William Wordsworth The Prelude Quotes

Bliss it was in that dawn to be alive But to be young was very heaven.

I had melancholy thoughts... a strangeness in my mind, A feeling that I was not for that hour, Nor for that place.

The earth was all before me. With a heart Joyous, nor scared at its own liberty, I look about; and should the chosen guide Be nothing better than a wandering cloud, I cannot miss my way.

And I was taught to feel, perhaps too much, The self-sufficing power of solitude.

Duty were our games.

Go to the poets, they will speak to thee More perfectly of purer creatures--

Feeling comes in aid Of feeling, and diversity of strength Attends us, if but once we have been strong.

Imagination! lifting up itself Before the eye and progress of my Song Like and unfather'd vapour; here that Power In all the might of its endowments, came Athwart me; I was lost as in a cloud, Halted without a struggle to break through, And now recovering to my Soul I say I recognize they glory; in such strength Of usurpation, in such visitings Of awful promise, when the light of sense Goes out in flashes that have shewn to us The invisible world, doth Greatness make abode There harbours whether we be young or old. Our destiny, our nature, and our home Is with infinitude, and only there; With hope it is, hope that can never die, Effort, and expectation, and desire, And something evermore about to be.

Here must thou be, O man, Strength to thyself — no helper hast thou here — Here keepest thou thy individual state: No other can divide with thee this work, No secondary hand can intervene To fashion this ability. 'Tis thine, The prime and vital principle is thine In the recesses of thy nature, far From any reach of outward fellowship, Else 'tis not thine at all.

[...]the stately and slow-moving Turk, With freight of slippers piled beneath his arm.

Mighty is the charm Of these abstractions to a mind beset With images, and haunted by herself And specially delightful unto me Was that clear synthesis built up aloft So gracefully.

What say you, then, To times, when half the city shall break out Full of one passion, vengeance, rage, or fear? WILLIAM WORDSWORTH, The Prelude

There are in our existence spots of time Which with distinct preeminence retain A fructifying virtue, whence, depressed By trivial occupations and the round Of ordinary intercourse, our minds - Especially the imaginative power - Are nourished and invisibly repaired. - The Two-Part Prelude: First Part

How oft, amid those overflowing streets, Have I gone forward with the crowd, and said Unto myself, "The face of every one That passes by me is a mystery!

How Nature by extrinsic passion first / Peopled my mind with beauteous forms or grand' (Book I.)

But that night When on my bed I lay, I was most mov'd And felt most deeply in what world I was; With unextinguish'd taper I kept watch, Reading at intervals

Thence did I drink the visionary power; And deem not profitless those fleeting moods Of shadowy exultation: not for this, That they are kindred to our purer mind And intellectual life; but that the soul, Remembering how she felt, but what she felt Remembering not, retains an obscure sense Of possible sublimity, whereto With faculties still growing, feeling still That whatsoever point they gain, they yet Have something to pursue.

Oh, blank confusion! true epitome Of what the mighty City is herself, To thousands upon thousands of her sons, Living amid the same perpetual whirl Of trivial objects, melted and reduced To one identity, by differences That have no law, no meaning, and no end— Oppression, under which even highest minds Must labour, whence the strongest are not free.

Nor was it mean delight To watch crude Nature work in untaught minds; To note the laws and progress of belief; Though obstinate on this way, yet on that How willingly we travel, and how far! To have, for instance, brought upon the scene The champion, Jack the Giant-killer: Lo! He dons his coat of darkness; on the stage Walks, and achieves his wonders, from the eye Of living Mortal covert, "as the moon Hid in her vacant interlunar cave." Delusion bold! and how can it be wrought? The garb he wears is black as death, the word "Invisible" flames forth upon his chest.

All moveables of wonder, from all parts, Are here—Albinos, painted Indians, Dwarfs, The Horse of knowledge, and the learned Pig, The Stone-eater, the man that swallows fire, Giants, Ventriloquists, the Invisible Girl, The Bust that speaks and moves its goggling eyes, The Wax-work, Clock-work, all the marvellous craft Of modern Merlins, Wild Beasts, Puppet-shows, All out-o'-the-way, far-fetched, perverted things, All freaks of nature, all Promethean thoughts Of man, his dullness, madness, and their feats All jumbled up together, to compose A Parliament of Monsters.

TO SLEEP A flock of sheep that leisurely pass by,   One after one; the sound of rain, and bees   Murmuring; the fall of rivers, winds and seas,   Smooth fields, white sheets of water, and pure sky;   I’ve thought of all by turns; and still I lie   Sleepless; and soon the small birds’ melodies   Must hear, first utter’d from my orchard trees;   And the first Cuckoo’s melancholy cry.   Even thus last night, and two nights more, I lay,   And could not win thee, Sleep! by any stealth:   So do not let me wear to night away:   Without Thee what is all the morning’s wealth?   Come, blessed barrier betwixt day and day,   Dear mother of fresh thoughts and joyous health!

Vale la pena soffermarci su quest’incubo [della fine della letteratura e delle arti], per come Borges ce lo racconta in una sua conversazione sui sogni e gli incubi. Il terribile sogno è del poeta inglese William Wordsworth e si trova nel secondo [rectius: quinto] libro del poema The Prelude — un poema autobiografico, come dice il sottotitolo. Fu pubblicato nel 1850, l’anno stesso della morte del poeta. Allora non si pensava, come invece oggi, a un possibile cataclisma cosmico che annientasse ogni grande opera umana, se non l’umanità interamente. Ma Wordsworth ne ebbe la preoccupazione e, in sogno, la visione. Ed ecco come Borges l’assume e riassume nel suo discorso: “Nel sogno la sabbia lo circonda, un Sahara di sabbia nera. Non c’è acqua, non c’è mare. Sta al centro del deserto — nel deserto si sta sempre al centro — ed è ossessionato dal pensiero di come fare per sfuggire al deserto, quando vede qualcuno vicino a lui. Stranamente, è un arabo della tribù dei beduini, che cavalca un cammello e ha nella mano destra una lancia. Sotto il braccio sinistro ha una pietra; nella mano una conchiglia. L’arabo gli dice che ha la missione di salvare le arti e le scienze e gli avvicina la conchiglia all’orecchio; la conchiglia è di straordinaria bellezza. Wordsworth ci dice che ascoltò la profezia (‘in una lingua che non conoscevo ma che capii’): una specie di ode appassionata, che profetizzava che la Terra era sul punto di essere distrutta dal diluvio che l’ira di Dio mandava. L’arabo gli dice che è vero, che il diluvio si avvicina, ma che egli ha una missione: salvare l’arte e le scienze. Gli mostra la pietra. La pietra, stranamente, è la Geometria di Euclide pur rimanendo una pietra. Poi gli avvicina la conchiglia, che è anche un libro: è quello che gli ha detto quelle cose terribili. La conchiglia è, anche, tutta la poesia del mondo, compreso, perche' no?, il poema di Wordsworth. Il beduino gli dice: ‘Devo salvare queste due cose, la pietra e la conchiglia, entrambi libri’. Volge il viso all’indietro, e vi è un momento in cui Wordsworth vede che il volto del beduino cambia, si riempie di orrore. Anche lui si volge e vede una gran luce, una luce che ha inondato metà del deserto. Questa luce è quella dell’acqua del diluvio che sta per sommergere la Terra. Il beduino si allontana e Wordsworth vede che è anche don Chisciotte, che il cammello è anche Ronzinante e che allo stesso modo che la pietra è il libro e la conchiglia il libro, il beduino è don Chisciotte e nessuna delle due cose ed entrambe nello stesso tempo”... l’immagine di don Chisciotte che si allontana invincibilmente richiama quella dipinta da Daumier, forse contemporaneamente. E ci è lecito, in aura borgesiana, chiederci se il poeta e il pittore non abbiano fatto lo stesso sogno.

Though absent long, These forms of beauty have not been to me, As is a landscape to a blind man’s eye: But oft, in lonely rooms, and mid the din Of towns and cities, I have owed to them, In hours of weariness, sensations sweet, Felt in the blood, and felt along the heart, And passing even into my purer mind With tranquil restoration: — feelings too Of unremembered pleasure; such, perhaps, As may have had no trivial influence On that best portion of a good man’s life; His little, nameless, unremembered acts Of kindness and of love.

With Ships the sea was sprinkled far and nigh,   Like stars in heaven, and joyously it showed;   Some lying fast at anchor in the road,   Some veering up and down, one knew not why.   A goodly Vessel did I then espy   Come like a Giant from a haven broad;   And lustily along the Bay she strode,   Her tackling rich, and of apparel high.   This Ship was nought to me, nor I to her,   Yet I pursued her with a Lover’s look;   This Ship to all the rest did I prefer:   When will she turn, and whither? She will brook   No tarrying; where she comes the winds must stir:   On went She, and due north her journey took.

Earth has not any thing to shew more fair:   Dull would he be of soul who could pass by   A sight so touching in it’s majesty:   This City now doth like a garment wear   The beauty of the morning; silent, bare,   Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples lie   Open unto the fields, and to the sky;   All bright and glittering in the smokeless air.   Never did sun more beautifully steep   In his first splendor valley, rock, or hill;   Ne’er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep!   The river glideth at his own sweet will:   Dear God! the very houses seem asleep;   And all that mighty heart is lying still!

Now if Newton had been a very plain, very dull, very matter-of-fact man, all that would be easily explicable. But I must make you see that he was not. He was really a most extraordinary, wild character. He practised alchemy. In secret, he wrote immense tomes about the Book of Revelation. He was convinced that the law of inverse squares was really already to be found in Pythagoras. And for such a man, who in private was full of these wild metaphysical and mystical speculations, to hold this public face and say, ‘I make no hypotheses’ – that is an extraordinary expression of his secret character. William Wordsworth in The Prelude has a vivid phrase, Newton, with his prism and silent face, which sees and says it exactly. Well,

I had melancholy thoughts . . .    a strangeness in my mind,    A feeling that I was not for that hour,    Nor for that place. —William Wordsworth, The Prelude