William Wordsworth

A white marble life size figure of poet William Wordsworth is now placed next to Shakespeare's memorial and below the bust of Samuel Taylor Coleridge in Poets' Corner, Westminster Abbey. The figure is seated on a rock with crossed legs, with a book on his lap. The quill in his hand has been broken off. There is a fern on the rock with a flower below. Another flower appears below his foot.

The sculptor was Frederick Thrupp, 1854.

The memorial was originally erected in what is now St George's chapel at the south west end of the nave. Dean Stanley had intended this chapel to become Little Poets' Corner, as the original area in the south transept was becoming crowded. Matthew Arnold and John Keble also had memorials in this chapel, which have also been moved to Poets' Corner.

Wordsworth's statue was moved to its present position in 1932 when the original chapel was designated as a war memorial chapel. The inscription reads:

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH. Blessings be with them - and eternal praise, Who gave us nobler loves and nobler cares, The poets - who on earth have made us heirs of truth and pure delight by heavenly lays! BORN APRIL 7 1770. DIED APRIL 23 1850. BURIED IN GRASMERE CHURCHYARD.

The quote is from his Personal Talk, 1806.

His life

He was born at Cockermouth in Cumberland (Cumbria), a son of John (died 1783) and his wife Ann (Cookson). His siblings were Richard (died 1816) who became a lawyer, Dorothy (1771-1855), John, a sea captain (drowned in 1805), and Christopher (died 1846), a clergyman and scholar.

After education at Hawkshead at Furness in Lancashire he went to St John's College, Cambridge. He and his sister Dorothy became friends of the poet Coleridge and lived near him in Somerset before moving to Dove Cottage at Grasmere in the Lake District. They travelled abroad many times.

William had a child, Caroline born in 1792, with Frenchwoman Annette Vallon. He married Mary Hutchinson on 4th October 1802 and their children were John, Dorothy (Dora), Thomas, Catherine and William. Both Thomas and Catherine died in 1811. In 1813 the family moved to Rydal Mount.

Wordsworth succeeded Robert Southey as Poet Laureate in 1843. All his poetry was inspired by an absorbing love of nature, written amongst the lakes and mountains where he spent most of his life.

His Lyrical Ballads of 1798 was a landmark in the development of a new style of English poetry, while The Prelude, 1805, contains much autobiographical material. 'I wandered lonely as a cloud' is one of his famous poems. While in London he composed his well known lines on Westminster Bridge 'Earth has not anything to show more fair...'

He died at Rydal Mount and is buried at St Oswald's church, Grasmere.

Christopher Wordsworth, Canon of Westminster 1844-1869 and Bishop of Lincoln was William's nephew.

Further reading

Oxford Dictionary of National Biography

"Memoirs of William Wordsworth" by Christopher Wordsworth, 1851.

"William Wordsworth, a biography. The early years" and "..the later years" by M. Moorman, 1957 and 1965.

Memorials to Wordsworth are also in Grasmere church and Ambleside church.