Introduction

Abstract

One of the key passages in Wordsworth’s 1800 politico-pastoral poem ‘Michael’ marks the point at which the eponymous and taciturn shepherd finally speaks for himself:

Our lot is a hard lot; the sun himself

Has scarcely been more diligent than I;

And I have lived to be a fool at last

To my own family. An evil man

That was, and made an evil choice, if he

Were false to us; and if he were not false,

There are ten thousand to whom loss like this

Had been no sorrow. I forgive him; — but

‘Twere better to be dumb than to talk thus.

(‘Michael’, 233–41)

“Twere better to be dumb than to talk thus’