The extract from "The Prelude" is written mainly in the first person singular and in the past tense, reminiscing about a happy winters day when Wordsworth was a child.

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            The extract from "The Prelude" is written mainly in the first person singular and in the past tense, reminiscing about  a happy winters day when Wordsworth was a child. Wordsworth wrote this poem in 1798, when he was 28 years old, looking back on his childhood which was spent largely among mountains at Hawkshead where he was educated.

            The sonnet "Composed upon Westminster Bridge" is written mainly in the third person in the present tense and describes the skyline of London from above the Thames and is set early in the morning. Wordsworth never lived in London and was not familiar with the bustling city that he was passing through. The sonnet describes the tranquillity of the city before everyone wakes up and goes about their usual daily routine. This poem is probably the more accurate of the two poems because Wordsworth could see the view whilst he was composing the sonnet, whereas "The Prelude" was written looking back, so some memories could have been forgotten, exaggerated or distorted in some way.

            The sonnet is fourteen lines long and all of the lines share the same approximate length of about ten syllables, forming a square shape on the page.  The extract from "The Prelude" is twenty four lines long and all the lines are also approximately the same length as each other. The extract is part of a longer piece, therefore it is incomplete, whereas the sonnet is complete, giving a much fuller and therefore clearer picture.

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            "The Prelude" is more like a continuous piece of prose, telling a story, with no rhyming couplets or rhyming pattern. "Composed upon Westminster Bridge" appears to have quite a random rhyming pattern for the majority of the poem, with an A,B,A,B,A,B rhyming pattern in the last sestet, maybe to emphasise this part of the poem.

            In many ways the two poems are contrasting. For example, "Composed upon Westminster Bridge" is written at sunrise and the extract from "The Prelude" is written about the time just before sunset. "The Prelude" involves other children playing games on the ice, with ...

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