Presentation handout: \"The Solitary Reaper\" and \"Goody Blake and Harry Gill\" PDF

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Presentation on a comparison of William Wordsworth's "The Solitary Reaper" and "Goody Blake and Harry Gill": The extraordinary ordinary countrywoman.
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The extraordinary ordinary countrywoman: A comparison of Wordsworth’s “The Solitary Reaper” and “Goody Blake and Harry Gill”

When read alongside each other, one can quickly identify the ideal of equality operating in Wordsworth’s choice of subject matter in “The Solitary Reaper” and “Goody Blake and Harry Gill”. The poems revolve around characters who are doubly marginalised – first because of their habitation in the rural countryside, and second because of their sex, a movement away from the central figures of nobility and the elite in earlier poetry. To briefly summarise the two poems – “The Solitary Reaper” speaks about a poetic persona chancing upon a lone reaper girl, who is singing as she works. Her melancholic song is captivating yet incomprehensible to the persona, and it continues to haunt him as he continues on his journey. “Goody Blake and Harry Gill” is a story about an encounter between old, weak and poor woman Goody Blake and young, healthy and wealthy Harry Gill. When caught and more or less abused by Harry Gill for taking sticks for fire from his property, Goody Blake prays to God and places a curse on Harry Gill to “nevermore be warm”. True enough, Harry Gill is never able to find respite from the unceasing chill, and becomes a warning for “ye farmers all”. Through this presentation, I hope to show how the two poems are highly similar in their treatment of the rural woman. Central to both poems is the central female’s “ordinariness” or marginalised position that later becomes a key to a deeper knowledge or truth about the world and humanity that other characters in the poem or the poetic persona are unable to access. The marginalised countrywoman’s possession of this incomprehensible knowledge then accords her power and reverence. Closely tied to this notion of the marginalised made powerful and admirable is Wordsworth’s emphasis on Nature as the ideal, pure and untainted. The women in “The Solitary Reaper” and “Goody Blake and Harry Gill” are extraordinary because of their association to Nature, which seems to bestow upon them access to truths of the world that others do not have. I would also argue that Wordsworth unveils these concerns through similar devices in both poems, namely the poetic voice, the motif of language and the use of contrasts.

1.1. Illustrating the ordinary/marginalised in “Goody Blake and Harry Gill”

The use of the omniscient third person speaker in the poem is particularly effective in presenting contrasting images of Harry Gill and Goody Blake as the “has” and the “has-not”, making clear Goody Blake’s disadvantaged and marginalised position. The voice is equally familiar with both characters’ lifestyles, and is able illustrate an almost point-for-point comparison. The use of the ABABCDCD rhyme scheme in Stanza especially works well with the omniscient speaker in presenting the stark opposition between Harry Gill in the pink (or red) of health and Goody Blake as a frail, old and poor woman, with their descriptions taking up four lines each. The visual contrasts between the two characters are furthered by the omniscient speaker by emphasising differences in colours associated to Harry Gill and Goody Blake. Harry Gill is associated with red – “cheeks were red as ruddy clover”, while Goody Blake is characterised by the bleakness of her living environment: “hoary dews” (hoary referring to white or grey), “hawthorn” (whose flowers are white) and how she is removed “from sheltered village-green”, suggesting an absence of colour. This monochromatic palette associated with the countrywoman in this poem seems to disadvantage Goody Blake even more so than the countrywoman in “The Solitary Reaper”. While the latter presents a young countrywoman, Goody Blake is further marginalised because of the references to her age. The third person speaker and the contrasts he illuminates also hint at the notion that isolation is part and parcel of marginalisation. “The Solitary Reaper” also suggests the same, but through a slightly different poetic voice that I will explain later. In “Goody Blake and Harry Gill”, the speaker is able to draw a contrast between Harry Gill as the more active participant in society owing to his work as a “drover”, while Goody Blake is removed “from sheltered village-green”, lives on a hill, and “housed alone”. It is also notable that this isolation plants Goody Blake deep into untamed Nature, where she is vulnerable to harsh and hostile weather conditions such as “sea-blasts”. It is also worth noting that the tone of the third person speaker is highly sympathetic towards Goody Blake, as seen from how her poverty and suffering in the cold is described in great detail and with a tone of pity in 5 stanzas (Stanzas 4 – 8). Phrases such as “poor Woman” and “poor old bones” lures the reader to feel a strong sense of pity for this helpless woman, helpless because of her marginalisation in society.

1.2. Illustrating the ordinary/marginalised in “The Solitary Reaper” The speaker in “The Solitary Reaper” differs from that of “Goody Blake and Harry Gill” in that it uses a first-person perspective. However, it still highlights the Reaper girl’s isolation – “single in the field”, “by herself”, “Alone”. Like the earlier poem, the subjective first-person perspective also sheds light on contrasts between the speaker and the Reaper girl, albeit less explicit. The key difference between the two figures is that the speaker seems to be a well-travelled person, whereas the Reaper girl does not. This is suggested by the second Stanza, where the speaker compares the Reaper girl’s song to a Nightingale’s welcome to “weary bands/Of travellers…/Among Arabian sands” and a “Cuckoobird/Breaking the silence of the seas/Among the farthest Hebrides”. It is possible then that the solitary nature of the Reaper girl has a double meaning – not only is she physically alone in the field, but she is isolated in her geographical location, having never travelled as extensively as the speaker. The opposition between the speaker and the Reaper girl is more implicit than that between Harry Gill and Goody Blake, especially since the speaker seems to also be a social outcast in some way. He appears to be a wanderer, a traveller, having been to exotic places such as Arabia and the Hebrides, a wilder, untamed natural landscape compared the field the Reaper girl is in. While the speaker is associated with Nature, I would argue that he is associated to a more worldly, international (for lack of a better word) sense of the wilderness. On the other hand, the Reaper girl belongs to a domestic sense of the English countryside. Like “Goody Blake and Harry Gill”, there is the “have” and the “have-nots”, where the speaker possesses a worldly knowledge of the world outside of England that the Reaper girl does not.

2.1. Rendering the ordinary extraordinary in “Goody Blake and Harry Gill” There is a strange and mildly surprising twist in the poem when, after being apprehended by Harry Gill for trespassing and collecting firewood, Goody Blake is revealed to have a powerful ally in

God, who curses Harry Gill with a never-ending chill. The twist in the poem confers Goody Blake, the ordinary countrywoman, her “extraordinariness” by illuminating her connection to supernatural forces that come to her aid when her physical capabilities fail. I posit that this connection to a higher spiritual realm and powers that drive the world is the deeper truth or knowledge that Goody Blake has access to while Harry Gill does not. This is suggested by the contrasts elucidated by the third-person persona as mentioned before, where Harry Gill and Goody Blake’s work and habitation influence their worldviews. Harry Gill is presented as a drover, someone involved in the city for trade and transaction. Based on his hostility towards Goody Blake trespassing on his property to acquire firewood despite her poverty and his own wealth, it suggests that Harry Gill possesses a worldview firmly rooted in the physical and material world. It appears that for Harry Gill, relationships are highly transactional – there must be an exchange in goods so that neither party (most importantly himself) loses out. By abusing Goody Blake when he catches her, Wordsworth seems to suggest that this materialistic worldview leaves no room for values such as generosity and kindness. I would say that this reflects the binary in which the city is bad, the countryside good that is a running theme throughout Wordsworth’s lyrical ballads. The binary also frames Goody Blake as a moral teacher to the readers of the lyrical ballad. On the other hand, Goody Blake resides in untamed Nature, where she is vulnerable to the cold and the wind. Her reality is one of material poverty. This presents her as someone who does not, or cannot, depend on her material possessions and physical ability to survive, which subsequently alludes to some other source of strength and sustenance that she taps into. This is exemplified in the use of language as in the form of prayer. Harry Gill does not know how to pray, or at least does not do so in the poem, and is powerless against frail Goody Blake’s prayer to God for help. The prayer connotes a knowledge of an invisible, yet powerful being, which Harry Gill does not grasp in the poem to his detriment. Goody Blake’s prayer therefore elevates her from her marginalised position as it demonstrates her possession of a truth that cannot be fathomed in the purely physical reality, and in the bigger picture reflects the Romantic movement away from rationality as a way of comprehending the world.

It is also worth noting that Goody Blake is accorded “extraordinariness” because of the physical effects of her appeal to a supernatural power. Harry Gill is cursed with a chill that lasts “in March, December, and in July”, “At night, at morning, and at noon” and “Beneath the sun, beneath the moon”, exemplifying the incomprehensible power of the invisible, spiritual force to enact physical and tangible effects. This is especially so when the speaker describes how all of Harry Gill’s possessions that could possibly keep him warm prove to be “in vain, a useless matter”. The force of the supernatural is also made all the more compelling by the reference to God’s omniscience in Goody Blake’s line “God! who art never out of hearing” and the speaker’s line “To God that is the judge of all”.

2.2. Rendering the ordinary extraordinary in “The Solitary Reaper” The knowledge that the Reaper girl in “The Solitary Reaper” possesses is more ambiguous than that in “Goody Blake and Harry Gill”. This is because of the limited first-person perspective of the persona, who is unable to completely fathom the contents of the Reaper girl’s song. This brings us to the symbol of language in the poem, where the girl’s song is incomprehensible to the speaker. He can only venture potential meanings, such as “old, unhappy, faroff things/And battles long ago”, or “Some natural sorrow, loss, or pain/That has been, and may be again”. The unknown language of the song furthers the extraordinariness of the Reaper girl, as she is shown to have access to a knowledge of the world that the speaker does not. This also reflects a similar theme that was discussed in lecture regarding “An Anecdote for Fathers”, where language becomes a hindrance to comprehending the real world. In a way, it is possible to view music as a new, higher form of language that gets closer to an accurate representation of the real world in this poem. Another possible reading is that the speaker’s hypotheses also elevate the Reaper girl’s simple song to contain profound wisdom, be it from a long forgotten past or observed from the pattern of life. What is also interesting is the lack of language in this poem. The speaker remembers the song not because he remembers the linguistic contents of the song, but for its melancholy and sorrow that it evokes within him. We know this because of the first-person perspective, that allows us insight into the speaker’s psyche and emotions. He does not explicitly mention it, but it is clear through repetition

of phrases such as “plaintive”, “sorrowful”, “unhappy” and “melancholy” that imply that the song is emotionally arresting. Arresting, as inferred from the ending couplet “The music in my heart I bore,/Long after it was heard no more”, and how he listens “motionless and still”. It is also noteworthy that the last stanza is written in past tense, as opposed to previous stanzas that were in the present, suggesting perhaps that a considerable length of time has passed since the encounter with the Reaper girl. The Reaper girl seems to become extraordinary for embodying a kind of deeply emotive truth regarding humanity and life, even more so as it is through this mundane scene in the ordinary English countryside that a worldly traveller learns it. There is a sense of reverence in the speaker’s treatment of the Reaper girl that is not evident in “Goody Blake and Harry Gill”. This can be seen in the first stanza where the speaker uses diction normally associated to nobility or God such as “Behold!” The phrase “Stop here, or gently pass” is also indicative of a respectful attitude in calling the reader to assume a posture of meekness towards the Reaper Girl, much like how one would adopt at a Church.

Concluding statements Could Wordsworth be considered as an early feminist, in his elevation of the ordinary and marginalised countrywoman into a sublime, awe-inspiring figure? Perhaps. It is important to note that their "extraordinariness” is inseparable from their location in the rural landscape, as part of Wordsworth’s larger emphasis on portraying Nature as that which is closer to the true state of things. Nonetheless, his ability to re-present the marginalised countrywoman into figures of wisdom and supernatural authority must have been a remarkable movement away from the common impressions and stereotypes regarding this community.

Bibliography Wordsworth, William. “Goody Blake And Harry Gill.” PoemHunter.com, 31 Dec. 2002, www.poemhunter.com/poem/goody-blake-and-harry-gill/comments/. Wordsworth, William. “The Solitary Reaper by William Wordsworth.” Poetry Foundation, Poetry Foundation, www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/45554/the-solitary-reaper....