‘The Ruined Cottage’ and ‘Michael’ by William Wordsworth

Samuel Taylor Coleridge was one of the first people to hear ‘The Ruined Cottage’, read aloud to him on a visit to the Wordsworths in 1797, and he later described it as ‘one of the most beautiful poems in the language’. Like ‘Michael’ (1800), it depicts the disintegration of ordinary lives under social and psychological pressures, reflecting Wordsworth’s interest in rural poverty as much as the natural world. In this episode, Seamus and Mark look at the two poems as part of the literary revolution brought about by the Lyrical Ballads, in which everyday language is used to depict marginal lives without sentiment, guided by Wordsworth’s assertion that ‘men who do not wear fine clothes can feel deeply.’

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Read more in the LRB:

Marilyn Butler on The Lyrical Ballads: https://lrb.me/npep702

Jonathan Wordsworth: Wordsworth in Love: https://lrb.me/npep701

Seamus Perry on 'The Prelude': https://lrb.me/npep703

Colin Burrow on Wordsworth: https://lrb.me/npep704