Letter from Wordsworth

William Wordworth was one of the great Romantic poets of 19th-century England. Like Robert Burns, his poetry celebrated the wonders of the natural world around him and the achievements of the human spirit while using the simple language of the common man.  His most remembered work is probably 'Lyrical Ballads', a collection published in 1798 in collaboration with Samuel Taylor Coleridge. It included both Coleridge's "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner" and Wordsworth's "Tintern Abbey". He was poet laureate of England from 1843 until his death in 1850. Wordsworth's younger sister and close confidante Dorothy (1771-1855) was also an accomplished writer, and travelled with him to the south west of Scotland to visit the grave and birthplace of Robert Burns who they both greatly admired.