The World Is Too Much With Us William Wordsworth

1. The world is too much with us; late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers:
Little we see in Nature that is ours;
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!
This Sea that bares her bosom to the moon;
The winds that will be howling at all hours,
And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers;
For this, for everything, we are out of tune,
It moves us not. Great God! I'd rather be
A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn;
So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,
Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;
Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea;
Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn.
“The world is too much with us” – William Wordsworth

2. Whitechapel High Street,
ca. 1894
The romantic period
1785 - 1830

3. •Turbulent time
•England changing from an
agricultural to a modern
industrial nation (steam
engine…machinery)
•Wealth and power shifts from
the aristocracy to large-scale
employers who employ a
migrant working class living
on a starvation wage
•Open fields and farms were
enclosed into privately owned
agricultural holdings.
romantic period

4. •Nature
•Isolationism
•Spiritual exile – the disinherited mind that
cannot
find a spiritual home in its native land
•Fascination with the outlaws of myth, legend
or history
•Mysticism
•Results of the industrial revolution
England’s Lake District
Themes in romantic lit.

5. William Wordsworth
Regarded as the founder and major voice of English
Romanticism
Appointed poet laureate in 1843
Central concern: the way in which people, of their own free will,
cut themselves off from the creative powers of Nature – the truth
of existence can be discovered by contemplating nature and the
lives of people connected with nature, simple lifestyles of rural
communities
Poetry = “…spontaneous overflow of emotion
recollected in tranquility…” written in the
language of the common man
Growth of human mind through individual’s
relation to natural world
Verges of pantheistic (God = Nature) beliefs at
times

6. Central concerns in the sonnet
Mankind has become obsessed with commercialism
This distracts us from our relationship with Nature
We are indifferent to cosmic forces that control the sea and the
wind
We no longer respond to the rhythms of Nature
Wordsworth feels that as a pagan he might use his imagination
more fully to perceive these cosmic forces through a more
intimate communion with Nature
Issues are still relevant today – destruction of environment as a
result of our endless quest for material prosperity

7. The world is too much with us; late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers:
Little we see in Nature that is ours;
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!
at all times
Neglect our powers and destroy
our own potential Waste our
power to appreciate the natural
world
An immoral blessing, a cheap, squalid
and foul gift – a low and despicable
thing to be grateful for
Inadequate interaction with and appreciation of Nature –
we are no longer able to see our selves as part of the vast
and mysterious natural universe
Obsessed with quantity
Have lost contact with the quality of natural,
moral values
PERSONIFICATION
Worldliness and worldly goods –
materialism and practicalities
Pressures of time, pursuit of money,
desire for material possessions
Exclamation mark: disgust
The colon
introduces an
explanation

8. This Sea that bares her bosom to the moon;
The winds that will be howling at all hours,
And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers;
For this, for everything, we are out of tune,
It moves us not.
METAPHOR – musical instrument – “out of tune”
with the melodies and harmonies of the natural
world, we do not live in rhythm with the cosmos
Sense of abundance, generosity, natural
spontaneity and feeling
PERSONIFICATION – beautiful woman
baring her bosom to her “lover”
We are unmoved by the wind and its
changeability
These are the
forces (the sea,
the moon, the
wind) that should
exercise our
intellectual and
emotional energy

9. Great God! I'd rather be
A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn;
So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,
Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;
Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea;
Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn.
Would rather be a pagan than a Christian in a society that is
spiritually dead - longing for closer contact with the world of
nature and through nature, God
Grassy meadow
Intimate bond with nature and beliefs – a belief
system that offers love and nurturing
Would feel less unhappy and alone
See visions of an ancient word filled with deities whose realms were natural
Vehement (impassioned) outrage Desperate call to
the Creator of the universe
NOT A REJECTION OF CHRISTIANITY BUT THE
REJECTION OF A CHRISTIAN SOCIETY WHICH HAS LOST
SIGHT OF ITS VALUES AND MORALS