The peculiarities of english romanticism: two trends progressive and regressive. The poets of the "lake school" w wordsworth as. Coleridge, rd. Southey

2.3 Stylistic analysis of Wordsworth’s work “A Fact and Imagination”


Let us have a closer view. The first part, obviously, “the Fact” deals with King Canute, the Danish Conqueror who invaded England in the 10th century and successfully occupied it thus becoming King of England. He was a religious man who supported the Church and was told to be a faithful man.
He put the God’s authority higher than man’s ambitions that is seen in such passages:
“He only is a King, and he alone
Deserves the name (this truth the billows preach)
Whose everlasting laws, sea, earth, and heaven, obey (10, 86).”
Though initially he is presented as a powerful man, which might is so great that he alone is able to command the waves – '
O yeApproaching
Waters of the deep, that share
With this green isle my fortunes, come not where
Your Master's throne is set.(10, 86)
Twice in the poem he turns to his servants who praise him, he tells them about God’s eternal power, but they are blind and do not accept the highest meaning of his words. Therefore, King Canute bends before God’s authority as it is seen the only true one and defies the human power as being senseless to gain and hold –
“From that time forth did for his brows disown
The ostentatious symbol of a crown;
Esteeming earthly royalty
Contemptible as vain.”(10, 86)
Then the narration stops abruptly and with the help of the authors guide, the “vision” transfers to another scene, with King Alfred. This second part is mostly pantheistic, praising nature as God’s emanative representation. This way of stylistic description was adopted by W. Wordsworth and is commonly seen throughout his poetry. Alfred once had lost all his power and sought any place to stay and rest with his thoughts of own fate. He spent much time on the run, wandering around the villages and, as he too was a religious man, might have turned to God for help. This is also quite obviously shown in the entire second part of the poem.
Special attention should be drawn to the distinct variety of stylistic devices used by the author in the poem: epithets ( “Rich Theme of England’s fondest praise” towards Alfred, “wanton air”, “oriental flattery”, “earthly royalty”), metaphors (“Waters of the Deep” towards sea, “sluggish pools” as bays), simily (“souls like the flood”), anaphoric repetition (such…..such) – all that powerful items were used to draw our attention and to intensify the effect that is made by the magnificent plot. Extensive use of capitalization (Conqueror, King – relating to God, Nature, Ocean etc.) and antonomasia make that pantheistic and sublime image so admired by Wordsworth. One more thing that attracts our view is the attitude of the author to the barren men. He calls them “Servile Courtiers”, “the undisguised extent of mortal sway”, even “rugged northern mouths” (metonymy) to convey the thought of their mutual incapability to accept and evaluate the grace and power of the nature and thus God’s authority even despite King’s speech and personal example of loyalty towards the Highest Power, they are only able to display “oriental flattery”. This is important for understanding of his views concerning the extensive degeneration of the human society and his disregard towards this, meanwhile accentuating that only love to nature can bring back all the purity of thoughts and feelings in men’s minds, and only faith can return people to the real progress.
Also significant is the point that both main characters (Canute and Alfred) don’t communicate with each other, as it couldn’t occur in the real time; they are not confronted with each other too. But both of them are doubtlessly considered as the greatest rules of England and ones among the most prominent leaders in Europe of that time.