William Wordsworth: The Major Works

“Resolution and Independence, 1802. I’ve taught Romantic poetry to American undergraduates for more than twenty years and this fascinates my students because the action is all in the young Wordsworth’s mind and emotions. At this time in his life, Wordsworth didn’t have a job or much purpose, and most of his poems are about roaming the countryside and meeting odd people.” Read more...

The Greatest Romantic Poems

Gillen D'Arcy Wood, Literary Scholar

“Stephen Gill’s edition gives us William Wordsworth’s career from the beginning right the way through, and it’s a long career – he started writing very young. Gill gives it to us collection by collection, so we see Wordsworth emerging at publication moments. The poems are selected with considerable care, and the book gives a very even account of Wordsworth’s whole life as a writer – prose as well as poetry – both in his publications and his unpublished, more private moments. This edition highlights the sense in which William Wordsworth attempted to tilt poetic tastes in a new direction. He famously talked about having to ‘create the taste by which he was to be enjoyed’. Each publication moment shows him engaged with current tastes and trying to reform them.” Read more...

The best books on William and Dorothy Wordsworth

Lucy Newlyn, Literary Scholar