ウィリアム・ワーズワス (William Wordsworth, 1770-1850)



イングランドの詩人。カンブリア州 (Cumbria) コカマス (Cockermouth) に生まれる。1798年、コールリッジ (Samuel Taylor Coleridge, 1772-1834) と共同で Lyrical Ballads with a Few Other Poems を出版、「イギリスロマン主義の画期的事件」と称された。第2版(1801年1月)に付されたワーズワスの「序文」も「ロマン派宣言書」と言われている。コールリッジは、この詩集における二人の役割分担について、Biographia Literaria (1817) で次のように述べている。

"[I]t was agreed, that my endeavours should be directed to persons and characters supernatural, or at least romantic; yet so as to transfer from our inward nature a human interest and a semblance of truth sufficient to procure for these shadows of imagination that willing suspension of disbelief for the moment, which constitutes poetic faith. Mr. Wordsworth, on the other hand, was to propose to himself as his object, to give the charm of novelty to things of every day, and to excite a feeling analogous to the supernatural, by awakening the mind's attention from the lethargy of custom, and directing it to the loveliness and the wonders of the world before us; an inexhaustible treasure, but for which, in consequence of the film of familiarity and selfish solicitude we have eyes, yet see not, ears that hear not, and hearts that neither feel nor understand." [S. T. Coleridge,Biographia Literaria, ed. J. Shawcross (1907; Oxford, 1958) 2: 5-6]

また、ワーズワスは "Essay, Supplementary to the Preface" (1815) で、自身を含めた当時の詩人たちがパースィ(Thomas Percy) のReliques of Ancient English Poetry (1765) に如何に大きな影響を受けたかについて、次のように率直な告白をしている。

"Contrast, in this respect, the effect of Macpherson's publication with the Reliques of Percy, so unassuming, so modest in their pretensions! — I have already stated how much Germany is indebted to this latter work; and for our own country, its poetry has been absolutely redeemed by it. I do not think that there is an able writer in verse of the present day who would not be proud to acknowledge his obligations to the Reliques; I know that it is so with my friends; and, for myself, I am happy in this occasion to make a public avowal of my own." [W. J. B. Owen, and Jane Worthington Smyser, eds., The Prose Works of William Wordsworth, 3 vols. (Oxford, 1974) 3: 78] 

1843 年、サウジー (Robert Southey, 1774-1843) の後を受けて桂冠詩人となり、50年4月23日に亡くなったが、同年、1798年に書き始められていた大作自伝詩 "The Prelude, or, Growth of a Poet's Mind" の最終版が死後出版された。 (M. Y.)

論文1   山中光義「Wordsworthのバラッド詩-Lyrical Ballads 初版とその後の改訂」『文芸と思想』(40) 65-81. 1976年.

 

原詩(英詩) 訳詩
1. Alice Fell  1. アリス・フェル
2. Ellen Irwin, or the Braes of Kirtle
3. The Female Vagrant
4. The Force of Prayer
5. George and Sarah Green
6. Goody Blake and Harry Gill 6. ブレイクばあさんとハリー・ギル
7. The Horn of Egremont Castle
8. The Idiot Boy
9. The Last of the Flock
10. Lucy Gray 10. ルーシー・グレイ
11. The Seven Sisters; or, the Solitude of Binnorie
12. Simon Lee
13. The Thorn 13. 山査子(さんざし)
14. The Two April Mornings
15. We are seven