William Wordsworth Daffodils manuscript returns to Grasmere home

A manuscript of the William Wordsworth poem most associated with the Lake District has returned to Cumbria.

The hand-written copy of I Wandered Lonely As A Cloud has gone on show at Wordsworth Grasmere, the museum at his former home of Dove Cottage.

More commonly known as Daffodils, the poem was inspired by an encounter while walking with his sister Dorothy.

The manuscript is on a three-month loan from the British Library as part of its Treasures on Tour programme.

The poem, written in 1804, was inspired by daffodils which were seen by Wordsworth and his sister Dorothy "laughing and dancing in the breeze" on the shore of Ullswater two years earlier.

She was so captivated by the sight she recorded it in her journal, and Wordsworth later created the poem from that.

The manuscript on show was one prepared for the printer over the winter of 1806-7.

Melissa Mitchell, curator at Wordsworth Grasmere, said: "It's a celebration of the beauty of the natural world and how we can be inspired and captivated by beauty, and how that can stay with us for years to come."

The manuscript is on display until 29 May, alongside a copy of Dorothy Wordsworth's Grasmere journal.

Michael McGregor, director of Wordsworth Grasmere, said: "We hope people coming here get that sense of almost stepping back in time to the moment of creation.

"The original manuscripts, their own hands writing these things down, and the fact that these have survived for so long and are here today."

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