A language really spoken by men . . .

The Cumbria Tourism Board notes that this is the 200th anniversary of William Wordsworth's poem "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud" (to refresh your memory, here is the text of the poem). Hmm, they wondered as they wandered over there . . . how to get people up here to see some daffodils . . . ?


(Hat-tip: NPR)

Will this hasten or delay the arrival of Spring? Will M. C. Nuts cause Wordsworth to spin in his grave even as he joins Lucy in rolling

round in earth's diurnal course,
With rocks, and stones, and trees[?]

I'm not horrified by this, but I do think, though, that the Board's choosing to do this represents, at the very least, a mistrust of Wordsworth's poem to move a new audience these days. Do not our postmodern hearts with pleasure fill, too, upon looking upon hosts of golden daffodils? Is emotion also one of those Grand Narratives that Lyotard warned us about, a ride that needs pimping so that we are moved by its coolness and thus keep our distance from that nasty ol' emotion?

I'm asking half-seriously, just so you know. Perhaps pure, unalloyed, tranquility-recalled emotion is passé, too, unrecognizable, or perhaps something to be suspicious of, lest our cool, sophisticated critical faculties be seduced into shutting down just this one time. Perhaps this at least partly explains my suspicion and loathing of Thomas Kinkade.

Something (else) to ponder . . .