Editing William Wordsworth (section)

=== Family and education ===
{{Main|Early life of William Wordsworth}}

The second of five children born to John Wordsworth and Ann Cookson, William Wordsworth was born on 7 April 1770 in what is now named [[Wordsworth House]] in [[Cockermouth]], Cumberland (now in Cumbria),<ref>{{NHLE |num=1327088 |desc=Wordsworth House |access-date=21 December 2009}}</ref> part of the scenic region in northwestern England known as the [[Lake District]]. William's sister, the poet and diarist [[Dorothy Wordsworth]], to whom he was close all his life, was born the following year, and the two were baptised together. They had three other siblings: Richard, the eldest, who became a lawyer; John Wordsworth, born after Dorothy, who went to sea and died in 1805 when the ship of which he was captain, the ''[[Earl of Abergavenny (1796 EIC ship)|Earl of Abergavenny]]'', was wrecked off the south coast of England; and [[Christopher Wordsworth (divine)|Christopher]], the youngest, who entered the Church and rose to be Master of [[Trinity College, Cambridge]].<ref>{{cite book|section=Appendix A (Past Governors)|last1=Allport|first1=Denison Howard|first2=Norman J.|last2=Friskney|title=A Short History of Wilson's School|publisher=Wilson's School Charitable Trust|year=1986|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=iyQxGwAACAAJ}}</ref>

Wordsworth's father was a legal representative of [[James Lowther, 1st Earl of Lonsdale]] and, through his connections, lived in a large mansion in the small town. He was frequently away from home on business, so the young William and his siblings had little involvement with him and remained distant until he died in 1783.<ref>Moorman 1968 pp. 5–7.</ref> However, he did encourage William in his reading, and in particular, set him to commit large portions of verse to memory, including works by [[John Milton|Milton]], [[William Shakespeare|Shakespeare]] and [[Edmund Spenser|Spenser]] which William would pore over in his father's library. William also spent time at his mother's parents' house in [[Penrith, Cumbria|Penrith]], Cumberland, where he was exposed to the moors but did not get along with his grandparents or uncle, who also lived there. His hostile interactions with them distressed him to the point of contemplating suicide.<ref>Moorman 1968:9–13.</ref>

Wordsworth was taught to read by his mother, and he first attended a tiny school of low quality in Cockermouth, then a school in Penrith for the children of upper-class families. He was taught there by Ann Birkett, who instilled in her students traditions that included pursuing scholarly and local activities, especially the festivals around Easter, May Day and [[Shrove Tuesday]]. Wordsworth was taught both the Bible and the ''[[The Spectator (1711)|Spectator]]'', but little else. At the school in Penrith, he met the Hutchinsons, including Mary Hutchinson, who later became his wife.<ref>Moorman 1968:15–18.</ref>

After the death of Wordsworth's mother, in 1778, his father sent him to [[Hawkshead Grammar School]] in [[Lancashire]] (now in [[Cumbria]]) and sent Dorothy to live with relatives in [[Yorkshire]]. She and William did not meet again for nine years.

Wordsworth debuted as a writer in 1787 when he published a sonnet in ''[[The European Magazine]]''. That same year he began attending [[St John's College, Cambridge]]. He received his BA degree in 1791.<ref>{{acad|id=WRDT787W|name=Wordsworth, William}}</ref> He returned to Hawkshead for the first two summers of his time at Cambridge and often spent later holidays on [[Hiking#Walking tours today|walking tours]], visiting places famous for the beauty of their [[landscape]]. In 1790, he went on a walking tour of Europe, during which he toured the [[Alps]] extensively and visited nearby areas of France, Switzerland, and Italy.<ref name="Bennett2015">{{cite book|author=Andrew Bennett|title=William Wordsworth in Context|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=XPtDBgAAQBAJ&pg=PA191|date=12 February 2015|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-1-107-02841-8|page=191}}</ref>