To the Skylark

“To a Skylark” by William Wordsworth (1815)

An earlier poem by Wordsworth in honor of a skylark, from the 1815 collection Poems, in Two Volumes. In this poem, Wordsworth celebrates both the skylark’s song and the kinship he feels with the bird, but with a greater emphasis on the speaker’s perspective and how the skylark’s song elevates his own mood.

“To a Skylark” by Percy Bysshe Shelley (1820)

One of Shelley’s most famous poems, also on the theme of admiring the skylark. In Shelley’s poem, the skylark becomes a symbol of freedom and joy, leading the speaker to compare the skylark’s situation and spirit with that of the speaker and human beings more generally. It may have served as inspiration for the Wordsworth poem featured in this guide.

“The Skylark” by John Clare (1835)

Although far less famous than Wordsworth in his own lifetime, John Clare (1793-1864) is one of English Romanticism’s most respected nature poets, sharing many similar themes with Wordsworth in terms of his love for the natural world and his valorization of a more traditional, agrarian way of life. In “The Skylark,” Clare depicts a group of schoolboys charmed by the beauty of the skylark’s singing and its apparent freedom, while out walking together in nature.