Well-Kept Secrets: The Story of William Wordsworth

Written by his collateral descendant, the sculptor Andrew Wordsworth, this insightful biography weaves life and poetry together to create an utterly revelatory account of the man who was arguably the greatest Romantic poet of them all. Radical in his youth, and father to a love-child in revolutiontorn France, Wordsworth later retreated into reaction and nationalism. His early writings transformed English poetry, but the greatest achievement was his epic The Prelude, which he squirreled away and which was not published until after his death. After 1805 he outwardly produced little that was of note, and his project with Coleridge, The Recluse, remained a literary pipe-dream, or perhaps a smoke-screen. He himself became something of a recluse, increasingly isolated in his bucolic corner of the Lake District, surrounded only by his close family circle (the harem, as Coleridge called it): his sister Dorothy, and later his wife Mary and his daughters. Wordsworth's complex and aloof personality has always been an enigma, but by combining close readings of the poems with a detailed examination of his life, Andrew Wordsworth is able to unlock the secrets of one of the most fascinating and influential writers in English. As Dr David Whitley notes, Well-Kept Secrets intersperses the narrative exploring Wordsworth's life with a wealth of verse. This structure clearly shows how Wordsworth's art was intimately linked to his existence and how it was a means - more or less conscious - to come to terms with the world, himself and the many contradictions running like chasms across his personality. It also enables Andrew Wordsworth to shed some new light on the interpretation of the poetry, to better understand the poet as a man.