William Wordsworth’s Prelude represents an extremely personal and philosophical turn in Wordsworth’s work. A great deal of personal information is conveyed in this work.

Wordsworth began The Prelude in 1798 at the age of 28 and continued to work on it throughout his life. He never gave it a title; he called it the “Poem (title not yet fixed upon) to Coleridge” and in his letters to Dorothy Wordsworth referred to it as “the poem on the growth of my own mind”. The poem was unknown to the general public until published three months after Wordsworth’s death in 1850, its final name given to it by his widow Mary.

Link to Video about Prelude