How painfully this traditional style cramps great writers whom it happens not to suit, is curiously seen in Wordsworth, who was bold enough to break through it, and, at the risk of contemporary neglect, to frame a style of his own.
Walter Bagehot: “How painfully this traditional style cramps great writers whom it happens not to suit, is curiously seen in Wordsworth…”
Editor's note · Context
Bagehot illustrates how traditional styles can stifle innovative writers, using Wordsworth as an example.
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We have thus a whole group of ancient republics of non-Aryan race, and one which, being more ancient than the classical republics, could not have borrowed from or imitated them.
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But all men heed great results, and a change of Government is a great result.





