We Are Seven

Clear and Straightforward Language

Wordsworth was all about clear and straightforward language. In the preface to Lyrical Ballads, where "We Are Seven" was first published, Wordsworth makes his desire to communicate with the everyman clear. He hated the fussy, complex, and hard-to-read verse of so many eighteenth-century poets. He aimed to be clear, direct, and to use words that everyone, from the humble farmer to the seafaring merchant to the King of England could understand.

And people loved him for it. His poems in Lyrical Ballads were a breath of fresh air. Wordsworth aimed to talk directly and clearly to the people, and he did just that in poems like "We Are Seven," as well as "Daffodils" and "The World is Too Much With Us."