Symbols, Imagery, Wordplay
Form and Meter
"The Solitary Reaper" is a classic example of iambic tetrameter, which—as you can probably guess—is lot like iambic pentameter. Still, if you have no idea what the blazes we're on about, don't...
Speaker
We've got a bonafide world traveler on our hands in this poem, folks, a veritable tourist. Okay, so maybe world traveler is a bit of stretch, but the speaker of "The Solitary Reaper" definitely lik...
Setting
Get ready friends because "The Solitary Reaper" whisks us away to the beautiful, scenic highlands of Scotland. The speaker is out walking around (he doesn't really say why) and happens upon a...
Sound Check
"The Solitary Reaper" is a poem all about sound. More specifically, it's a poem about how sound can be interpreted even when there are no intelligible words. The reaper herself, for example, sings...
What's Up With the Title?
Okay, so we've got three words in the title, but only two of them that really matter: "solitary" and "reaper." No, the reaper that our speaker has in mind isn't this guy or these guys, but rat...
Calling Card
Just about everything Wordsworth ever wrote in his prime has some kind of solitary figure just kind of… wandering around. And by "everything" we mean pretty much everything. We've seen how "The S...
Tough-o-Meter
Wordsworth's shorter poems are usually pretty kind. The diction is always really basic, the sentence structure (syntax) isn't as winding, long, and complicated as it is in The Prelude, and overall...
Trivia
Wordsworth was a lucky guy, that's for sure. He spent time in France during the French Revolution (in 1791), which eventually became an incredibly violent and bloody affair. (Source.) Wordswor...
Steaminess Rating
Yes, we have a guy and, yes, he's looking at a girl. However, he's not ogling here. He's just quietly (though, to be fair, a little creepily) watching her sing because, well, she's singing an incre...
Allusions
Thomas Wilkinson, Tours to the British Mountains (throughout)Gilbert West, "Education: A Poem" (7)