William Wordsworth

William Wordsworth launched English Romanticism with the 1798 collection Lyrical Ballads, arguing that poetry should use "the real language of men" and find its subjects in ordinary life and the natural world.

He lived most of his life in the Lake District, whose landscapes fill his work. "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud" — the daffodils poem — is probably the most widely taught nature poem in the language.

He served as Britain's Poet Laureate from 1843 until his death in 1850.