I wandered lonely as a Cloud - wikipedia I wandered lonely as a Cloud I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud by William Wordsworth A hand - written manuscript of the poem ( 1802 ). British Library Add. MS 47864 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 Along 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.. William Wordsworth ( 1815 ) `` I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud '' ( also commonly known as `` Daffodils '' ) is a lyric poem by William Wordsworth. It is Wordsworth 's most famous work. The poem was inspired by an event on 15 April 1802, in which Wordsworth and his sister Dorothy came across a `` long belt '' of daffodils. Written some time between 1804 and 1807 ( in 1804 by Wordsworth 's own account ), it was first published in 1807 in Poems in Two Volumes, and a revised version was published in 1815. In a poll conducted in 1995 by the BBC Radio 4 Bookworm programme to determine the nation 's favourite poems, I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud came fifth. Often anthologised, the poem is commonly seen as a classic of English romantic poetry, although Poems in Two Volumes, in which it first appeared, was poorly reviewed by Wordsworth 's contemporaries. Contents 1 Background 2 Revised version 3 Reception 3.1 Contemporary 3.2 Modern usage 3.2. 1 Daffodil tourism 3.2. 1.1 Anniversaries 3.2. 2 In popular culture 4 References 5 Notes 6 Bibliography 7 External links Background The inspiration for the poem came from a walk Wordsworth took with his sister Dorothy around Glencoyne Bay, Ullswater, in the Lake District. He would draw on this to compose `` I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud '' in 1804, inspired by Dorothy 's journal entry describing the walk : Ullswater in the English Lake District. Ullswater from Gobarrow Park, J.M.W. Turner, watercolor, 1819. When we were in the woods beyond Gowbarrow park we saw a few daffodils close to the water side, we fancied that the lake had floated the seed ashore and that the little colony had so sprung up -- But as we went along there were more and yet more and at last under the boughs of the trees, we saw that there was a long belt of them along the shore, about the breadth of a country turnpike road. I never saw daffodils so beautiful they grew among the mossy stones about and about them, some rested their heads upon these stones as on a pillow for weariness and the rest tossed and reeled and danced and seemed as if they verily laughed with the wind that blew upon them over the Lake, they looked so gay ever glancing ever changing. This wind blew directly over the lake to them. There was here and there a little knot and a few stragglers a few yards higher up but they were so few as not to disturb the simplicity and unity and life of that one busy highway -- We rested again and again. The Bays were stormy and we heard the waves at different distances and in the middle of the water like the Sea. -- Dorothy Wordsworth, The Grasmere Journal Thursday, 15 April 1802 At the time he wrote the poem, Wordsworth was living with his wife, Mary Hutchinson, and sister Dorothy at Town End, in Grasmere in England 's Lake District. Mary contributed what Wordsworth later said were the two best lines in the poem, recalling the `` tranquil restoration '' of Tintern Abbey, They flash upon that inward eye Which is the bliss of solitude Wordsworth was aware of the appropriateness of the idea of daffodils which `` flash upon that inward eye '' because in his 1815 version he added a note commenting on the `` flash '' as an `` ocular spectrum ''. Coleridge in Biographia Literaria of 1817, while he acknowledging the concept of `` visual spectrum '' as being `` well known '', described Wordsworth 's ( and Mary 's ) lines, amongst others, as `` mental bombast ''. Fred Blick, has shown that the idea of flashing flowers was derived from the `` Elizabeth Linnaeus Phenomenon '', so - called because of the discovery of flashing flowers by Elizabeth Linnaeus in 1762. The phenomenon was reported upon in 1789 and 1794 by Erasmus Darwin, whose work Wordsworth certainly read. The entire household thus contributed to the poem. Nevertheless, Wordsworth 's biographer Mary Moorman, notes that Dorothy was excluded from the poem, even though she had seen the daffodils together with Wordsworth. The poem itself was placed in a section of Poems in Two Volumes entitled Moods of my Mind in which he grouped together his most deeply felt lyrics. Others included To a Butterfly, a childhood recollection of chasing butterflies with Dorothy, and The Sparrow 's Nest, in which he says of Dorothy `` She gave me eyes, she gave me ears ''. The earlier Lyrical Ballads, a collection of poems by both himself and Samuel Taylor Coleridge, had been first published in 1798 and had started the romantic movement in England. It had brought Wordsworth and the other Lake poets into the poetic limelight. Wordsworth had published nothing new since the 1800 edition of Lyrical Ballads, and a new publication was eagerly awaited. Wordsworth had, however, gained some financial security by the 1805 publication of the fourth edition of Lyrical Ballads ; it was the first from which he enjoyed the profits of copyright ownership. He decided to turn away from the long poem he was working on ( The Recluse ) and devote more attention to publishing Poems in Two Volumes, in which `` I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud '' first appeared. Revised version Narcissus pseudonarcissus, the `` daffodil '' native to the Lake District Wordsworth revised the poem in 1815. He replaced `` dancing '' with `` golden '' ; `` along '' with `` beside '' ; and `` ten thousand '' with `` fluttering and ''. He then added a stanza between the first and second, and changed `` laughing '' to `` jocund ''. The last stanza was left untouched. The plot of the poem is simple. In the 1815 revision, Wordsworth described it as `` rather an elementary feeling and simple impression ( approaching to the nature of an ocular spectrum ) upon the imaginative faculty, rather than an exertion of it... '' 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 along 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. Pamela Woof notes `` The permanence of stars as compared with flowers emphasises the permanence of memory for the poet. '' Andrew Motion notes that the final verse replicates in the minds of its readers the very experience it describes. Reception Contemporary The title page of Poems in Two Volumes Poems in Two Volumes was poorly reviewed by Wordsworth 's contemporaries, including Lord Byron, whom Wordsworth came to despise. Byron said of the volume, in one of its first reviews, `` Mr. W ( ordsworth ) ceases to please,... clothing ( his ideas ) in language not simple, but puerile ''. Wordsworth himself wrote ahead to soften the thoughts of The Critical Review, hoping his friend Francis Wrangham would push for a softer approach. He succeeded in preventing a known enemy from writing the review, but it did n't help ; as Wordsworth himself said, it was a case of `` Out of the frying pan, into the fire ''. Of any positives within Poems in Two Volumes, the perceived masculinity in The Happy Warrior, written on the death of Nelson and unlikely to be the subject of attack, was one such. Poems like `` I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud '' could not have been further from it. Wordsworth took the reviews stoically. Even Wordsworth 's close friend Samuel Taylor Coleridge said ( referring especially to the `` child - philosopher '' stanzas VII and VIII of Intimations of Immortality ) that the poems contained `` mental bombast ''. Two years later, however, many were more positive about the collection. Samuel Rogers said that he had `` dwelt particularly on the beautiful idea of the ' Dancing Daffodils ' '', and this was echoed by Henry Crabb Robinson. Critics were rebutted by public opinion, and the work gained in popularity and recognition, as did Wordsworth. Poems in Two Volumes was savagely reviewed by Francis Jeffrey in the Edinburgh Review ( without, however, singling out `` I wandered lonely as a Cloud '' ), but the Review was well known for its dislike of the Lake poets. As Sir Walter Scott put it at the time of the poem 's publication, `` Wordsworth is harshly treated in the Edinburgh Review, but Jeffrey gives... as much praise as he usually does '', and indeed Jeffrey praised the sonnets. Upon the author 's death in 1850, the Westminster Review called `` I wandered lonely as a Cloud '' `` very exquisite ''. Modern usage The poem is presented and taught in many schools in the English - speaking world : these include the 7th grade of most schools of the Indian Certificate of Secondary Education ( ICSE ), India ; the English Literature GCSE course in some examination boards in England, Wales, and Northern Ireland ; and in the current Higher School Certificate syllabus topic, Inner Journeys, New South Wales, Australia. It is also frequently used as a part of the Junior Certificate English Course in Ireland as part of the Poetry Section. In The Middle Passage, V.S. Naipaul refers to a campaign in Trinidad against the use of the poem as a set text because daffodils do not grow in the tropics. Because it is one of the best known poems in the English language, it has frequently been the subject of parody and satire. The English Prog Rock band Genesis parodies the poem in the opening lyrics to the song `` The Colony of Slippermen '', from their 1974 album The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway. It was the subject of a 1985 Heineken beer TV advertisement, which depicts a poet having difficulties with his opening lines, only able to come up with I walked about a bit on my own or I strolled around without anyone else until downing a Heineken and reaching the immortal `` I wandered lonely as a Cloud '' ( because `` Heineken refreshes the poets other beers ca n't reach '' ). The assertion that Wordsworth originally hit on `` I wandered lonely as a cow '' until Dorothy told him `` William, you ca n't put that '' occasionally finds its way into print. Daffodil Tourism The daffodils Wordsworth saw would have been wild daffodils. However, the National Gardens Scheme runs a Daffodil Day every year, allowing visitors to view daffodils in Cumbrian gardens including Dora 's Field, which was planted by Wordsworth. In 2013 the event was held in March, when unusually cold weather meant that relatively few of the plants were in flower. April, the month that Wordsworth saw the daffodils at Ullswater, is usually a good time to view them, although the Lake District climate has changed since the poem was written. Anniversaries In 2004, in celebration of the 200th anniversary of the writing of the poem, it was also read aloud by 150,000 British schoolchildren, aimed both at improving recognition of poetry, and in support of Marie Curie Cancer Care. In 2007, Cumbria Tourism released a rap version of the poem, featuring MC Nuts, a Lake District Red squirrel, in an attempt to capture the `` YouTube generation '' and attract tourists to the Lake District. Published on the two - hundredth anniversary of the original, it attracted wide media attention. It was welcomed by the Wordsworth Trust, but attracted the disapproval of some commentators. In 2015 events marking the 200th anniversary of the publication of the revised version were celebrated at Rydal Mount. In popular culture In the 2013 musical Big Fish ( musical ), composed by Andrew Lippa, some lines from the poem are used in the song `` Daffodils, '' which concludes the first act. Lippa mentioned this in a video created by Broadway.com in the same year. References Jump up ^ Wordsworth, William. `` I wandered lonely as a cloud ''. British Library Images Online. Jump up ^ `` William Wordsworth ( 1770 -- 1850 ) : I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud ''. Representative Poetry Online. 2009. Retrieved 23 December 2009. Jump up ^ BBC. `` Historic figures : William Wordsworth ( 1770 -- 1850 ) ''. Retrieved 26 December 2009. Jump up ^ Moorman ( 1965 ) p. 27 Jump up ^ Magill, Frank Northen ; Wilson, John ; Jason, Philip K. ( 1992 ). Masterplots II. ( Goa - Lov, Vol. 3 ). Salem Press. p. 1040. ISBN 978 - 0 - 89356 - 587 - 9. Jump up ^ Gryff Rhys Jones, ed. ( 1996 ). The Nation 's Favourite Poems. BBC Books. p. 17. ISBN 0563387823. ^ Jump up to : The Wordsworth Trust. `` Dove Cottage ''. The Wordsworth Museum & Art Gallery. Retrieved 5 April 2010. ^ Jump up to : `` Daffodils at Glencoyne Bay. ''. Visit Cumbria. Retrieved 23 December 2009. Jump up ^ Wordsworth ed. Woof ( 2002 ) p. 85 Jump up ^ ( https://wordsworth.org.uk/blog/2017/02/22/flashes-upon-the-inward-eye-wordsworth-coleridge-and-flashing-flowers Jump up ^ Moorman ( 1965 ) p. 27 Jump up ^ Moorman ( 1965 ) p. 96 - 7 ^ Jump up to : Davies, Hunter ( 2009 ). William Wordsworth. Frances Lincoln Ltd. pp. 189 -- 190. ISBN 978 - 0 - 7112 - 3045 - 3. Retrieved 30 December 2009. Jump up ^ Johnston, Kenneth R. ( 1998 ). The Hidden Wordsworth. New York : W.W. Norton & Company. pp. 822 -- 823. ISBN 0 - 393 - 04623 - 0. Jump up ^ `` I wandered lonely as a Cloud by William Wordsworth ''. The Wordsworth Museum & Art Gallery. Retrieved 23 December 2009. ^ Jump up to : Motion, Andrew ( 6 March 2004 ). `` The host with the most ''. Guardian Online. London. Retrieved 29 December 2009. Jump up ^ Pamela Woof ( November 2009 ). `` The Wordsworths and the Cult of Nature : The daffodils ''. British History in - depth. BBC. Retrieved 23 December 2009. Jump up ^ `` William Wordsworth ''. Britain Express. 2000. Retrieved 25 December 2009. Jump up ^ Byron, Baron George ( 1837 ). The works of Lord Byron complete in one volume. H.L. Broenner. p. 686. Jump up ^ Hill, John Spencer. `` The Structure of Biographia Literaria ''. John Spencer Hill ( self - published ). Jump up ^ Woof, Robert ; et al. ( 2001 ). William Wordsworth : the critical heritage. Routlege. p. 235. ISBN 978 - 0 - 415 - 03441 - 8. Jump up ^ Editor ( 1850 ). `` The Prelude... ''. Westminster Review. New York : Leonard Scott and Co. 53 ( October ) : 138. Jump up ^ Rilkoff, Matt ( 27 December 2011 ). `` Greenie of the week : William Wordsworth ''. Taranaki Daily News. p. 14. Jump up ^ `` Lyrics to The Colony of Slippermen ''. Jump up ^ `` Flowery language ''. Scottish Poetry Library. Retrieved 31 May 2012. Jump up ^ Wainwright, Martin ( 20 March 2012 ). `` The ruthless side of William Wordsworth ''. The Guardian. London. Retrieved 31 May 2012. Jump up ^ McCarthy, Michael ( March 2015 ). `` I wandered lonely through a secret daffodil wood ''. Retrieved 8 April 2015. Jump up ^ `` From Cartmel to Carlisle. Wordsworth 's Daffodil Legacy ''. National Gardens Scheme. Retrieved 18 March 2013. Jump up ^ `` Opportunity to view host of golden daffodils ''. Westmorland Gazette. March 2014. Retrieved 21 March 2014. Jump up ^ Wainwright, Martin ( March 2012 ). `` The ruthless side of William Wordsworth ''. The Guardian. London. Retrieved 5 April 2013. Jump up ^ `` Mass recital celebrates daffodils ''. BBC. March 2004. Retrieved 23 December 2009. Jump up ^ `` Poem set to rap to lure visitors ''. BBC. April 2007. Retrieved 23 December 2009. Jump up ^ Martin Wainwright ( April 2007 ). `` Respect for Wordsworth 200 years on with daffodil rap ''. guardian.co.uk. London. Retrieved 23 December 2009. Jump up ^ Ben Marshall ( April 2007 ). `` Romantic poetry will never rock the house ''. guardian.co.uk. London. Retrieved 23 December 2009. Jump up ^ `` Exhibition tribute to Wordsworth 's Daffodils ''. Cumbria Crack : Breaking News Penrith, Cumbria, Carlisle, Lake District. Jump up ^ Broadwaycom ( 2013 - 09 - 25 ), Composer Andrew Lippa Sits Down at the Piano to Share the Larger - Than - Life Tales of `` Big Fish '', retrieved 2016 - 11 - 29 Notes Jump up ^ Their cottage is known as Dove Cottage today, but in fact it had no name in their time and their address was simply `` Town End, Grasmere '', Town End being the name of the hamlet in Grasmere they lived in c.f. Moorman ( 1957 ) pp. 459 -- 60. Jump up ^ In the Preface to the Lyrical Ballads Wordsworth famously defined poetry as `` the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings : it takes its origin from emotion recollected in tranquility. '' Mary Moorman ( 1957 pp. 148 -- 9 ) remarks that in this manner spring poems such as `` Tintern Abbey '' and `` I wandered lonely as a Cloud '', as well as all the best of The Prelude. Bibliography Davies, Hunter. William Wordsworth, Weidenfeld and Nicolson 1980 Gill, Stephen. William Wordsworth : A Life, Oxford University Press 1989 Moorman, Mary. William Wordsworth, A Biography : The Early Years, 1770 -- 1803 v. 1, Oxford University Press 1957 Moorman, Mary. William Wordsworth : A Biography : The Later Years, 1803 -- 50 v. 2, Oxford University Press 1965 Wordsworth, Dorothy ( ed. Pamela Woof ). The Grasmere and Alfoxden Journals. Oxford University Press 2002 External links Wikisource has original text related to this article : I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud Daffodils, The Wordsworth Trust Information about William Wordsworth Facsimile of Dorothy 's `` daffodils '' entry in her journal Google Books archive of Poems in Two Volumes Volume II Preface to Lyrical Ballads Google Books archive of Francis Jeffrey 's review of Poems in Two Volumes `` Daffodils '' set to music From the 1990 concept album `` Tyger and Other Tales '' ( 1 ) William Wordsworth Topics Early life Lake Poets Lyrical Ballads Preface to the Lyrical Ballads `` Anecdote for Fathers '' `` The Idiot Boy '' `` Lucy Gray '' The Lucy poems `` She dwelt among the untrodden ways '' `` A slumber did my spirit seal '' `` Strange fits of passion have I known '' `` Three years she grew in sun and shower '' The Matthew poems `` Michael, a Pastoral '' `` Lines written a few miles above Tintern Abbey '' `` We Are Seven '' Later poetry Poems, in Two Volumes Peter Bell The White Doe of Rylstone `` Composed upon Westminster Bridge '' `` Elegiac Stanzas '' `` I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud '' The Lucy poems `` I travelled among unknown men '' `` London, 1802 '' `` Ode : Intimations of Immortality '' `` Resolution and Independence '' `` The Solitary Reaper '' `` The World Is Too Much with Us '' `` Character of the Happy Warrior '' The Recluse The Excursion The Prelude Prose Guide to the Lakes People Samuel Taylor Coleridge Robert Southey Dora Wordsworth ( daughter ) Dorothy Wordsworth ( sister ) Places Alfoxton House Allan Bank Dove Cottage Rydal Mount Wordsworth House Jump up ^ http://www.shmoop.com/wandered-lonely-cloud-daffodils/man-the-natural-world-theme.html Retrieved from `` https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=I_Wandered_Lonely_as_a_Cloud&oldid=800258867 '' Categories : Poetry by William Wordsworth British poems 1804 poems 1807 poems 1815 poems British poetry Cumbria in fiction Hidden categories : EngvarB from September 2013 Use dmy dates from September 2013 Articles which use infobox templates with no data rows All articles with unsourced statements Articles with unsourced statements from April 2017 Talk Contents About Wikipedia Wikisource Italiano Nederlands Edit links This page was last edited on 12 September 2017, at 11 : 48. 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Question: who wrote the poem a host of golden daffodils
Answer: William Wordsworth