William Wordsworth, rising to poet, was born on the 7 April 1770 in the northwestern England market town of Cockermouth, in the region known as the Lake District. The Wordsworths, like the Coleridges, Tennysons and the Brontës, were among that remarkable coterie of nineteenth century families of the professional middle-class, who around that time enjoyed growing influence in society. They all produced outstanding writers. Wordsworth wrote his first poem in 1784, while at school in Hawkshead, and nine years later his first published collections of verse appeared and were titled An Evening Walk and Descriptive Sketches. No other poet before or since has ever quite matched the output of Wordsworth, who during his long lifetimes produced some 70,000 lines of verse.
Today the English Lake District has a just reputation for stunning landscapes — lakes like gemstones set in green velvet, soaring mountain heights and a myriad mountain tarns like teardropss let down from some celestial paradise. Today the region is a Mecca for walkers, fishermen, rock climbers, open-air enthusiasts or those simply seeking a spiritual lift, a break from the welter of city life. For the Wordsworth fan his joie de vivre and his poetry can be sensed in the landscape, heard in the waterfalls, seen in the woodland groves and felt in the wind crooning through craggy heights. Wordsworth is the Lake District and the latter is the poet; neither can exist without the other.
Wordsworth’s Lake District illustrates the wonderful landscapes that shaped the mind, and inspired the work of, the poet William Wordsworth. By combining the poet’s own verse with superb colour photography — taken over several years’ intimate knowledge of this premier National Park, the author has produced a visual treasure for lovers of countryide, stunning landscapes and romantic poetry.
Available here http://www.howardmbeck.co.uk/