Представляем научные достижения миру. Гуманитарные науки Saratov State University Presenting Academic Achievements to the World. The Humanities Papers from the conference for young scientists «Presenting Academic Achievements to the World» March 14–15, 2012 Saratov Issue 3 Saratov Saratov University Press 2013 Саратовский государственный университет им. Н. Г. Чернышевского Представляем научные достижения миру. Гуманитарные науки Материалы научной конференции молодых ученых «Presenting Academic Achievements to the World» Март 14–15, 2012 Саратов Выпуск 3 Саратов Издательство Саратовского университета 2013 УДК 3(82) ББК 6/8я43 П71 Представляем научные достижения миру. Гуманитарные П71 науки : материалы научной конференции молодых ученых «Pre- senting Academic Achievements to the World». – Саратов : Изд-во Сарат. ун-та, 2013. – Вып. 3 – 256 с. : ил. В данном сборнике опубликованы материалы участников гуманитарной секции научной конференции «Presenting Academic Achievements to the World», которая состоялась в Саратовском государственном университете 14-15 марта 2012 года. В сборник включены статьи с результатами в области истории, социологии, филологии, экономики, юриспруденции и психологии. Для преподавателей и студентов гуманитарных факультетов и институтов. This publication assembles papers given at the conference for young scientists «Pre- senting Academic Achievements to the World» which was held in March 14-15, 2012 at Saratov State University. The articles present the results in such fields of humanities as His- tory, Sociology, Philology, Economy, Law and Psychology. Редакционная коллегия: Н. И. Иголкина (отв. редактор), Л. В. Левина (отв. секретарь), О. В. Морозова, М. В. Феллер УДК 3(082) ББК 6/8я43 Работа издана в авторской редакции ISSN 2306-3076 © Саратовский государственный университет, 2013 WILLIAM WORDSWORTH AND HIS VISION OF THE LIBERTY M.Yu. Abdulina Saratov State University Science advisor: Andrey V. Gladyshev, Doctor in History Language advisor: Rosalia M. Bazyleva, PhD in Linguistics This article is devoted to the evolution of forming Wordsworth’s world- outlook. The study of the famous thinker’s visions can be defined as a part of the intellectual history, which is rather new and needs detailed examination. In this work the question why William Wordsworth is interesting for his- torians is discussed and the poet’s vision and its changes during his life time are considered. William Wordsworth (1770-1850) is a rather popular and well known au- thor in England, but in Russia this name is usually combined with the names of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert Southey who together were the so-called “Lake Poets”. William Wordsworth was one of the poets who formed the Ro- mantic school in England. His works became a part of the treasure-house of world literature. This person is usually investigated just as a Romantic poet by philolo- gists. However William Wordsworth was not only a literature genius but also a thinker and a philosopher. He was a notable and famous person; there were some admirers and supporters of his views in the English society of his time. Moreover, in his later years William Wordsworth considered himself to be the Tutor and the Sage. Generally speaking, he was a part of the English intellec- tual elite and so had some influence on the public opinion. This fact makes the name of William Wordsworth interesting to historians too. As for William Wordsworth’s interests and the questions which formed his philosophy, they were really wide: interaction of the society and the state, 5 God and religion, the role of Nature in human life and so on. In this work Wordsworth’s vision of liberty will be considered. This problem on a par with his view on the Revolution played the main role in the poet’s world-outlook. The whole life of William Wordsworth can be divided into two parts: the early period and the later period. These periods are different not only in his poetry but in his world-outlook in whole. The crucial point was the French Revolution. The time of the poet’s youth was very disquieted. Young men of this pe- riod were grown on the ideas of the Age of the Enlightenment and waited for changes. Wordsworth in his work “The Prelude” wrote: “[…]`Twas in truth an hour Of universal ferment; mildest men Were agitated; and commotions, strife Of passion and opinion, filled the walls Of peaceful houses with unique sounds. The soil of common life, was, at that time, Too hot to tread upon.” (Wordsworth, 1959) In the early 1790s Wordsworth was in France and became not only the contemporary but also the participant of the French Revolution (he was in the rank of a Girondist) and this event had an indelible influence on him. “Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive, But to be young was very Heaven!” (Wordsworth, 1959) In his early years William Wordsworth, as the majority of his con- temporaries, was an idealist and romantic. Contemporaries said that Wordsworth “proved to instinctively a democratic” in different arguments with an army royalist (Harper, 1960). He was the follower of the revolutionary ideas, such as equality of all men and freedom, and was committed to the French Revolution. He thought that monarchy was an institution which sought to take away these freedoms. Young Wordsworth had great hopes for the Revolution. A Free World and power in the hands of the Republic would be the result of the revolution for William Wordsworth. The poet wanted France to become a “work of honour” made possible by men who “by patient exercise of reason made/ Worthy of liberty” (Wordsworth, 1959). To sum it up, liberty for Wordsworth was only in the presence of common political rights and freedoms, and the Revolution was just one way of finding it at that period. Because of breaking out the diplomatic relationships between France and England Wordsworth was obliged to return to his Homeland and after that it was one of the most difficult periods in his life. Exactly at that moment his at- titude to the Revolution and its ideas began to change. When Wordsworth visited France again he saw the collapse of the French Revolution. He noted the changed atmosphere in the country: “[…] now, sole register hat these things were, 6 Two solitary greetings have I heard “Good morrow, Citizen!” a hollow word, As if a dead man spoke it. Yet despair Touches me not, though pensive as a bird Whose vernal coverts winter hath laid bare.” (Wordsworth, 1959) Wordsworth finally was disappointed at the French Revolution. Terror and death of thousands of people were the real result of its ideas. The poet became an opponent of the Revolution. At that time the main philosophic idea appeared: Wordsworth understood what the liberty was. Freedom did not belong to the men, it could be possible under any form of a human government, but liberty was inside the person, in his soul, in his religion, in his connection with nature. The man was the more independent the more his love for God and Nature was. The Nature for Wordsworth became a symbol of the divine mind. (Dustin, 2009) “[…] The blessing of my life, the gift is yours, Mу mountains! Thine, O Nature!” (Wordsworth, 1959) Wordsworth thought that people and nature were united. His new idea was “going back to the Nature”. Isolation in the Lake District was his way to be close to Nature and to feel really independent. Moreover, isolation was a kind of defense from the world’s sins, which existed in quantity in cities, and only a prelapsarian man could have the proximity with God. So, at this period liberty became a synonym of solitude and unity with Nature and God. Because of the bad example with the French Revolution Wordsworth pro- moted safety and stability in the state and into the society. He thought that it was more useful not to have a revolution and change the world but to try and change yourself. For him it was necessary to have permanent self-knowledge and the self-perfection, without which it was impossible to approach the Na- ture and to understand its wisdom (Woods, 2011). Wordsworth with his new ideals and the proximity of the religion became a very famous poet among the ruling class in England. The poet with such a world-outlook was really necessary at that unstable time: the society needed moral stability, power of religion, harmony in their souls (Алябьева, 2001). To sum up, the evolution in Wordsworth’s visions and understanding liberty is clear. At first, liberty was just a political category, but then its understand- ing changed and it became a philosophic category of the soul’s harmony. The ways of Wordsworth’s search for liberty changed too: at first it was a revolu- tionary way, but later –safety and unity with Nature. And if in his early years Wordsworth was committed to the French Revolution and its ideas, then in the later years the poet became its opponent and spoke against instability in general. REFERENcES: 1. Алябьева Л. “This will never do”: история литературной репутации Уильяма Вордсворта//Диалог со временем. Альманах интеллектуальной истории. Вып. 5. 7 Спец. Выпуск: историческая биография и персональная история. М. : Эдиториал УРСС, 2001. 2. Dustin S. William Wordsworth and the French Revolution. The influence of Michael Beaupuy. 2009 / URL: http:// www.suite101.com/content/william-wordsworth-and-the- french-revolution-a115104 (дата просмотра: 25.07.2011). 3. Harper, G. McL. William Wordsworth: His Life, Works, and Influence. New York : Rus- sell and Russell, 1960. 4. Woods A. Art and Revolution. British poets and the French revolution. Part two: The death of an Ideal. / URL: http:// www.marxist.com/ArtAndLiterature-old/british_poets2. html (дата просмотра: 25.07.2011). 5. Wordsworth W. The Prelude or Growth of a Poet`s mind.1850/ Ed. Ernest De Selincourt.