The Prelude

• The Prelude was written by William Wordsworth (1770-1850)
• The Prelude was Wordsworth's autobiography, which took over 50 years to write
• The poem has a freeverse structure (no stanzas), showing the speaker's confusion
• 'troubled pleasure' oxymoron, the narrator knows their actions are wrong
• 'elfin pinnace' links to the supernatural, which is magical and not threatening
• 'I struck and struck again' shows the protagonist's fear
• 'Towered up' emphasises the power of nature
• 'covert of the willow tree' shows that the tree is comforting for him
• 'in grave' has connotations of death, emphasises his loss of childish nature
• 'no pleasant images of trees' nature's innocence has been taken
• 'trouble to my dreams' the events of the day changed his perspective of nature, could symbolise his childhood ending early (Wordsworth's family being taken from him early in his life)
• 'their own voices' they are speaking out against their oppressors
• 'led by her' is a personification of nature, who is benevolent and gentle at this point
• 'huge' repetition could symbolise the fact that Wordsworth's childhood ended early due to the loss of his family, therefore resulting in his restricted vocabulary; however, it could represent the narrator's fear as they are stuck for words
• 'dim' 'undetermined' 'unknown' vague vocabulary, emphasises that the narrator does not fully understand what happened