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Wordsworth Family Papers

 Collection
Identifier: MS192

  • Staff Only
  • No requestable containers

Scope and Contents

This small collection consists of three notebooks and correspondence written by members of the family or immediate circle of poet William Wordsworth. One small notebook by Christopher Wordsworth (ca1791), brother of the poet, includes some earlier entries by William (ca1784-5). A longer notebook by the poet’s nephew and biographer, Christopher Wordsworth, records several conversations with the poet (1834-5). There are several small collections of correspondence. Christopher Wordsworth wrote seven letters to Mary Sykes Watson in 1836 and his son Christopher wrote nine letters to her between 1836 and 1838. Fanny Eliza (Graham) Wordsworth, wife of William Wordsworth, Jr. wrote four letters in 1866 to the Rev. Henry Michell Wagner who married Mary Sykes Watson in 1838. Gordon Wordsworth, grandson of poet William Wordsworth and son of William and Fanny, wrote two letters to Thomas J. Wise in 1917; both are concerned with Wise’s Bibliography of the Writings in Prose and Verse of William Wordsworth and the identification of some handwriting as by Sarah Hutchinson, not Dorothy Wordsworth.

Susan Wordsworth, daughter of Christopher Wordsworth and Head of Greyladies’ College for Women Workers, wrote three letters to the Rev. Henry Michell Wagner between 1905 and 1911 thanking him for donations.

The artist of a notebook with pencil and watercolor sketches of the Lake District after 1840 is not identified, but is likely by a member of the Watson-Wagner Circle related to the Wordsworth family or friends.

Dates

  • 1791 - 1911

Conditions Governing Access

There are no restrictions on use of the materials in the department for research; all patrons must comply with federal copyright regulations.

Extent

1 Boxes

Language of Materials

English

Abstract

William Wordsworth (1770-1850) and Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834) began the English Romantic movement with their publication of Lyrical Ballads in 1798. Wordsworth's youngest brother, Christopher Wordsworth (1774-1846), received his Doctor of Divinity degree from Trinity College, Cambridge, becoming a renowned scholar, and Master of Trinity in 1820. Christopher’s third son, also Christopher (1807-1885), was an English bishop in the Anglican Church, and became known as a poet and scholar as well as a cleric. This small collection consists of three notebooks and correspondence written by members of the family or immediate circle of poet William Wordsworth. One small notebook by Christopher Wordsworth (ca. 1791), brother of the poet, includes some earlier entries by William (ca. 1784-5).

Arrangement

The materials in this collection are arranged in chronological order, by the birthdate of their author.

Immediate Source of Acquisition

Special purchase by Northwestern University Libraries in 195-.

Related Materials

For additional critical comments about this collection, especially the earlier notebook, see the essay and annotated edition of it edited by Z.S. Fink in The Early Wordsworthian Milieu; A Notebook of Christopher Wordsworth with a few entries by William Wordsworth (Oxford, 1958). (NUL 821.7 W92Ywo.e)

Title
Guide to the Wordsworth Family Papers
Author
Revised by Sigrid Pohl Perry
Date
2018
Description rules
Describing Archives: A Content Standard
Language of description
English
Script of description
Latin

Library Details

Part of the Charles Deering McCormick Library of Special Collections Repository

Contact:
Deering Library, Level 3
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