136:. The space between stanza one and stanza two depicts a transition of Lucy from life into death. The two stanzas also show that Lucy, a being connected intrinsically to nature, dies before she can attain her own distinct consciousness apart from nature. However, as literary critic Geoffrey Hartman explains, "Growing further into consciousness means a simultaneous development into death and not growing further also means death (animal tranquillity, absorption by nature)." The lifeless rocks and stones described in the concluding line convey the finality of Lucy's death. Boris Ford argues that within the second stanza as "the dead girl is now at last secure beyond question, in inanimate community with the earth's natural fixtures." Coleridge, in a letter to
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masks the profundity of feeling; the delicate naturalness of language hides the range of implication". Antonia Till remarks that the poem consists mainly of monosyllables with the occasional disyllable. Thus the use of the near-scientific word 'diurnal' achieves astonishing power, bringing a cosmic dimension to the girl's death and demonstrating
Wordsworth's mastery of both the majestic and the mundane in his poetry.
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transcending human fears because his feelings towards an immortality connected to Lucy, a feeling brought up in "Strange fits". These feelings of immortality continue in the second stanza because, though dead, she is separated from him by death. She is always a being connected to nature, and the narrator slumbers because his understanding of Lucy is not conscious.
33:. It is part of a series of poems written about a mysterious woman named Lucy, whom scholars have not been able to identify and are not sure whether she was real or fictional. Although the name Lucy is not directly mentioned in the poem, scholars nevertheless believe it to be part of the "Lucy poems" due to the poem's placement in
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used the name Lucy in reference to his sister in many poems, including "The Glow-Worm" and "Nutting". The problem with relating Lucy to
Dorothy is in explaining why Dorothy would be presented in a state of death. Dorothy was alive during the composition of the poem, and presented as alive in other Wordsworth poems like
167:
it is a sequel to the other deep poems that precede it, and is about one Lucy, who is dead. From the table of contents, however, we are informed by the author that it is about 'A Slumber;' for this is the actual title which he has condescended to give it, to put us out of pain as to what it is about."
166:
Upon receiving
Wordsworth's letter containing a copy of "A slumber", Coleridge described the work as a "sublime epitaph". Wordsworth's friend Thomas Powell wrote that the poem "stands by itself, and is without title prefixed, yet we are to know, from the penetration of Mr. Wordsworth's admirers, that
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Coleridge's reference was to the state of Lucy as dying or dead within the Lucy poems as a whole and to "A slumber" in particular. Although Lucy cannot be established, it is certain that there is a relationship between the name Lucy and
Wordsworth's sister within Wordsworth's poetry since Wordsworth
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The second stanza maintains the quiet, even tone of the first, but serves to undermine the former's sense of the eternal by revealing that Lucy has, by the time of composition, died. The narrator's response to her death lacks bitterness or emptiness; and instead takes consolation from the fact that
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In 1967, Hartman claims that within the poem, "Wordsworth achieves the most haunting of his elisions of the human as a mode of being separate from nature." John
Mahoney, in 1997, emphasises the poem's "brilliant alliteration of the opening lines" along with pointing out that "the utter simplicity
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Since Lucy exists on an unconscious level for the narrator, he cannot grasp her until she has died. As such, he experiences the events as one who is woken from a dream without an understanding of what the dream entailed, and is not able to feel shock at learning of her death. This is thematically
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Lucy is an isolated figure in which the narrator responds to her death. The beginning of the poem, according to
Wordsworth biographer Mary Moorman, depicts a "creative sleep of the senses when the 'soul' and imagination are most alive." This idea appears in other poems by Wordsworth, including
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Lucy is presented as character connected to nature who exists in a state between the spiritual and human; similar to a mythical nymph. However, she represents a state of consciousness and exists within the poem as part of the narrator's consciousness. The first stanza describes the narrator
66:
Unique amongst Lucy poems, "A slumber" does not directly mention Lucy. The decision by critics to include the poem as part of the series is based in part on
Wordsworth's placing it in close proximity to "Strange fits" and directly after "She dwelt" in the
57:" and "A slumber". In December 1798, Wordsworth sent copies of "Strange fits" and "She dwelt" to Coleridge and followed his letter with "A slumber". Eventually, "A slumber", was published in the 1800 edition of
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83:'s lamentations on the death of young girls. Written in spare language, "A slumber..." consists of two stanzas, each four lines. The first is built upon an even,
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140:, states, "Whether it had any reality I cannot say. Most probably, in some gloomier moment he had fancied the moment when his sister might die."
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424:, a Doom Metal band from Sweden, composed music for this poem, and was included as part of their debut album
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150:. As such, the poems are most likely not about Dorothy but just a continuation of a theme in general.
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During the autumn of 1798, Wordsworth travelled to
Germany with his sister Dorothy and fellow poet
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Mahoney, John L. William
Wordsworth: A Poetic Life. New York: Fordham University Press, 1997.
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represented in the poem by placing Lucy's death between the two stanzas.
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Powell, Thomas. "Literary
Characters. No. III. Mr. Wordsworth."
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in 1798 and first published in volume II of the 1800 edition of
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From Blake to Byron: The Pelican Guide to English Literature
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The Lucy poems fall within a genre of poems that includes
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William Wordsworth A Biography: The Early Years 1770–1803
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conveys the nebulous image of a girl. The poem begins:
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338:Wordsworth, William (1994). Antonia Till (ed.).
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122:With rocks, and stones, and trees. (lines 5–8)
597:Lines Written a Few Miles above Tintern Abbey
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713:On the Extinction of the Venetian Republic
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394:. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1967.
341:The Collected Poems of William Wordsworth
411:. London: Oxford University Press, 1968.
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119:Rolled round in earth's diurnal course,
104:The touch of earthly years. (lines 1–4)
576:Three years she grew in sun and shower
101:She seemed a thing that could not feel
387:Vol. 5. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1957.
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569:Strange fits of passion have I known
51:Strange fits of passion have I known
109:she is now beyond life's trials:
555:She dwelt among the untrodden ways
55:She dwelt among the untrodden ways
14:
818:Christopher Wordsworth (brother)
650:Composed upon Westminster Bridge
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113:No motion has she now, no force;
23:" is a poem that was written by
846:(birthplace and childhood home)
699:Ode: Intimations of Immortality
741:Character of the Happy Warrior
1:
727:The World Is Too Much with Us
676:I travelled among unknown men
392:Wordsworth's Poetry 1787–1814
95:A slumber did my spirit seal;
906:Poetry by William Wordsworth
664:I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud
562:A slumber did my spirit seal
21:A slumber did my spirit seal
813:Dorothy Wordsworth (sister)
706:Resolution and Independence
116:She neither hears nor sees;
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808:Dora Wordsworth (daughter)
16:Poem by William Wordsworth
643:The White Doe of Rylstone
497:
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426:Where Lovers Mourn (2003)
301:Hartman 1967 pp. 158–159
283:Moorman 1968 pp. 423–424
274:Moorman 1968 qtd. p. 424
823:Samuel Taylor Coleridge
418:3 (June 1831): 557–566.
47:Samuel Taylor Coleridge
629:Poems, in Two Volumes
186:Matlak 1978 pp. 46–50
98:I had no human fears:
529:Anecdote for Fathers
720:The Solitary Reaper
590:Michael, a Pastoral
390:Hartman, Geoffrey.
346:Wordsworth Editions
328:Hartman 1967 p. 158
310:Hartman 1967 p. 159
292:Moorman 1968 p. 424
247:Moorman 1968 p. 426
235:Mahoney 1997 p. 106
209:Hartman 1967 p. 157
200:Moorman 1968 p. 422
89:figurative language
791:Guide to the Lakes
463:William Wordsworth
256:Hartman 1967 p. 21
162:Critical reception
87:movement in which
25:William Wordsworth
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692:My Heart Leaps Up
584:The Matthew poems
416:Fraser's Magazine
397:Hirsch, Edward. "
319:Powell 1831 p. 63
265:Hirsch 1998 p. 40
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885:Wordsworth Trust
844:Wordsworth House
747:The Yarrow poems
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522:Lyrical Ballads
520:Preface to the
511:Lyrical Ballads
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407:Moorman, Mary.
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766:The Excursion
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472:List of poems
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611:We Are Seven
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364:. Retrieved
360:the original
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870:(1813-1850)
868:Rydal Mount
864:(1808-1811)
858:(1799-1808)
852:(1797-1798)
773:The Prelude
757:The Recluse
147:The Prelude
916:1800 poems
911:1798 poems
900:Categories
862:Allan Bank
636:Peter Bell
604:Poor Susan
491:Lake Poets
486:Early life
378:References
41:Background
543:Lucy Gray
422:Draconian
399:Five acts
85:soporific
878:Related
801:People
479:Topics
366:28 May
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127:Themes
837:Homes
783:Prose
175:Notes
368:2012
350:ISBN
75:Poem
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