Tone Analysis

I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud
by William Wordsworth

I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the milky way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced, but they
Out-did the sparkling leaves in glee;
A poet could not be but gay,
In such a jocund company!
I gazed—and gazed—but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:

For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.


After reading this poem, it is impossible to nail down one specific tone that describes the work in its entirety. Instead there are several clear tone shifts that eventually come full circle. For example, in the first two lines, when the speaker describes himself as "lonely," lacking direction ("wandering") and separated from the rest of nature (floating "high o'er vales and hills"), the tone is melancholy and very dispassionate. The scene is very pale and cold and so is the presence of the speaker. The moment that the daffodils come into view, however, the tone abruptly shifts to one of warm admiration. There is an abundance of visual imagery- "golden daffodils" that are "fluttering" and "tossing their heads in sprightly dance"- and all of the descriptions are very specific (the daffodils are "beside the lake, beneath the trees"). It suddenly seems like the speaker is captivated by the scene before him, which is a drastic shift from his disinterested tone in the first few lines.

By the second stanza, the tone has increased from admiring to completely awed, as the speaker compares the daffodils with other-earthly things such as "the stars" of "the Milky Way" and describes them as "continuous" and "never-ending." In the third stanza, the dominant tone is one of joy. The speaker is enraptured as he describes the flowers as "sparkling" and "jocund company." As he "gaze[s]" at them, he feels "gay" and sees the daffodils as "wealth." This joyful tone also carries over somewhat to the final stanza, where it is mixed with a tone of nostalgia. The speaker still describes the memory of the field of flowers as "bliss" and it still gives him great "pleasure" to think of it, but the imagery and diction are not nearly as powerful as before. His tone almost reverts back to its original distant quality, as is evidenced by the fact that these happy memories crop up only when he is "vacant" or "pensive." However much he may have enjoyed the daffodils, the memory and his happiness are, in the present, only shadows.