![]() A similar opinion was articulated by William Godwin, who asked, “Amidst the barbarous pomp of war and the clamorous din of civil brawls, who can tell whether the event shall be prosperous or miserable?” (147). For example, he describes being “enflam’d with hope” upon returning to France, but is careful to note how, in the past, “the work / Of massacre in which the senseless sword / Was pray’d to as a judge” (521). Wordsworth’s opinion of the French Revolution is similar to many of his contemporaries in that he is sympathetic to the lofty goals of the movement, but he was repulsed by the violence that it catalyzed. In doing so, Wordsworth demonstrates how revolutionary events can have transformative effects on the individual along with society as a whole. Wordsworth's magnum opus, The Prelude, is a work that places individual experience at the center of its concern, and in books nine and ten, we see how Wordsworth stages his own individual meaning in response to his experiences in France during the French Revolution. Wordsworth was a writer deeply engaged with both the individual and revolution, at one point even commencing a literary revolution all on his own. ![]() While revolution is certainly a collective act, Romantic Era writers like William Wordsworth also show how the individual fits within it. When we think of the term “revolution,” our instinct might be to picture a raging mob marching through city streets, a group of tattered soldiers storming a palace, or something akin to Eugene Delacroix’s Liberty Leading the People-that is, images of collective action.
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