I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud

“I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud,” also known as “Daffodils,” was written by English poet William Wordsworth in 1804. It was first published in 1807, then revised and republished in Wordsworth’s Collected Poems in 1815.

The poem, considered one of the finest examples of English Romanticism, was inspired by a walk he took around Glencoyne Bay in the Lake District with his sister, Dorothy, in 1802, as well as an entry Dorothy made in her journal, which speaks of a “long belt” of daffodils on the shores of a lake near Grasmere.

Wordsworth also wrote the poem partly as a reaction to the Industrial Revolution—a phenomenon that changed the socio-economic landscape of Britain for good.

The Industrial Revolution was characterized by mechanization and mass production, which made the country’s economy more efficient but led to an increase in urbanization and exploitative, sometimes dehumanizing working conditions.

At the same time, France and the United States were in the throes of political revolution, and radical new ideas were everywhere—liberal politics and an early understanding of human rights were taking hold.

The Romantic poets felt that fresh literary forms were needed to capture the new, rebellious spirit of the age. The lyric poem, which is spoken in the first person, was a popular choice—it allowed poets the freedom to express their feelings directly and put forward the idea that we are creatures of the imagination, not merely cogs in the wheel of society.

“I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud” is a typical Romantic poem as it focuses on the inner state of the individual—in this instance, an individual who has a mystical attachment to the natural world and longs for a simpler, more innocent time when rural England was unspoiled.

Poet Biography

William Wordsworth was born in the Lake District in northwestern England in 1770. His sister Dorothy, who also wrote poetry, was born in 1771, and the pair maintained a deep emotional bond throughout their lifetime.

William’s father, John Wordsworth, was frequently away on business but encouraged his son to memorize works by Shakespeare, Milton, and Spenser. His mother, Ann Cookson, taught him to , and he spent a lot of time with his maternal grandparents in Penrith, a civil parish in Cumbia, on the outskirts of the Lake District. It was here that he met his future wife, Mary Hutchinson, as they were at school together.

He published his first poem, a sonnet, in 1787, the same year he started reading for a BA degree at Cambridge University. Even in his youth, he enjoyed long walks in nature, and went on several hiking tours, both at home and abroad.

His first collections of poems, An Evening Walk and Descriptive Sketches —published in 1793—provided evidence of his love for Swiss, Italian, and French landscapes.

While in France in 1791, the young poet met Annette Vallon, with whom he had a daughter, Caroline. Although he never married Annette, he provided diligent financial support to his French family, despite the upheavals of the French Revolution. In 1802, Wordsworth married Mary Hutchinson, with whom he had five children, although three of them predeceased their parents.

Named Poet Laureate in 1843, Wordsworth stopped writing poetry altogether when his daughter Dora died, in 1847. He died of pleurisy in 1850, at the age of 80.

Poem Text

I wandered lonely as a cloud

That floats on high o’er vales and hills,

When all at once I saw a crowd,

A host, of golden daffodils;

Beside the lake, beneath the trees,

Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine

And twinkle on the milky way,

They stretched in never-ending line

Alone the margin of a bay:

Ten thousand saw I at a glance,

Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced; but they

Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:

A poet could not but be gay,

In such a jocund company:

I gazed—and gazed—but little thought

What wealth the show to me had brought:

For oft, when on my couch I lie

In vacant or in pensive mood,

They flash upon that inward eye

Which is the bliss of solitude;

And then my heart with pleasure fills,

And dances with the daffodils.

Wordsworth, William. “I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud.” 1815. The Poetry Foundation.

Summary

The poem conveys the speaker’s feelings about the natural world, particularly when he truly pays attention to it, rather than simply strolls unseeing through the landscape.

It consists of four six-line stanzas that advance the poet’s argument, namely that the natural world is full of undiscovered riches to which we do not always pay attention.

The first stanza sets the scene, with the speaker wandering on his own, “lonely as a cloud” (Line 1), beside a lake. Although we know the poet was inspired to write the poem when out walking with his sister Dorothy, the speaker in the poem does not have a companion.

When he comes across a host of “golden daffodils” (Line 4), he is filled with tremendous joy and reflects that he no longer feels alone: “A poet could not but be gay, / In such a jocund company” (Lines 15-16).

In the third stanza, he reflects on the “wealth” these humble flowers bring into his life. In the fourth stanza, the scene changes and he is alone at home. However, the memory of the daffodils has enriched him to the extent that he feels he is still in their presence. He is filled with tremendous joy, a feeling at odds with his earlier sense of isolation.