SOURCE: An introduction to Wordsworth and His Circle, G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1907, pp. 1-17.

In the following excerpt, Rannie discusses the Romantic characteristics and influences of Wordsworth's work and the poet's association with Coleridge, Southey, De Quincey, and Charles Lamb.

In one sense it seems a dubious use of metaphor to regard Wordsworth as the centre of any circle. For, if we think of a body of men as a circle, we must think of the centre as one of a group who shares its qualities; one who gives and takes, who lives in intellectual community and not alone. Yet no fact about Wordsworth is more certain and more striking than his essential solitariness. To him, even more than to Milton, his own words belong: his soul was like a star and dwelt apart. The Puritanism of his age, the culture of his age, are much more perceptible...