Wordsworth’s Trauma and Poetry

Richard E. Matlak is professor emeritus from the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, MA. He lives with his wife on Cape Cod, MA, where he engages in community service, social and athletic activities, scholarship, travel, and family events. He has published five books: Approaches to Teaching Coleridge's Poetry and Prose, Contributing Editor (1991); British Literature: 1780-1830, Co-editor with Anne K. Mellor (1996); The Poetry of Relationship: The Wordsworths and Coleridge, 1797-1800 (1997); Deep Distresses: William Wordsworth – John Wordsworth – Sir George Beaumont, 1800-1808 (2003); and William Wordsworth: Poems, in Two Volumes (1807), Editor (2016). He also established with Lisa Villa the CrossWorks website "The Berth of the Abergavenny, East Indiaman" http://crossworks.holycross.edu/spcol/

Contents

Illustrations

Preface

Chapter One Wordsworth’s Trauma: October 1793

Chapter Two French Heroes and a Poet Recluse, 1795

Chapter Three Beaupuy and Godwin in The Borderers, 1796

Chapter Four “The Discharged Soldier” of Alfoxden, 1798

Chapter Five Revolutionary Foreboding in the Spots of Time, 1799

Chapter Six Finding a Home at Grasmere, 1800

Chapter Seven Making Amends, Abroad and at Home, 1802

Chapter Eight A Poet-Soldier: “October 1803”

Bibliography