We Are Seven

Last updated

"We are Seven" is a poem written by William Wordsworth and published in his Lyrical Ballads . It describes a discussion between an adult poetic speaker and a "little cottage girl" about the number of brothers and sisters who dwell with her. The poem turns on the question of whether to account two dead siblings as part of the family.

Contents

Background

Wordsworth claimed that the idea for We are Seven came to him while travelling alone across England in October 1793 after becoming separated from his friend, William Calvert. This solitude with nature he claimed encouraged him to reach a deeper understanding where the experience was no longer just for pleasure, as it was in his earlier days, but also hinted at a darker side. [1] Immersed in these feelings, Wordsworth came to Goodrich Castle and met a little girl who would serve as the model for the little girl in We are Seven. Although there is no documentation on what the little girl actually told him during their conversation, she interested Wordsworth to such an extent that he wrote: [2]

I have only to add that in the spring of 1841 I revisited Goodrich Castle, not having seen that part of the Wye since I met the little Girl there in 1793. It would have given me greater pleasure to have found in the neighbouring hamlet traces of one who had interested me so much; but it was impossible, as unfortunately I did not even know her name. [3]

Wordsworth began to write the poem in early 1798 while working on many other poems modelled on the ballad form for a joint poetry collection with Samuel Coleridge. The collection was proposed in March because Wordsworth needed to raise money for a proposed journey to Germany with Coleridge. These poems were included in Lyrical Ballads and A Few Other Poems with a few written by Coleridge. [4] Wordsworth describes the moment of finishing the poem:

My friends will not deem it too trifling to relate that while walking to and fro I composed the last stanza first, having begun with the last line. When it was all but finished, I came in and recited it to Mr. Coleridge and my Sister, and said, 'A prefatory stanza must be added, and I should sit down to our little tea-meal with greater pleasure if my task were finished.' I mentioned in substance what I wished to be expressed, and Coleridge immediately threw off the stanza thus:-

'A little child, dear brother Jim,' —

I objected to the rhyme, 'dear brother Jim,' as being ludicrous, but we all enjoyed the joke of hitching-in our friend, James T —'s name, who was familiarly called Jim. He was brother of the dramatist, and this reminds me of an anecdote which it may be worth while here to notice. The said Jem got a sight of the Lyrical Ballads as it was going through the press at Bristol, during which time I was residing in that city. One evening he came to me with a grave face, and said, 'Wordsworth, I have seen the volume that Coleridge and you are about to publish. There is one poem in it which I earnestly entrate you will cancel, for, if published, it will make you ever lastingly ridiculous.' I answered that I felt much obliged by the interest he took in my good name as a writer, and begged to know what was the unfortunate piece he alluded to. He said, 'It is called "We are seven."' Nay! said I, that shall take its chance, however, and he left me in despair. [3]

The collection, including We are Seven, was accepted by Joseph Cottle in May 1798 and was soon after published anonymously. [5] In 1820, the poem was republished as a broadside and titled "The Little Maid and the Gentleman". [6]

Some guidebooks and locals in Conwy, Wales, claim Wordsworth was inspired to write the poem after seeing a gravestone at St Mary and All Saints Church in the town; this gravestone is marked "We are Seven." [7]

The poem

The poem is a dialogue between a narrator who serves as a questioner and a little girl, with part of the evolving first stanza contributed by Coleridge. [8] The poem is written in ballad form.

The poem begins with the narrator asking:

A simple child, dear brother Jim,
That lightly draws its breath,
And feels its life in every limb,
What should it know of death? (lines 1–4)

He transitions to describe a girl whose beauty pleased him:

She had a rustic, woodland air,
And she was wildly clad;
Her eyes were fair, and very fair;
—Her beauty made me glad. (lines 9–12)

He begins to question her about her siblings:

"Sisters and brothers, little Maid,
How many may you be?"
How many? seven in all," she said,
And wondering looked at me. (lines 13–16)

He questions her further, asking where they are, and she simply responds that two are in Wales, two are at sea, and two are buried in a churchyard near her home. He is confused by her answer and asks:

"Yet you are seven; I pray you tell,
"Sweet Maid, how this may be?" (lines 27–28)

She replies:

"Seven boys and girls are we;
"Two of us in the church-yard lie,
"Beneath the church-yard tree." (lines 30–32)

He questions her further, trying to have her admit that there are only five but she responds:

"Their graves are green, they may be seen,"
The little Maid replied,
"Twelve steps or more from my mother's door,"
"And they are side by side."
"My stockings there I often knit,
"My 'kerchief there I hem;
"And there upon the ground I sit—
"I sit and sing to them.
"And often after sun-set, Sir,
"When it is light and fair,
"I take my little porringer,
"And eat my supper there (lines 36–48)

She then describes how they die, which prompts the narrator to ask:

"How many are you then," said I,
"If they two are in Heaven?" (lines 61–62)

After the little girl repeats that they were seven in number, the narrator, frustrated, replies:

"But they are dead: those two are dead!
"Their spirits are in Heaven!" (lines 65–66)

The poem ends with a divide between the child and the narrator:

'Twas throwing words away: for still
The little Maid would have her will,
And said, "Nay, we are seven!" (lines 67–69)

Ownership of the poem is in the public domain and the full text can be found on wikisource.

Interpretation and critical response

In his preface to Lyrical Ballads, Wordsworth wrote that the poems exhibit a "power of real and substantial action and suffering" and, in particular to We are Seven, to express "the perplexity and obscurity which in childhood attend our notion of death, or rather our utter inability to admit that notion". [9] Geoffrey Hartman points out that there is a subconscious cleaving to an idea to escape from a feeling of separation. The little girl in the poem is unable to realise that she is separated from her dead siblings. She is unable to understand death, and she is forever in an imaginative state of being, and nature is interfering to keep the girl from understanding her separation from her siblings. [10] Susan J. Wolfson emphasised the reducing tone of the questioner, which allows the girl to articulate a more Romantic view of presence. [11]

More recent scholarship, however, focuses on the sociological context for the poem, written the same year that Thomas Malthus's An Essay on the Principle of Population was published. Frances Ferguson argues that the poem stages a debate about personification in language. [12] Scholars including Aaron Fogel, Hollis Robbins, and Heather Glen argue that the questions asked of the little girl follow the census polling forms proposed by John Rickman in his 1796 census proposal to Parliament. [13] [14] [15] Like Oliver Goldsmith's "The Deserted Village", Robbins argues, Wordsworth's "We Are Seven" "promotes a traditional link between individuals and the place they were born." [16] Peter DeBolla argues that the poem is irresolvable partly because of the math in the poem—the evenhanded tension between even and odd. [17] Maureen McLane reads the poem in the context of moral philosophy and argues that while the girl and the questioner speak the same language, they have wholly different views about time, death, and counting. [18] John Mahoney argues, "The seemingly silly squabble between adult and child is already a revelation of the early and continuing tension in the poet between the hope for a perpetual bliss and the incursion of a harsh reality." [19]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">William Wordsworth</span> English Romantic poet (1770–1850)

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).

<i>The Rime of the Ancient Mariner</i> 1798 poem by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

The Rime of the Ancient Mariner is the longest major poem by the English poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge, written in 1797–98 and published in 1798 in the first edition of Lyrical Ballads. Some modern editions use a revised version printed in 1817 that featured a gloss. Along with other poems in Lyrical Ballads, it is often considered a signal shift to modern poetry and the beginning of British Romantic literature.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud</span> Lyric poem by William Wordsworth

"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.

<i>Lyrical Ballads</i> Poem collection by William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Lyrical Ballads, with a Few Other Poems is a collection of poems by William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge, first published in 1798 and generally considered to have marked the beginning of the English Romantic movement in literature. The immediate effect on critics was modest, but it became and remains a landmark, changing the course of English literature and poetry. The 1800 edition is famous for the Preface to the Lyrical Ballads, something that has come to be known as the manifesto of Romanticism.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">The Idiot Boy</span>

"The Idiot Boy" is a poem written by William Wordsworth, a representative of the Romantic movement in English literature. The poem was composed in spring 1798 and first published in the same year in Lyrical Ballads, a collection of poems written by Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge, which is considered to be a turning point in the history of English literature and the Romantic movement. The poem investigates such themes as language, intellectual disability, maternity, emotionality, organisation of experience and "transgression of the natural."

Nationality words link to articles with information on the nation's poetry or literature.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ode: Intimations of Immortality</span> Poem by William Wordsworth

"Ode: Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood" is a poem by William Wordsworth, completed in 1804 and published in Poems, in Two Volumes (1807). The poem was completed in two parts, with the first four stanzas written among a series of poems composed in 1802 about childhood. The first part of the poem was completed on 27 March 1802 and a copy was provided to Wordsworth's friend and fellow poet, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, who responded with his own poem, "Dejection: An Ode", in April. The fourth stanza of the ode ends with a question, and Wordsworth was finally able to answer it with seven additional stanzas completed in early 1804. It was first printed as "Ode" in 1807, and it was not until 1815 that it was edited and reworked to the version that is currently known, "Ode: Intimations of Immortality".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Strange fits of passion have I known</span> Poem by William Wordsworth

"Strange fits of passion have I known" is a seven-stanza poem ballad by the English Romantic poet William Wordsworth. Composed during a sojourn in Germany in 1798, the poem was first published in the second edition of Lyrical Ballads (1800). The poem describes the poet's trip to his beloved Lucy's cottage, and his thoughts on the way. Each of its seven stanzas is four lines long and has a rhyming scheme of ABAB. The poem is written in iambic tetrameter and iambic trimeter.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">She dwelt among the untrodden ways</span>

"She Dwelt Among the Untrodden Ways" is a three-stanza poem written by the English Romantic poet William Wordsworth in 1798 when he was 28 years old. The verse was first printed in Lyrical Ballads, 1800, a volume of Wordsworth's and Samuel Taylor Coleridge's poems that marked a climacteric in the English Romantic movement. The poem is the best known of Wordsworth's series of five works which comprise his "Lucy" series, and was a favorite amongst early readers. It was composed both as a meditation on his own feelings of loneliness and loss, and as an ode to the beauty and dignity of an idealized woman who lived unnoticed by all others except by the poet himself. The title line implies Lucy lived unknown and remote, both physically and intellectually. The poet's subject's isolated sensitivity expresses a characteristic aspect of Romantic expectations of the human, and especially of the poet's condition.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">The Lucy poems</span> Five poems written by William Wordsworth

The Lucy poems are a series of five poems composed by the English Romantic poet William Wordsworth (1770–1850) between 1798 and 1801. All but one were first published during 1800 in the second edition of Lyrical Ballads, a collaboration between Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge that was both Wordsworth's first major publication and a milestone in the early English Romantic movement. In the series, Wordsworth sought to write unaffected English verse infused with abstract ideals of beauty, nature, love, longing, and death.

William Wordsworth was an English Romantic poet who, with Samuel Taylor Coleridge, helped launch the Romantic Age in English literature with their 1798 joint publication, Lyrical Ballads. His early years were dominated by his experience of old Trafford around the Lake District and the English moors. Dorothy Wordsworth, his sister, served as his early companion until their mother's death and their separation when he was sent to school.

The "Matthew" poems are a series of poems, composed by the English Romantic poet William Wordsworth, that describe the character Matthew in Wordsworth's poetry.

"Lucy Gray" is a poem written by William Wordsworth in 1799 and published in his Lyrical Ballads. It describes the death of a young girl named Lucy Gray, who went out one evening into a storm.

"Anecdote for Fathers" is a poem by William Wordsworth first published in his 1798 collection titled Lyrical Ballads, which was co-authored by Samuel Taylor Coleridge. A later version of the poem from 1845 contains a Latin epigraph from Praeparatio evangelica: "Retine vim istam, falsa enim dicam, si coges," which translates as "Restrain that force, for I will tell lies if you compel me."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">I travelled among unknown men</span>

"I travelled among unknown men" is a love poem completed in April 1801 by the English poet William Wordsworth and originally intended for the Lyrical Ballads anthology, but it was first published in Poems, in Two Volumes in 1807. The third poem of Wordsworth's "Lucy series", "I travelled..." was composed after the poet had spent time living in Germany in 1798. Due to acute homesickness, the lyrics promise that once returned to England, he will never live abroad again. The poet states he now loves England "more and more". Wordsworth realizes that he did not know how much he loved England until he lived abroad and uses this insight as an analogy to understand his unrequited feelings for his beloved, Lucy.

Frost at Midnight is a poem by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, written in February 1798. Part of the conversation poems, the poem discusses Coleridge's childhood experience in a negative manner and emphasizes the need to be raised in the countryside. The poem expresses hope that Coleridge's son, Hartley, would be able to experience a childhood that his father could not and become a true "child of nature". The view of nature within the poem has a strong Christian element in that Coleridge believed that nature represents a physical presence of God's word and that the poem is steeped in Coleridge's understanding of Neoplatonism. Frost at Midnight has been well received by critics, and is seen as the best of the conversation poems.

The Nightingale: A Conversation Poem is a poem written by Samuel Taylor Coleridge in April 1798. Originally included in the first edition of Lyrical Ballads, which he published with William Wordsworth, the poem disputes the traditional idea that nightingales are connected to the idea of melancholy. Instead, the nightingale represents to Coleridge the experience of nature. Midway through the poem, the narrator stops discussing the nightingale in order to describe a mysterious female and a gothic scene. After the narrator is returned to his original train of thought by the nightingale's song, he recalls a moment when he took his crying son out to see the Moon, which immediately filled the child with joy. Critics have found the poem either decent with little complaint or as one of his better poems containing beautiful lines.

"Dejection: An Ode" is a poem written by Samuel Taylor Coleridge in 1802 and was published the same year in The Morning Post, a London daily newspaper. The poem in its original form was written to Sara Hutchinson, a woman who was not his wife, and discusses his feelings of love for her. The various versions of the poem describe Coleridge's inability to write poetry and living in a state of paralysis, but published editions remove his personal feelings and mention of Hutchinson.

"A slumber did my spirit seal" is a poem that was written by William Wordsworth in 1798 and first published in volume II of the 1800 edition of Lyrical Ballads. It is part of a series of poems written about a mysterious woman named Lucy, whom scholars have not been able to identify and are not sure whether she was real or fictional. Although the name Lucy is not directly mentioned in the poem, scholars nevertheless believe it to be part of the "Lucy poems" due to the poem's placement in Lyrical Ballads.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Poor Susan</span> 1797 poem by William Wordsworth

"Poor Susan" is a lyric poem by William Wordsworth composed at Alfoxden in 1797. It was first published in the collection Lyrical Ballads in 1798. It is written in anapestic tetrameter.

References

  1. Moorman 1968 p. 232
  2. Moorman 1968 p. 237
  3. 1 2 Wordsworth 1907 p. 293
  4. Moorman 1968 pp. 369–371
  5. Moorman 1968 pp. 372–373
  6. Bateson 1954 p. 49
  7. "St Mary and All Saints Church, Conwy" . Retrieved 2 March 2015.
  8. Hartman 1967 p. 144
  9. Wordsworth 1802 pp. xxx, xiii
  10. Hartman 1967 pp. 143–145
  11. Susan Wolfson, The Questioning Presence: Wordsworth, Keats, and the Interrogative Mode in Romantic Poetry, (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1986) 50.
  12. Frances Ferguson, Solitude and the Sublime: Romanticism and the Aesthetics of Individuation (New York: Routledge, 1992), 164.
  13. Hollis Robbins, "William Wordsworth's 'We Are Seven' and the First British Census." ELN 48.2, Fall/Winter 2010.
  14. Aaron Fogel, "Wordsworth's "We Are Seven" and Crabbe's The Parish Register: Poetry and the Anti-Census, Studies in Romanticism 48 (2009)
  15. Heather Glen, "'We Are Seven' in the 1790s," Grasmere 2012: Selected Papers from the Wordsworth Summer Conference, (Penrith: Humanities Ebooks, 2012
  16. "William Wordsworth's 'We Are Seven' and the First British Census." ELN 48.2, Fall/Winter 2010.
  17. Peter De Bolla, Art Matters (Cambridge: Harvard UP, 2001)
  18. Maureen N. McLane, Romanticism and the Human Sciences: Poetry, Population, and the Discourse of the Species (Cambridge University Press, 2000) 53–62.
  19. Mahoney 1997 pp. 75–76

Bibliography