William Wordsworth's After thought
Uploaded by amany kamal on May 26, 2006
Wordsworth’s After Thought represents a typical application for the deconstruction theory. It includes a number of binaries like: permanence, transience/ form, content/ function, existence, manhood, childhood, etc. Traditionally speaking, content is privileged over form and manhood is privileged over childhood. However, in this poem, the poet priterises form over content. In this sense, Wordsworth espouses the typically Romantic structure of the opposition. Form is basic and everlasting while content is short-lived and momentary. Nevertheless, in terms of human dichotomy, the order is different. What survives is ‘Something from our hand’, something we make and it could be: a poem, a portrait, or a painting.
Wordsworth again insists that what ever lasts is not the content. Instead it is the form. By this endorsement, Wordsworth is redrafting what Plato had said about content and form significance. In his 3 last lines, Wordsworth confirms the notion of permanence and this can be touched in the final invocation f love, hope, and faith.
By the end, all I can say here is that my initial reading to this poem and the theory itself before made me feel how bizarre and peculiar the founder of this school is. However, as a deconstructive reader, I admit the fact that the poet did a superb effort in trying to shake our perception of fixed and rigid things. But the question that is still unanswerable and is bewildering me is: Is the poem itself a proof of Wordsworth’s survival or his survival existence or his passing away?