William Wordsworth
William Wordsworth | |
|---|---|
 Portrait by Benjamin Robert Haydon, 1842 | |
| Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom | |
| In office 6 April 1843 – 23 April 1850 | |
| Monarch | Victoria |
| Preceded by | Robert Southey |
| Succeeded by | Alfred, Lord Tennyson |
| Personal details | |
| Born | 7 April 1770 Cockermouth, Cumberland, England |
| Died | 23 April 1850 (aged 80) Rydal, Westmorland, England |
| Spouse |
Mary Hutchinson (m. 1802) |
| Children | 6, including Dora |
| Relatives |
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| Education | St John's College, Cambridge |
| Occupation | Poet |
| Signature |  |
William Wordsworth (7 April 1770 – 23 April 1850) was an English Romantic poet who, with Samuel Taylor Coleridge, helped to launch the Romantic Age in English literature with their joint publication Lyrical Ballads (1798).
Wordsworth's magnum opus is generally considered to be The Prelude, a semi-autobiographical poem of his early years that he revised and expanded a number of times. It was posthumously titled and published by his wife in the year of his death, before which it was generally known as "The Poem to Coleridge".
Wordsworth was Poet Laureate from 1843 until his death from pleurisy in 1850. He remains one of the most recognisable names in English poetry and was a key figure among the Romantic poets.