He recalls that even then he had intimations of his future greatness. In the delicious quiet, Wordsworth suddenly sees in his mind's eye the cottage of the landlady with whom he stayed as a schoolboy. Feelings of irresponsible freedom and lack of purpose quickly give way to a prevision of an impending period of optimism and creativity. He immediately identifies spiritual freedom with the absence of the encumbrances of civilization. Wordsworth experiences relief in coming back to nature. This material is amalgamated with the poet's adult views of philosophy and art (those views held during the writing and endless revision of The Prelude, roughly from 1799 until 1850). The body of the poem employs flashbacks to describe the development of the poetic mind during youth. The start of Book 1 finds Wordsworth speaking from a mature point of view. It is difficult to fix his age as the poem opens because time constantly shifts backward and forward throughout the narrative. The poet has, by his own account, been too long pent-up in London and only now has managed to return to the beloved Lake District where he spent his childhood and adolescence.
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