The World Is Too Much With Us

In “The World is Too Much With Us,” William Wordsworth utilizes literary devices such as tone, personification, and allusion to address how the growth of industry has influenced people to become disconnected with nature. Through the traditional structure of a Petrarchan sonnet, Wordsworth conveys a negative attitude towards these industrial changes and how the changes are too drastic even for religion to fix. The author uses the volta, the traditional shift of a Petrarchan sonnet between the octave and sestet, to respond to the spiritual losses caused by materialism. The poem communicates to the audience that the expansion of industry causes people to overlook the beauty of nature. Wordsworth conveys different tones throughout the poem to address that how the overwhelming fixation of materialism is causing people to lose touch with nature as well as their own souls. There is an evident tone of dissatisfaction in the entirety of the poem. The author groups society as a whole when he says, “Getting and spending,
Though the material things people wish for have evolved from a steam locomotive to the newest iPhone, the obsession with material goods has remained unchanged. The frustration that Wordsworth asserts with people becoming disconnected with nature is similar to the feelings that parents have about their kids today. The popularity of video games and similar technology has influenced many kids to never gain an appreciation for nature. The want for these new technologies result in kids of this generation remaining disinterested in the beauty that nature has to offer. The growth of industry and technology is inevitable in the world today, and has taken over a lot of the natural world. Wordsworth would be appalled by the dominant role technology plays in society today and how many rely on technology for