Prelude

• The prelude is argued to be a metaphorical journey of growing up
• William Wordsworth was a romantic poet who was privileged during the industrial revolution
• 'summer evening'

  1. Summer is seen as perfection and a positive connotation
  2. Pathetic fallacy
• 'within a rocky cove'

  1. Protected and sheltered much like he considered himself before seeing the scary side of nature
  2. Metaphorical
• 'i unloosened her chain'

  1. Personification
• 'an act of stealth'

  1. He knows he shouldn't be doing it so foreshadowing
  2. Imply gentleness and cautiousness as if he didn't want to disrupt the peace of nature
• 'troubled pleasure'

  1. Oxymoron
  2. He knows he shouldn't do it but still persists
• 'nor without the voice of mountain echos'

  1. He's in silence so he doesn't disrupt the nature as he has a deep understanding of it
• 'small circled glittering idly in the moon'

  1. Imagery
  2. This idea of a perfect and beautiful nature
• 'sparkling light'

  1. Implys it's night time which is when all bad happens
  2. Foreshadowing
• 'with an unswerving line'

  1. Perfection
• 'heaving through the water like a swan'

  1. Simile to show how perfect everything is
  2. Swan connotates to beauty and purity as white represents innocence and purity as he sees nature at that point
• 'a huge peak, black and huge'

  1. Repetition of 'huge' creates emphasis
  2. To show nature is becoming intimidating to him as it's bigger than he is
  3. Power of nature!
• 'voluntary power'

  1. It has free will
  2. Personification
• 'growing still in stature'

  1. Becoming more and more intimidating
• 'like a living thing'

  1. Simile and personification
• 'trembling oars'

  1. Contrast to how perfectly he was rowing beforehand
  2. Natures effect on him
• ''back to the covert of the willow tree'

  1. Back to safety
  2. Can represent the safety of a home
• 'in grave and serious mood'

  1. It's affected him and his mood as he's seen nature for what it actually is
• 'i had seen that spectacle for many days'

  1. It's an occuring thought to him so clearly memorable
  2. Euphemism of 'spectacle'
• 'o'er my thoughts there hung a darkness'

  1. Metaphor for depression
• 'no familiar shapes'

  1. Nature isn't what he thought it to be and he feels decieved and troubled by this idea
• 'a trouble to my dreams'

  1. Oxymoron
  2. He still has a love for nature no matter how powerful it is as if he has stopped loving it, it'd be a nightmare
• 'that do not live'

  1. Separating it from men as the power isn't comparable