I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud
"I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud" is a lyric poem by William Wordsworth. It is one of his most popular, and was inspired by a forest encounter on 15 April 1802 that included himself, his younger sister Dorothy and a "long belt" of daffodils. Written in 1804, this 24 line lyric was first published in 1807 in Poems, in Two Volumes, and revised in 1815.
A hand-written manuscript of the poem (1804). British Library Add. MS 47864
Ullswater in the English Lake District. Ullswater from Gobarrow Park by J. M. W. Turner, watercolour, 1819. Gobarrow Park is on the north side of Ullswater, so Wordsworth’s daffodils would have been on the nearer shore – near the cows perhaps?
Narcissus pseudonarcissus, the "daffodil" native to the Lake District
The title page of Poems, in Two Volumes
William Wordsworth was an English Romantic poet who, with Samuel Taylor Coleridge, helped to launch the Romantic Age in English literature with their joint publication Lyrical Ballads (1798).
Anonymous portrait of Wordsworth, c. 1840-50
Wordsworth in 1798, about the time he began The Prelude.
Dove Cottage (Town End, Grasmere) – home of William and Dorothy Wordsworth, 1799–1808; home of Thomas De Quincey, 1809–1820
Rydal Mount – home to Wordsworth 1813–1850. Hundreds of visitors came here to see him over the years
