Bewell's Introduction: The Recluse as a Beginning Intention

Near the beginning of the introduction to his 1989 book Wordsworth and the Enlightenment, Alan Bewell states that The Recluse (the poet's unfinished piece on "Man, Nature and Human Life" within The Prelude) "constituted a poetic paradigm by introducing the principle of inclusion, a set of problems, and a mode of writing appropriate to solving them" (3). The observation is well-suited to Bewell's thesis that Wordsworth's poetry actively participated in Enlightenment discourse, further expanding on the analysis of anthropological ideas and delving into experimental subjects such as the socially ostracized and physically disabled individuals who are alienated from society. For within Bewell's introduction, we are given not only a sizable assessment of The Prelude's (and the theoretical 'Recluse') verses and its correlation to rationalist ideals of Enlightenment philosophers, but a manifestation of the author's ideas on Wordsworth's transformative poetry. More specifically, this involves a focus on Wordsworth's poetry as a distinct form of knowledge that articulates the dynamics of human agency in its emergence through societal institutions, social networks, and the natural world.

Initially, as Bewell eagerly pursues his ideas about Wordsworth's application of moral philosophy onto society, we get the sense that the author is merely expressing his fondness of a poet who wished to connect his lyrical subjects to enlightenment ideals. However, the later transition of Bewell's rhetoric confirms what we all know to be true--most pointedly, that Wordsworth sought to generate and procure the Romanticist zeitgeist within his 'Recluse' saga. "His is a domestic anthropology, which seeks to give a 'substance and life' to a specific way of life that he knew was disappearing" (31). And there are many such well-recognized endearments of "primitivism" in the Lyrical Ballads, verses such as "And should he live a thousand years, / He never will be out of humour" (Lyrical Ballads, 242) from "The Idiot Boy" or  "I lived on the mercy of the fields" (LB, 226) within "The Female Vagrant." Of the former example, Bewell is quick to inform us of Wordsworth's overarching intent in characterizing such figures, even reminding us of the timeliness of his poetry in conjunction with such real life examples as certain well-known "wild children" investigated by the scientific community. "Because textual concerns supervene upon life in a direct, though subtle and concealed, way in empirical discourse, we should be careful not to confuse the lives of these individuals led in texts with the lives they led in the world" (27). Very little is actually known--philosophically speaking or otherwise--of the actual cases of persons such as Kaspar Hauser and Bewell is sure to reemphasize the abstract and often flawed nature of textual discourse.


The most provocative position Bewell's introduction takes on is his characterization of Wordsworth's "special sense" which he states "justified what was to become his [Wordsworth's] central concern as a poet: the task of writing a history of the imagination. Indeed, the ultimate objective of the poet's 'Recluse' was to demonstrate how the imagination influences, or "nourishes" all of the other intellectual and emotive faculties to the definitive end of elucidating how "passion shapes us into social beings" (43-44). Such a nuanced approach to exploring Wordsworth's poetry--examining the Lyrical Ballads for their value as anthropologically historical--is indeed well carried out and worthy of further exploration.