Group# 02

Assignment: English Poetry 18th to 19th Century

Poem: “It is a Beauteous Evening, Calm And Free” by
William Wordsworth
Submitted to: Maam Abeera Waseem
Submitted by
 Ambreen Amjad
 Fatima Aamir
 Farheen Ishtiaq
 Shahbaz Ahmad
 Syed Hadi Hassan
 Mohammad Adeel
‘It is a Beauteous Evening, Calm And Free’ (By William
Wordsworth)
It is a beauteous evening, calm and free,
The holy time is quiet as a Nun
Breathless with adoration; the broad sun
Is sinking down in its tranquillity;
The gentleness of heaven broods o’er the Sea;
Listen! the mighty Being is awake,
And doth with his eternal motion make
A sound like thunder—everlastingly.
Dear child! dear Girl! that walkest with me here,
If thou appear untouched by solemn thought,
Thy nature is not therefore less divine:
Thou liest in Abraham’s bosom all the year;
And worshipp’st at the Temple’s inner shrine,
God being with thee when we know it not.

Poet’s Introduction
 Life span:
William Wordsworth was born on April 7, 1770, in the United Kingdom and died on April 23,
1850, in Rydal, United Kingdom.
 Early life:
As a young man, Wordsworth developed a love of nature, which is a theme reflected in his
many poems. He began to write poetry when he was in school but none of them were
published until 1793.
In 1797, he moved to Somerset to live near the poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge, who was also
an admirer of Wordsworth's works.
 Works:
Coleridge and Wordsworth collaborated to launch the Romantic Age in English Literature with
their joint publication "Lyrical Ballads." It was considered to have marked the beginning of the
English Romantic movement in Literature. He continued to write poetry but it was never as
great as his early works. More of his poems are "I wandered lonely as a Cloud" commonly
known as daffodils is one of his famous poems. And the Prelude is a romantic epic poem.
 Last days:
In 1842, he was given a government pension. On 23 April 1850, he passed away.

Background of the Poem:

This poem is one the personal works of Wordsworth and this originates from the real
moments of Wordsworth's life. During the Revolution in 1971, Wordsworth visited France and
there he fell in love with a French woman Annette Vallon with whom he had a daughter,
Caroline. Due to Financial problems he left France alone. But during the "Peace of Amiens" in
1802, he got a chance to return to France and meet his daughter for the first time. But at that
time he was engaged to Mary Huchison. The main purpose of the visit was to prepare Annette
Vallon for his forthcoming marriage to Huchison and also make arrangements and financially
support Caroline. Afterwards he wrote this sonnet “It’s a Beauteous Evening Calm and free”
by recalling a seaside walk with his 10 years old daughter whom he had never seen before
that visit.
Actually he was fascinated by the innocence of his daughter Caroline and as we know that he
was a pastoral poet. So, he described his emotions and feelings through the Petrarchan
Natural poetry.

Summary
On a beautiful evening, the speaker thinks that the time is “quiet as a Nun,” and as the sun
sinks down on the horizon, “the gentleness of heaven broods o’er the sea.” The sound of the
ocean makes the speaker think that “the mighty Being is awake,” and, with his eternal motion,
raising an everlasting “sound like thunder.” The speaker then addresses the young girl who
walks with him by the sea, and tells her that though she appears untouched by the “solemn
thought” that he himself is gripped by, her nature is still divine. He says that she worships in
the “Temple’s inner shrine” merely by being, and that “God is with thee when we know it
not.”
This poem is one of the many excellent sonnets Wordsworth wrote in the early 1800s. Sonnets
are fourteen-line poetic inventions written in iambic pentameter. There are several varieties
of sonnets; “The world is too much with us” takes the form of a Petrarchan sonnet, modeled
after the work of Petrarch, an Italian poet of the early Renaissance. A Petrarchan sonnet is
divided into two parts, an octave (the first eight lines of the poem) and a sestet (the final six
lines). In this case, the octave follows a rhyme scheme of ABBAABBA, and the sestet follows
a rhyme scheme of CDEDEC.

Explanation
This poem is one of the most personal and intimate in all of Wordsworth’s writing, and its
aura of heartfelt serenity is as genuine as anything in the Wordsworth canon. Shortly before
he married Mary Hutchinson, Wordsworth returned to France to see his former mistress
Annette Vallon, whom he would likely have married ten years earlier had the war between
France and England not separated them. He returned to visit Annette to make arrangements
for her and for their child, Caroline, who was now a ten-year-old girl. This poem is thought to
have originated from a real moment in Wordsworth’s life, when he walked on the beach with
the daughter he had not known for a decade.
Unlike many of the other sonnets of 1802, “It is a beauteous evening” is not charged with
either moral or political outrage; instead it is as tranquil as its theme. The main technique of
the sonnet is to combine imagery depicting the natural scene with explicitly religious
imagery—a technique also employed, although less directly, in “Tintern Abbey.” The octave
of the sonnet makes the first metaphorical comparisons, stating that the evening is a “holy
time,” and “quiet as a nun / Breathless with adoration.” As the sun sets, “the mighty Being”
moves over the waters, making a thunderous sound “everlastingly.” In the sestet, the speaker
turns to the young girl walking with him, and observes that unlike him, she is not touched by
“solemn thought” (details also appearing in the Immortality Ode). But he declares that this
fact does not make her “less divine”—childhood is inherently at one with nature, worshipping
in the unconscious, inner temple of pure unity with the present moment and surroundings.

Setting of Poem:
Setting, in literature, the location and time frame in which the action of a narrative takes
place. Setting is an environment or surrounding in which an event or story takes place.
It may provide particular information about placement and timing, such as New York,
America, in the year 1820. Setting could be simply descriptive, like a lonely cottage on a
mountain. Social conditions, historical time, geographical locations, weather, immediate
surroundings, and timing are all different aspects of setting.
• Components of Setting
There are three major components to setting: social environment, place, and time. Moreover,
setting could be an actual region, or a city made larger than life.
 Integral Setting
It is when the place and time influences the theme, character, and action of a story. This type
of setting controls the characters.

Themes
1. Majesty of nature
One of the foremost obvious themes within the poem is that the majesty of nature and
therefore the many powers it's on the spirit, mind, and body. The primary advantage of nature
lies in its ability to evoke serenity and peaceful contemplation in its observer.
In addition to promoting feelings of well-being, the poet hints that nature can provoke
wisdom, because it causes one to interact in solemn thought. Wordsworth believed that
nature was an ingenious force that acts as a catalyst for meditations on life and truth.
He believed these meditations inspired by the wildlife served to forward a man's
comprehension and understanding of the planet and therefore the folks that sleep in it.

2. Open opportunity to connect with divine

Wordsworth believed that nature provided a chance for man to attach more deeply with the
divine. This will be seen through the religious words and pictures he uses within the poem
itself, like describing the scene as a holy time that puts one within the mind of a nun that's
breathless with adoration.
As the speaker walks along the shore together with his daughter, he's reminded of the
awesome power of God. This will be seen when he remarks on the atmosphere reminding
him of the gentleness of heaven.
He also envisions God's actions within the world as eternal motions that never cease. He
compares the sound of the ocean to thunder created by a mighty God whose influence is
boundless.

Poetic devices used in the poem

 Imagery
Wordsworth compares nature to Christian images like a ‘nun’, ‘heaven’ When Wordsworth
wrote this poem, and he used language that was like everyday language. Now, two hundred
years later, the words and especially the word order seem old fashioned: ‘Thou’, ‘beauteous’,
‘o’er’, ‘liest’, 'walkest', 'thee'. These words are from the bible too. This emphasizes the
religious aspect of nature.
 Similes
The holy time is quiet as a Nun:
As sunset is a sacred or holy time in many of Wordsworth's poems. He compares the time of a
day to a holy nun adoring God. And how time seems to stand still in this calmness.
A sound like thunder
Wordsworth thinks that the motion of tides makes a sound like thunder on the shore. It’s also
a symbol of strength and power, so Wordsworth is expressing eternal might of nature.
 Metaphor
The metaphor in the poem is: ‘Thou liest in Abraham’s bosom.’ Suggests the trust and
innocence of Caroline. Or suggesting that her soul is blessed by God.

Critique of Poem:
Wordsworth opens the poem with an accomplished description of a sunset over the sea. The octet
is carefully structured so that there is a sense of immediacy for the reader; he wants us to feel
that we are standing alongside him and witnessing the scene with him. Although we know that
Wordsworth felt that poetry was created by using the memory of a significant moment, he
deliberately uses the present tense throughout this poem, as if he is actually writing as the
incident occurs. His description uses not only the sense of sight but also the sense of hearing.
This gives a greater depth to the picture and reinforces the immediacy of the scene. Although the
scene in the octet is not obviously dramatic, as a huge storm might be, Wordsworth describes it
in such a way that it has great impact. He stresses the peacefulness of the sunset with such words
as ‘calm’, ‘quiet’, ‘tranquillity’, ‘gentleness’. For Wordsworth, this quietness comes from a sense
of natural order. The sun sets according to an established pattern. The sea rises and falls in a
rhythmic and regular way. Each natural object behaves in a constant and appropriate way, just as
a nun follows her religious rituals with a dignified and quiet reverence. Wordsworth holds us in a
moment of stillness. For it is only a moment. Although the sea moves ‘everlastingly’, there is the
strong feeling that Wordsworth is only too aware that this scene is anything but everlasting, and
that gives it an added impact. Although Wordsworth has put a great deal of effort into making us
feel and experience the ‘beauteous evening’, it is only with the sestet that we realise why he
considers this a significant moment. It is not the scene in itself that is significant; it is the contrast
between his own reaction and his companion’s reaction to it that moved Wordsworth to recreate
this moment from memory. His companion does not react to the sunset in an intellectual way –
she is ‘untouched by solemn thought’; whereas Wordsworth, as we have seen by the type of
language he uses in the octet, has been filled with solemn thoughts. But Wordsworth realises that
his companion’s reaction, although different, is a valid one; she is in no way ‘less divine’.
Indeed, he suggests that he is rather envious of the spontaneous way in which she does react. Just
as the sunset is impressive because it is driven by a natural order, so his companion’s reaction is
enviable because it too is natural. For Wordsworth, Nature symbolised, or represented, Great
Truths of existence. His companion, by reacting naturally, is more able to come to an
understanding of these Truths; she can go into ‘the Temple’s inner shrine’. The implication is
that Wordsworth, because his reaction is more self-consciously intellectual, is not admitted into
the ‘inner shrine’. Indeed, the final line of the sonnet summarises just this. He understands that
his companion is always close to the Truth of existence, is always near to ‘God’, because she
reacts to God’s creations in an instinctively natural way. She does not continually think about it:
she just enjoys it. She is happy not to ‘know’ intellectually, and as a result she knows in a much
deeper sense. Once again, there is the strong suggestion that Wordsworth regrets that he cannot
react in the way his companion does. The ‘dear girl’ is accompanied by God, while Wordsworth
is accompanied by the need to know.

Conclusion:
In this assignment, brief introduction of the poet, his life span and other
works have been discussed with the background of the poem. The poem
is briefly summarized and explained including its setting and structure.
Poetic devices and themes used in the poem are discussed. Moreover,
the views of the critics on this poem are also included in this assignment
along with references.
References:
 https://www.gillbooks.ie/AcuCustom/Sitename/DAM/090/New_Explorations_Critical_C
ommentaries_FINAL_VERSION.pdf
 https://books.google.com.pk/books?
id=iIqbnFM2kMYC&pg=PA83&lpg=PA83&dq=critics+of+its+a+beauteous+evening&s
ource=bl&ots=zuBi54-
VcP&sig=ACfU3U17jOzygdxNJ5ShI5iHXiGH4Q6ZCw&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEw
jvn_OY36HxAhUlRkEAHQP5BnEQ6AEwEXoECAYQAw#v=onepage&q=critics
%20of%20its%20a%20beauteous%20evening&f=false
 https://www.sparknotes.com/poetry/wordsworth/section5/
 https://goodstudy.org/beauteous-evening-summary/#.YMzfq9UzbIU