Solitary Reaper\Third Stage\ First course
This poem was written by Wordsworth in 1805. It is based on his own
experience about a woman who was reaping alone in the Highland.
The first stanza depicts a girl who is reaping alone in the field. The first
three lines here loneliness in the wide land "Behold…by herself".
Wordsworth uses exclamation ! with many words that show her
loneliness "single, solitary, herself alone" which mean he is surprised to
see her reaping alone. Reaping is, usually, done by group but here, find
only one young girl reaps alone. In addition, she is singing a sad song
"singing by herself". The poet addresses the passengers who pass near
her either to stop or to pass softly "stop…pass" in order not to disturb
her. The use of exclamation shows that she is with reaping. She will not
notice those who pass her and to show his surprise because of her loud
voice that covers the whole valley.
The second stanza describes the song that she is singing alone. The
poet likes this song and describes the reaper as a nightingale. He does
not know whether it is happy or not. He does not even know its words.
But, its melody reveals that it is sad. Her song is sweeter than the sound
of cuckoo-bird as it is very thrilling "Not nightingale…bands", he chooses
the bird because it travels a lot. The poet mentions the Arabian sands as
the Arabian travel and the Arabian sand is deserted which shows the
loneliness "Among Arabian Sands". The song goes far away that it breaks
the silence of the sea and reaches the Hebrew lands "Breaking….
Hebrew".
In the third stanza, the reader learns that the poet does not understand
the meaning of the song. This idea is proved by the question of the poet
himself "Will…what she sings?" The poet guesses that it is sad for many
reasons "perhaps…numbers flow". It may be because an old sadness
that happened before. She may be sad from something has happened
and may happen again, or she is suffering from something which she still
suffers from "For old, unhappy, far-off things…long ago…and may be
again!". The only thing that he is sure about is that she is sad and alone.
In the fourth stanza, Wordsworth tells his reader that even though he
does not know the words of the song the music stays in his head as he
continues up the hill "the music….no more". She stays in his imagination
as he likes it.
His identity is not known. This poem continues many places of
mystery that motivates the reader's mind to think about her and to be in
suspense to what is coming later. This mystery of her identity senses
that people do not care about here as they are busy with materialism
which make them leave the real beauty of nature. Moreover, this poem
shows the suffering that all romantic poets are famous with. Finally, this
contains many images of nature that is not spoiled by Man such as "field,
Highland, grain, Vale, cuckoo-bird, sea hill, ect.
Solitary Reaper is a short lyrical ballad, composed of thirty-two lines
and divided into four stanzas written by English Romantic poet William
Wordsworth, and it is one of his best-known works. This poem was
written during the poet's Scottish tour of 1803. The Solitary Reaper
illustrates the beauty and importance of music found in nature and the
solitude of the countryside.
He tells of an experience of watching the "solitary highland lass"
working in some fields and singing. Wordsworth is in awe and wonder of
the women's voice and the tone of the poem is happy and it almost is a
poem of praise. The words of the reaper's song are incomprehensible to
the speaker, so his attention is free to focus on the tone, expressive
beauty, and the blissful mood it creates in him.
The poem is written in the first person and can be classified as a
pastoral, or a literary work describing a scene from country life. The
eyewitness narration conveys the immediacy of personal experience,
giving the reader the impression that the poet did not merely imagine
the scene but actually lived it.
This is an important experience for the speaker because it is
transformative. It is transcendent, it changes the observer,and it
changes the scene. It is in many ways a classic example of a moment of
Romantic artistic inspiration. The speaker has to have seen workers
before, but something in that one moment freezes him, making him call
out "BEHOLD her, single in the field, Yon Solitary Highland Lass!"
The isolation of the girl makes the speaker realize his own isolation, her
song makes him realizes how art (music) transforms daily labor: he does
the same by capturing the girl in a poem. Finally, the memory is timeless,
even though the girl, the moment, the song, and the experience are all
ephemeral, trapped in time and soon passing. He's living paradox.
