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    The Borderers: "Nature never did betray the heart that loved her."
    The Borderers: "Nature never did betray the heart that loved her."
    The Borderers: "Nature never did betray the heart that loved her."
    Ebook130 pages1 hour

    The Borderers: "Nature never did betray the heart that loved her."

    By William Wordsworth

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    William Wordsworth was born on 7 April, 1770 in Cockermouth, in Cumbria, northwest England. Wordsworth spent his early years in his beloved Lake District often with his sister, Dorothy. The English lakes could terrify as well as nurture, and as Wordsworth would write “I grew up fostered alike by beauty and by fear”. After being schooled at Hawkshead he went to St. John’s College, Cambridge but not liking the competitive nature of the place idled his way through saying he “was not for that hour, nor for that place.” Whilst still at Cambridge he travelled to France. He was immediately taken by the Revolutionary fervor and the confluence of a set of great ideals and rallying calls for the people of France. In his early twenties he ventured again to France and fathered an illegitimate child. He would not see that daughter till she was 9 owing to the tensions and hostilities between England and France. There now followed a period of three to four years that plagued Wordsworth with doubt. He was now in his early thirties but had no profession, was rootless and virtually penniless. Although his career was not on track he did manage to publish two volumes, both in 1793; An Evening Walk and Descriptive Sketches. This dark period ended in 1795. A legacy of £900 received from Raisley Calvert enabled Wordsworth to pursue a literary career in earnest. In 1797 he became great friends with a fellow poet, Samuel Taylor Coleridge. They formed a partnership that would change both their lives and the course of English poetry. Their aim was for a decisive break with the strictures of Neoclassical verse. In 1798 the ground breaking Lyrical Ballads was published. Wordsworth wrote in the preface “the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings: it takes its origin from emotion recollected in tranquility.” Most of the poems were dramatic in form, designed to reveal the character of the speaker. Thus the poems set forth a new style, a new vocabulary, and new subjects for poetry. Coleridge had also conceived of an enormous poem to be called “The Brook,” in which he proposed to treat all science, philosophy, and religion, but soon laid the burden of writing it to Wordsworth. To test his powers for that endeavour, Wordsworth began writing the autobiographical poem that would absorb him for the next 40 years, and which was eventually published as The Prelude, or, Growth of a Poet’s Mind. By the 1820s, the critical acclaim for Wordsworth was growing, but perhaps his best years of work were behind him. Nonetheless he continued to write and to revise previous works. With the death is 1843 of his friend and Poet Laureate Robert Southey, Wordsworth was offered the position. He accepted despite saying he wouldn’t write any poetry as Poet Laureate. And indeed he didn’t. Wordsworth died of pleurisy on 23 April 1850. He was buried in St Oswald’s church Grasmere.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherCopyright Group
    Release dateNov 27, 2015
    ISBN9781785434938
    The Borderers: "Nature never did betray the heart that loved her."
    Author

    William Wordsworth

    William Wordsworth was born on 7 April 1770 at Cockermouth, in the English Lake District, the son of a lawyer. He was one of five children and developed a close bond with his only sister, Dorothy, whom he lived with for most of his life. At the age of seventeen, shortly after the deaths of his parents, Wordsworth went to St John’s College, Cambridge, and after graduating visited Revolutionary France. Upon returning to England he published his first poem and devoted himself wholly to writing. He became great friends with other Romantic poets and collaborated with Samuel Taylor Coleridge on Lyrical Ballads. In 1843, he succeeded Robert Southey as Poet Laureate and died in the year ‘Prelude’ was finally published, 1850.

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      Book preview

      The Borderers - William Wordsworth

      The Borderers by William Wordsworth

      A Tragedy

      William Wordsworth was born on 7 April, 1770 in Cockermouth, in Cumbria, northwest England.

      Wordsworth spent his early years in his beloved Lake District often with his sister, Dorothy. The English lakes could terrify as well as nurture, and as Wordsworth would write I grew up fostered alike by beauty and by fear,

      After being schooled at Hawkshead he went to St. John’s College, Cambridge but not liking the competitive nature of the place idled his way through saying he was not for that hour, nor for that place.

      Whilst still at Cambridge he travelled to France.  He was immediately taken by the Revolutionary fervor and the confluence of a set of great ideals and rallying calls for the people of France.

      In his early twenties he ventured again to France and fathered an illegitimate child. He would not see that daughter till she was 9 owing to the tensions and hostilities between England and France.

      There now followed a period of three to four years that plagued Wordsworth with doubt.  He was now in his early thirties but had no profession, was rootless and virtually penniless.

      Although his career was not on track he did manage to publish two volumes, both in 1793;  An Evening Walk and Descriptive Sketches.

      This dark period ended in 1795. A legacy of £900 received from Raisley Calvert enabled Wordsworth to pursue a literary career in earnest.

      In 1797 he became great friends with a fellow poet, Samuel Taylor Coleridge. They formed a partnership that would change both their lives and the course of English poetry.

      Their aim was for a decisive break with the strictures of Neoclassical verse. In 1798 the ground breaking Lyrical Ballads was published. Wordsworth wrote in the preface the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings: it takes its origin from emotion recollected in tranquility. Most of the poems were dramatic in form, designed to reveal the character of the speaker. Thus the poems set forth a new style, a new vocabulary, and new subjects for poetry.

      Coleridge had also conceived of an enormous poem to be called The Brook, in which he proposed to treat all science, philosophy, and religion, but soon laid the burden of writing it to Wordsworth.  To test his powers for that endeavour, Wordsworth began writing the autobiographical poem that would absorb him for the next 40 years, and which was eventually published as The Prelude, or, Growth of a Poet’s Mind.

      By the 1820s, the critical acclaim for Wordsworth was growing, but perhaps his best years of work were behind him. Nonetheless he continued to write and to revise previous works.

      With the death is 1843 of his friend and Poet Laureate Robert Southey, Wordsworth was offered the position. He accepted despite saying he wouldn’t write any poetry as Poet Laureate. And indeed he didn’t.

      Wordsworth died of pleurisy on 23 April 1850. He was buried in St Oswald’s church Grasmere.

      Index of Contents

      DRAMATIS PERSONAE.

      SCENE—Borders of England and Scotland.

      TIME—The Reign of Henry III.

      ACT I.

      SCENE—Road in a Wood.

      SCENE—The Door of the Hostel.

      SCENE—Changes to the Wood Adjoining the Hostel

      ACT II.

      SCENE—A Chamber in the Hostel

      SCENE Changes to a Wood

      SCENE—The Area of a Half Ruined Castle

      ACT III.

      SCENE—The Door of the Hostel, a Group of Pilgrims as Before;

      SCENE—A Desolate Moor.

      SCENE Changes to Another Part of the Moor at a Short Distance—

      SCENE—An Eminence, a Beacon on the Summit.

      SCENE—The Wood on the Edge of the Moor.

      ACT IV.

      SCENE—A Desolate Prospect—

      SCENE—A Room in the Hostel—

      SCENE—The Inside of a Poor Cottage.

      ACT V.

      SCENE—A Wood on the Edge of the Waste.

      SCENE—The Edge of the Moor.

      SCENE—Changes to the Door of ELDRED'S Cottage—

      WILLIAM WORDSWORTH – A SHORT BIOGRAPHY

      WILLIAM WORDSWORTH – A CONCISE BIBLIOGRAPHY

      DRAMATIS PERSONAE.

      MARMADUKE.  |

      OSWALD.     |

      WALLACE.    |- Of the Band of Borderers.

      LACY.       |

      LENNOX.    |

      HERBERT.

      WILFRED, Servant to MARMADUKE.

      Host.

      Forester.

      ELDRED, a Peasant.

      Peasant, Pilgrims, etc.

      IDONEA.

      Female Beggar.

      ELEANOR, Wife to ELDRED.

      SCENE—Borders of England and Scotland.

      TIME—The Reign of Henry III.

      Readers already acquainted with my Poems will recognise, in the following composition, some eight or ten lines which I have not scrupled to retain in the places where they originally stood. It is proper, however, to add, that they would not have been used elsewhere, if I had foreseen the time when I might be induced to publish this Tragedy.

      February 28, 1842.

      ACT I.

      SCENE—Road in a Wood.

      WALLACE and LACY.

      LACY - The troop will be impatient; let us hie

      Back to our post, and strip the Scottish Foray

      Of their rich Spoil, ere they recross the Border.

      —Pity that our young Chief will have no part

      In this good service.

      WALLACE - Rather let us grieve

      That, in the undertaking which has caused

      His absence, he hath sought, whate'er his aim,

      Companionship with One of crooked ways,

      From whose perverted soul can come no good

      To our confiding, open-hearted, Leader.

      LACY - True; and, remembering how the Band have proved

      That Oswald finds small favour in our sight,

      Well may we wonder he has gained such power

      Over our much-loved Captain.

      WALLACE - I have heard

      Of some dark deed to which in early life

      His passion drove him—then a Voyager

      Upon the midland Sea. You knew his bearing

      In Palestine?

      LACY - Where he despised alike

      Mahommedan and Christian. But enough;

      Let us begone—the Band may else be foiled.

      [Exeunt.

      Enter MARMADUKE and WILFRED.

      WILFRED - Be cautious, my dear Master!

      MARMADUKE - I perceive

      That fear is like a cloak which old men huddle

      About their love, as if to keep it warm.

      WILFRED - Nay, but I grieve that we should part. This Stranger,

      For such he is—

      MARMADUKE - Your busy fancies, Wilfred,

      Might tempt me to a smile; but what of him?

      WILFRED - You know that you have saved his life.

      MARMADUKE - I know it.

      WILFRED - And that he hates you!—Pardon me, perhaps

      That word was hasty.

      MARMADUKE - Fy! no more of it.

      WILFRED - Dear Master! gratitude's a heavy burden

      To a proud Soul.—Nobody loves this Oswald—

      Yourself, you do not love him.

      MARMADUKE - I do more,

      I honour him. Strong feelings to his heart

      Are natural; and from no one can be learnt

      More of man's thoughts and ways than his experience

      Has given him power to teach: and then for courage

      And enterprise—what perils hath he shunned?

      What obstacles hath he failed to overcome?

      Answer these questions, from our common knowledge,

      And be at rest.

      WILFRED - Oh, Sir!

      MARMADUKE - Peace, my good Wilfred;

      Repair to Liddesdale, and tell the Band

      I shall be with them in two days, at farthest.

      WILFRED - May He whose eye is over all protect you!

      Exit.

      Enter OSWALD (a bunch of plants in his hand).

      OSWALD - This wood is rich in plants and curious simples.

      MARMADUKE - (looking at them). The wild rose, and the poppy, and the nightshade:

      Which is your favourite, Oswald?

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