacant," at the same time he feels "pensive," which means
he thinks kind-of-sad thoughts.
• So often the image of the daffodils "flashes" through "inward eye" his
mind. It is a form of "solitude." But its truth and beauty make it "blissful."
• When the memory of the flowers and the lake flashes into his mind, he
feels happy again. His heart is set to dancing, just like the flowers. He
dances along "with" them – they are his cheerful companions once
again.
Fourth Stanza

19. Structure
● This poem has an end rhyme
● the rhyme scheme :
1st stanza-ABABCC
2nd stanza-DEDEFF
3rd stanza-EGEGHH
4th stanza-IJIJBB

20. Literary Devices
● Simile - a comparison using the word like or as
– “I wandered lonely as a cloud”
– “Continuous as the stars”
● Metaphor - an unusual substitution
– “milky way”: He means the heavens and universee
– “inward eye”: he means his mind and thoughts
● Personification - giving human qualities to inanimate object
– “dancing in the breeze”
– “Tossing their heads”
● Alliteration - repetition of the same consonant sound at the
beginning of several words
– “high o’er vales and hills”

21. Literary Devices
● Exaggeration - describe something as larger or wildly different than it
actually is.
– “Ten thousand saw I at a glance”
● Imagery - the use of words to represent things, actions, or ideas by
sensory description
– the image of the poet wandering alone like a cloud
– a host of golden daffodils
– the image of the beautiful daffodils dancing under the trees.
– the image of the waves dancing in delight.
– the poet lying on his couch and feeling pleasant.

22. Theme
Happiness
Memory and the Past
Man and the Natural World

23. References
•http://www.biography.com/people/william-wordsworth-9537033
•http://www.biographyonline.net/poets/william-wordsworth.html
•https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Wordsworth
•http://www.victorianweb.org/previctorian/ww/bio.html
•http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic_figures/wordsworth_william.shtml
•https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poets/detail/william
Wordsworth
•http://www.shmoop.com/wandered-lonely-cloud-daffodils/stanza-1-summary.html
•http://www.shmoop.com/wandered-lonely-cloud-daffodils/stanza-2-summary.html
•http://www.shmoop.com/wandered-lonely-cloud-daffodils/stanza-3-summary.html
•http://www.shmoop.com/wandered-lonely-cloud-daffodils/stanza-4-summary.html
WILLIAMWORDSWORTH(1770–1850)