Excerpt from the Prelude

• "in the frosty season, when the sun / Was set,"

  
  

  "the twilight blaz'd"

  
  

  AQ: scene is set. Time of day and cold weather are crucial - dominate poets recounting of his memory

  
  

  Frosty season is contrasted with "blaz'd" cottage windows echoing effect of the setting sun - the warmth and light (vitality) of childhood made him ignorant to the cold.

  
  

  WT: Winter - reminiscent of Christmas/family time. Snow is exciting for children. Metaphor for near end of childhood.
• "while the stars, / Eastward, were sparkling clear"

  
  

  "The orange sky of evening died away"

  
  

  AQ: inevitable process of day turning to night, fading into darkness.

  Just as the passing of time is unstoppable, so childhood pleasures mutate into adult awareness and responsibility and therefore 'melancholy'

  WT - Metaphor passing childhood to adulthood - progress of day from setting sun to night

  Sombre tone - everything becomes darker and bleaker as you grow up.

  Z: 'sparkling clear' - memory is vivid romanticised. impact of childhood on adults - shapes you into who you are.
• • "not a voice was idle;"
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  • "Meanwhile, the precipices rang aloud"
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  • AQ: climax - natural world joins with chatter and excitement
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  • Children nature could become one - you grow up, nature set apart humans.
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  • WT: volta - shift in focus/tone - distinct change - greater awareness
  • Echo reflects their childhood.
  • Children eventually lose connection to nature
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  • Personifies mountain - responding calls -sibilance precipices.
  • humans = noisy, nature's sounds are more delicate unusual
  • Sounds of nature are otherworldly - onomatopoeia of tinkled shows they're softer than human sounds
• "I heeded not the summons:"

  "It was, indeed, for all of us; to me / It was a time of rapture."

  
  

  AQ - poets view intrudes. Narrator rebels by not going home, showing youthful enthusiasm and excitement. Happy time turned into time of rapture.

  
  

  Z: rapture - signifies his immense happiness - biblical connotations - ascension of souls to heaven conveys Wordsworths portrayal of nature as his own heaven, his escape

  
  

  WT: caesura - pauses - narrator breathless and excited. Processing his memories - reliving/relishing First-person - anecdotal tone - ignores responsibility of adulthood - carefree
• • "I wheel'd about, / Proud and exulting, like an untir'd horse"
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  • He seems gregarious and enthusiastic
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  • looks fondly back on childhood - idyllic scene - sense of excitement and freedom
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  • WT: simile - youthful energy, vitality, strength, nature Horses are fast and free - children behave primally.
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  • WT: semantic field of energy and life
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  • compares himself to nature - connection with nature - however, horses = domesticated - they aren't truly apart
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  • Starting line Proud highlights confident carefree attitude.
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  • "wheel'd", "flew" - short monosyllabic verbs - pace - speed of movements + youthful energy
• "The Pack loud bellowing and the hunted hare"

  
  

  AQ: a lack of complete restraint/control and independence/individual identity.

  
  

  They live in the moment, complete euphoria.

  
  

  Sounds of humans are loud, familiar and boisterous

  
  

  .Children's game compared to hunting - they're wild and energetic.

  
  

  WT: alliteration - sound of breathlessness - unaware of the inevitability of childhood - too distracted by childhood joy to realise there was danger/true nature
• • "while the distant hills / Into the tumult sent an alien sound / Of melancholy, not unnoticed,"
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  • WT: synaesthesia - chaos. Melancholy not associated with sound. No joy untainted.
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  • Melancholy is the adults nostalgia for childhood euphoria. realising growing up. reality of adulthood is alien
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  • Sound nature contrasts with the familiar noise children.
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  • WT: enjambment emphasises 'melancholy' contrast with the narrators feelings earliee
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  • caesurae slow down lines reflective.
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  • AQ: distant hills. Children don't perceive anything beyond childhood. Deep down they know they must grow up - metaphorical.