Table of Contents
Topic: “The author’s flow of feeling” in “The daffodils” by William Wordsworth
A. Introduction ................................................................................................................. 2
B. Content ......................................................................................................................... 3
I. William Wordsworth and “The daffodils”. .......................................................... 3
1. William Wordsworth ............................................................................................. 3
2. “The Daffodils” ...................................................................................................... 4
II. The author’s flow of feeling...................................................................................... 6
1. Stanza 1: Feeling lonely and “shock” at the scene. ............................................... 6
2. Stanza 2: Enjoying the beauty of daffodils. ........................................................... 7
3. Stanza 3: Changing emotion entirely. .................................................................... 8
4. Stanza 4: Recollecting emotion in tranquility and realizing what the show
brought. ....................................................................................................................... 10
C. Conclusion ................................................................................................................. 12
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A. Introduction
Wordsworth is a British poet who is associated with the Romantic movement of
the early 19th century. He is a well-known romantic poet who believed in conveying
simple and creative expressions through his poems. His lyric poem, "I Wandered Lonely
as a Cloud” focuses on his response to the beauty of nature, presents the deep feelings
and emotions of the poet rather than telling a story or presenting a witty observation.
He had quoted: "Poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings: it takes
its origin from emotion recollected in tranquility". Therefore, “The Daffodils” is one of
the most popular poems of the Romantic Age, unfolding the poet's excitement, love and
praise for a field blossoming with daffodils. In very plain language, it describes how the
speaker’s loneliness is cured by a field of daffodils.
This poem contains vivid imagery and reflects William Wordsworth’s flow of
feeling at the sight of the daffodils, from loneliness and sadness to happiness, glee and
“in such a jocund company”. Especially, whenever the poet is in low spirits, the sight of
the daffodils flashes in his mind. His heart fills with joy and happiness and it seems to
him as if his heart is dancing with the daffodils resting their heads on stones as on a
pillow and looking so gay ever glancing ever changing.
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B. Content
I. William Wordsworth and “The Daffodils”.
1. William Wordsworth
a. Life
On April 7, 1770, William Wordsworth was born in Cockermouth, Cumbria, England.
He is probably the most famous of the Romantic poets, and may be the best. His love for
wild, mountainous English lakes never left him, and remained to the end of his life.
His father was John Wordsworth, Sir James Lowther's attorney. The magnificent
landscape deeply affected Wordsworth's imagination and gave him a love of nature. He
lost his mother when he was eight and five years later his father. The domestic problems
separated Wordsworth from his beloved and neurotic sister Dorothy, who was a very
important person in his life.
b. Wordsworth and nature
Perhaps above all Wordsworth is associated in the popular mind with his vision of
nature. Wordsworth is perhaps not as good as at describing the natural landscape as a
number of other poets. As a purely descriptive poet he is highly capable, but his real
genius lies in showing what happens when the innate power of nature meets the power
and capacity to teach, it what matters, rather than nature itself.
His love of Nature was probably truer, and more tendered, than that of any other
English poet, before or since. Nature comes to occupy in his poem a separate or
independent status and is not treated in a casual or passing manner as by poets before
him. Wordsworth had a full-fledged philosophy, a new and original view of Nature.
c. Wordsworth’s poetry
At the end of the 18th century, poet William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor
Coleridge helped found the Romantic movement in English literature with their joint
publication “Lyrical Ballad” (1798). His first poems were ‘Descriptive Sketches’ (1793)
and “Guilt and Sorrow” (1793-94), the latter justly considered as an indictment of the
whole social order. In his joint publication with Coleridge, Wordsworth was the more
active of the two and wrote numerous poems descriptive of the village life, of common
villagers and unadorned nature.
His several long poems: the unfinished philosophical poem “Prelude” (1799-1805),
“The Excursion” (1814- ). W. Wordsworth expanded his view on art of poetry and poetic
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diction in the elaborate preface to the second edition of “Lyrical Ballads” (1800), to the
“Poem” (1807) and the “Poem” of 1815.
W. Wordsworth is at his best in description of natural scenery, in conveying delight
with all that part of nature and analyzing its influence upon the shaping of the mind of
man. His consistent efforts in bringing the language of poetry into proximity with
colloquial speech of his day gave rise to much criticism but greatly influenced 19-century
English poets.
2. “The daffodils”
William Wordsworth's "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud”, also known as “The
daffodils”, is a lyric poem focusing on the poet's response to the beauty of nature. (A
lyric poem presents the deep feelings and emotions of the poet rather than telling a story
or presenting a witty observation.)
Wordsworth wrote his poem in 1804, presumably after re-visiting the diary entry, and
this original version, which is now seen as closest to his original sentiment, was
published in 1807 in Poems in Two Volumes, a collection of some of the poetry he had
written in the preceding years while living at Dove Cottage. The poem was untitled at the
first time, because to tell the reader it was about Daffodils would be to spoil the surprise
of the fourth line.
Wordsworth revised the poem in 1815. He replaced "dancing" with "golden"; "along"
with "beside"; and "ten thousand" with "fluttering and". He then added a stanza between
the first and second, and changed "laughing" to "jocund". The last stanza was left
untouched.
The plot of the poem is simple. In the 1815 revision, Wordsworth described it as
"rather an elementary feeling and simple impression (approaching to the nature of an
ocular spectrum) upon the imaginative faculty, rather than an exertion of it..."
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The poem recaptures a moment on April 15, 1802, when Wordsworth and his sister,
Dorothy, were walking near a lake at Grasmere, Cumbria Country, England, and came
upon a shore lined with daffodils…
We should remind the readers that this poem was not a result of imagination. Dorothy,
Wordsworth’s sister provides us an explanation of the occasion which inspired
Wordsworth to produce this masterpiece. She wrote:
The wind was furious… the Lake was rough… When we were in the woods beyond
Gowbarrow park we saw a few daffodils close to the water side, we fancied that the lake
had floated the seeds ashore & that the little colony had so sprung up — But as we went
along there were more & yet more & at last under the boughs of the trees, we saw that
there was a long belt of them along the shore, about the breadth of a country turnpike
road. I never saw daffodils so beautiful they grew among the mossy stones about & about
them, some rested their heads upon these stones as on a pillow for weariness & the rest
tossed & reeled & danced & seemed as if they verily laughed with the wind that blew
upon them over the Lake, they looked so gay ever glancing ever changing. This wind
blew directly over the lake to them. There was here & there a little knot & a few
stragglers a few yards higher up but they were so few as not to disturb the simplicity &
unity & life of that one busy highway… — Rain came on, we were wet.
Wordsworth’s “I wandered Lonely as a Cloud” is a descriptive poem in which the
author expresses the happiness he gets after enjoying the beauty of a great number of
daffodils. He begins the poem by telling his loneliness. This solitude of his, however, is
gradually lessened as he keeps on gazing the nice feature and movement of the daffodils.
After describing how the blowing wind makes the flowers move, dance, and stretch
continuously in an endless line along the bay, the poet states that whenever he feels sad,
he will try to recollect the beauty of the daffodils in his mind. By doing this he will
directly finds ‘the bliss of solitude’ which enables him to get happiness.
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II. The author’s flow of feeling.
1. Stanza 1: Feeling lonely and “shock” at the scene.
“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”.
In the beginning lines, the speaker, by using a simile in which he compares
himself to a floating cloud over hills and valleys, precisely described how deep his
loneliness was. He used the word “wandered” which literally means roaming around
without a purpose, like when you explore something. In metaphorical use, "wandered"
can mean feeling purposeless and directionless in general. We feel that the speaker is
seeking for the meaning of his life. He walked aimlessly, beside his sister but still felt
“lonely as a cloud”. However, is a cloud lonely? Clouds always travel in group; they are
huge, and far away above the sky. How could such huge groups of cloud can be lonely?
Or maybe just the cloud on the hills, the cloud in the speaker’s eyes was lonely as he
seemed to project his own loneliness on it.
Suddenly, in his lonely condition, he saw a great number of daffodils “beside the
lake, beneath the trees”. They were yellow in color, but the speaker called them “golden
daffodils” as they were so beautiful that sparkling like the precious metal. He denoted
the lovely bright daffodils like a crowd just like a crowd of people. The words “crowd”
and “host” show us how numerous the daffodils were.
The daffodils looked as if they were “fluttering and dancing in the breeze”.
"Fluttering" suggests flight, which could bring us to the image of angels, or even birds or
butterflies. "Dancing" is something that usually only humans do. Perhaps, the daffodils
were given the qualities of humans and also of some kind of otherworldly creatures. This
wasn’t just some scattered patch of daffodils. The entire scene looked so vibrant and the
poet’s dreams and thoughts felt like flowing with this wave of daffodils.
The image of a crowd of daffodils seems to be in contrast with the lonely speaker.
In the first line, we learn that the speaker was drifting in a cloud of solitude. Yet, when he
encountered the beauty of the natural world, of the “host of golden daffodils”, he was
anything but lonely. The 'crowd' of daffodils certainly seemed to be having a good time,
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moving and dancing merrily. Standing in front of them, the speaker forgot his loneliness
and participated in that joy, as we will see in the coming stanzas.
Almost immediately, in the first stanza, we are given a wealth of imagery. We can
see the 'vales and hills' through which the speaker wandered, as well as the 'host' of
daffodils that covered the landscape. We can feel the breeze that made the flowers move,
and, if you're familiar with the scent of daffodils, we may even smell the flowers.
2. Stanza 2: Enjoying the beauty of daffodils.
“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 stanza 1 is opened with the narrator walking in the state of worldly
detachment, his wandering. That is a romantic poet in a romantic emotion too. In a
dreamy, disinterested state, poet gazed and thought about the life and himself. And we
can see the changes in mood and feelings of the author when he saw the Daffodils in the
first stanza. The felling of the author is demonstrated in the 2nd stanza.
In the 2nd stanza, he continued describing daffodils:
“Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the milky way,”
The figure of simile is subtly used: “as the stars that shine”. The golden daffodils
were compared with the stars shining and twinkling on the galaxy. By that way the poet
immortalized daffodils. And this is in contrast with the laws of nature examined in other
works. They seemed to become more beautiful in Wordsworth’s poem.
How glorious and plentiful these daffodils were! Maybe this was also the first
time he had come across such an immense field of daffodils along the shore. It was
impossible for us to count them, but the author could still feel how many flowers were
stretching as far as the eyes can see:
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“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.”
Particularly, the author reversed usual syntax and hyperbole in: “Ten thousand saw
I at a glance”. That was capable of emphasizing quantities of daffodils. In the last of the
2nd stanza, Wordsworth used personification “Tossing their heads in sprightly dance”
again. They seemed to have action and mind like people. Those lines are as beautiful as a
picture. It is a vivid painting and color. If Wordsworth didn’t have love of nature, he
couldn’t write such a good stanza.
The poet felt happy and pleasant in the meanwhile to see golden flowers smiling in
the sunshine. He put his loneliness aside and mingled with the beautiful sight. To him, the
daffodil’s charm was a great gift and no fortune was as wonderful as the beauty granted
by the God. The mood of the author has changed obviously. From being lonely, the
author became happy and soaked up the beauty of nature. We can point out that
William’s state was changing in a slight way. He was not alone any longer, yet he
probably thought that he would be stronger if he made a contrast between a lonely
traveler and happy daffodils.
3. Stanza 3: Changing emotion entirely.
“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 gazed – and gazed – but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought.”
In the first stanza, the writer finds himself as a lonely cloud floating over the
valley. Second stanza is about how amazing the daffodils looked in the spring season.
Third stanza is the continuation of how along with the flowers, the water in the lake also
moved, as if they were competing with each other in the dance. But the glee flowers won
and the sparkling lake lost. Finding their playfulness, the author couldn't stop himself
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from joining their company. The author kept staring at both of them, wondering how his
sad mood changed into a happy one. The daffodils and lake's dance bought him a wealth
that he couldn't deny. The mesmerizing flowers gained a place in his heart he couldn't
understand but felt.
“The waves beside them danced, but they
Out-did the sparkling leaves in glee.”
The waves were also dancing in the breeze, but the daffodils seemed happier than
the waves. Though the lake’s sparkling waves danced beautifully, the daffodils seemed to
do much better than them, in its pleasure. The point is that the entire scene has suddenly
been invested with a joyful human-like presence. Since waves do not bring as much joy
as the yellow flowers, the flowers “out-did” the water with their happiness. The waves
“sparkle”, which creates yet another association with the stars. Everything seems to be
gleaming and twinkling, shining and sparkling
“A poet could not be but gay,
In such a jocund company!”
The speaker reenters the poem. Despite his earlier loneliness, the speaker now
can’t help but feel happy, or “gay” with such a beautiful vision to look out. Or, as he puts
at, with such joyful and carefree (“jocund”) “company” to hang out with. The flowers and
waves feel like companions to him. They are all pals. Group hug!
In their gleeful fluttering and dancing, the daffodils outdo the rippling waves of
the lake. But the poet does not at this moment fully appreciate the happy sight before him
The poet felt happy and pleasant in the meanwhile to see golden flowers smiling in
the sunshine. He put his loneliness aside and mingled with the beautiful sight. To him, the
daffodil’s charm was a great gift and no fortune was as wonderful as the beauty granted
by the God:
“I gazed—and gazed—but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought”
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The repetition of “gaze” tells us that he kept looking at the flowers for a long time.
It’s as if the speaker enjoyed looking at these daffodils at the time, but didn’t realize
exactly how great of a gift he had just received with this vision. Apparently, the speaker
didn’t think that he fully appreciated the vision at the time. This is a bid off, because he
seemed to be really enjoying those daffodils. In the description of the daffodils, William
used quite a lot of literary devices and it was these figures that helped us understand more
about the vivid picture he draw and the way he connected with the nature. . In the last line
of the stanza, Wordsworth uses anastrophe, writing “the show to me had brought” instead
of “the show brought to me”. Anastrophe is an inversion of the normal word order. The
word “Wealth” expresses a more permanent kind of happiness. It also carries a hint of
money that does not quite fit with the supernatural language that has come before.
Through characterized daffodils, we could find that nature had its own soul.
William lifted him out of his soul and placed him in a higher state in which the soul of
nature and the soul of man were united into a single harmony. Apparently, he felt dazed
with so many daffodils around him and there was no limitation between his vision and
the long belt of golden flowers.
4. Stanza 4: Recollecting emotion in tranquility and realizing what the show
brought.
Many years later, the images of daffodils came to mind and flashed upon his inner
eyes:
“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.”
In the final stanza, the “inward eye” reminds him what he has experienced and in
the tranquility he can recollect the memories in the solitude of his house, moreover he
realizes what this show meant and his heart is filled with pleasure. The poet is not able at
a first sight to interpret the act, it is only afterwards, that thoughts are understood and
described, nonetheless he can understand this experience, thanks to “the inward eye”,
which represents feelings of imagination, it is a metaphor, a special way to see things; the
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poet is able to interpret the secret language of nature and technical poetry made up
emotion.
“They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude!”
The memory of the daffodils was etched in the author’s mind and soul to be
cherished forever. When he was feeling lonely, dull or depressed, he thought of the
daffodils and cheered up. These flowers seemed to be emerging before him, far and wide.
Then his loneliness and sorrow seemed to vanish; and he desired to dance with the
daffodils.
“And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.”
The full impact of the daffodil’s beauty (symbolizing the beauty of nature) did not
strike him at the moment of seeing them, when he stared blankly at them but much later
when he sat alone, sad and lonely and remembered them. Thanks to the closing of the last
stanza, we can get more reason why William wrote the poem. His impression at the
daffodils would never fade in his mind, and it was the amazing motivation for him.
“For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye…”
We can point out that William’s state was changing in a slight way. He was not alone
any longer, yet he probably thought that he would be stronger if he made a contrast
between a lonely traveler and happy daffodils. This simple but effective way seems to
take hold on us, and then each time we read this poem, we can see the harmonious beauty
of the poet and the long belt of golden daffodils and enjoy their brightness.
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C. Conclusion
The title, “The daffodils” is a simple word that reminds us of the arrival of spring,
when the field is full of daffodils. Daffodils have an amazing shape and beautiful
fragrance. A bunch of daffodils symbolize the joy and happiness of life. The theme of the
poem “The daffodils” is a collection of human emotions inspired by nature that we may
have not noticed enough due to our busy lives. The daffodils imply the beginning or
rebirth for human beings, blessed with the grace of nature. The arrival of daffodils in the
month of March is welcomed and it's an enjoyable time to appreciate them!
The poet uses descriptive language throughout the stanzas. He cannot resist
himself from participating in the dance of the daffodils. The wording is simple and
melodious. This poem really shows Wordsworth’s exceptional talent and imagination as a
poet. The subjects he uses in the poem are simple. The words he uses are daily and
common. However, the poem is absolutely beautiful and meaningful.
This poem helps us get into our head how much love and admiration William
gives to Nature. He would like to call us to come back to the nature and enjoy it.
Moreover, at any rate William could make us realize that what we feel at the beauty of
golden daffodils is the way they speak to us, via their own soul.
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Members of group 4
1. Vũ Thị Thùy Linh
2. Ngô Thị Loan
3. Nguyễn Thị Mai
4. Trần Thanh Mai
5. Trần Thị Thu Mai
6. Vũ Thị Hồng Minh
7. Nguyễn Thị Nga
8. Phạm Quỳnh Nga
9. Đỗ Thị Hồng Nhung
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Task assignment and Evaluation
Member Task Evaluation
1 Vũ Thị Thùy Linh Opening and conclusion
Reading the poem.
2 Ngô Thị Loan Stanza 3
3 Nguyễn Thị Mai Opening and conclusion
4 Trần Thanh Mai Stanza 2
5 Trần Thị Thu Mai Stanza 1
Designing slides.
Editing words.
6 Vũ Thị Hồng Minh Stanza 4
7 Nguyễn Thị Nga The poet William Wordsworth
8 Phạm Quỳnh Nga Reading the poem.
Preparing for the video.
9 Đỗ Thị Hồng Nhung The poem “The daffodils”
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