ABSTRACT
Wordsworth's writing explores both spoken and written language, and author shall argue that one should read it in the light of contemporary thinking about language, whether theoretical or pragmatic. But in more pragmatic discussions of spoken language such as guides to pronunciation, which abounded in the late eighteenth century, language difference is the point at issue: difference that reflects region or education. So much of Wordsworth's writing about poetry, in verse and in prose, is concerned with the nature of language, and so many of his best-known poems have elements of dialogue or represented speech. Joseph Priestley had begun to explore the relation between spoken and written language in terms of diversity and standardisation, noting that spoken language is more diverse than written. Language difference, configuring strangeness or foreignness, plays an important part in many of the travel poems of Wordsworth's middle and later years.
