Helvellyn

Helvellyn is the third highest peak in the Lake District, a mountainous area of England made famous because of William Wordworth's Romantic-era poetry. Wordsworth regularly climbed the mountain and is associated with the peak because of a portrait, Wordsworth on Helvellyn, by Benjamin Robert Haydon.

Coordinates

Latitude: 54.526818500000
Longitude: -3.017246400000

Timeline of Events Associated with Helvellyn

Date Event Manage

Benjamin Robert Haydon, Wordsworth on Helvellyn (1842)

31 Aug 1840

Wordsworth composes "On a Portrait of the Duke of Wellington"

Haydon portrait of WellingtonOn 31 August 1840, William Wordsworth composed the sonnet, "On a Portrait of the Duke of Wellington upon the Field of Waterloo, by Haydon."  The poem is a companion to his earlier 11 June 1831 sonnet, "To B.R. Haydon, on Seeing His Picture of Napoleon Buonaparte on the Island of St. Helena."  Wordsworth informed Isabella Fenwick in 1843 that he composed the sonnet while ascending Helvellyn with his daughter (on horseback) and her husband.  In response to this sonnet, Haydon began a portrait of Wordsworth, which he sent to Elizabeth Barrett Browning for her to view before he completed it. Elizabeth Barrett Browning wrote her own sonnet, "On a Portrait of Wordsworth," as a result.  Image:  Benjamin Robert Haydon, Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington (National Portrait Gallery).  This work is in the public domain in its country of origin and other countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 100 years or less.   Here is Wordsworth's sonnet:

By Art's bold privilege Warrior and War-horse stand
On ground yet strewn with their last battle's wreck;
Let the Steed glory while his Master's hand
Lies fixed for ages on his conscious neck;
But by the Chieftain's look, though at his side
Hangs that day's treasured sword, how firm a check
Is given to triumph and all human pride!
Yon trophied Mound shrinks to a shadowy speck
In his calm presence! Him the mighty deed
Elates not, brought far nearer the grave's rest,
As shows that time-worn face, for he such seed
Has sown as yields, we trust, the fruit of fame
In Heaven; hence no one blushes for thy name,
Conqueror, 'mid some sad thoughts, divinely blest!

circa. 1842

Haydon portrait of Wordsworth completed

In 1842 (exact date not known), Benjamin Robert Haydon completed his portrait of William Wordsworth, Wordsworth on Helvellyn.  Wordsworth is 72 years of age in the portrait.  The original, an oil on canvas, is 124 × 99 cm (48.8 × 39 in) and is owned by the National Portrait Gallery.  This work is in the public domain in its country of origin and other countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 100 years or less.

Haydon portrait of Wordsworth Benjamin Robert Haydon, Wordsworth on Helvellyn