With letters to his family, to Charles Lamb, Walter Scott, Sir Robert Peel and many others - Wordsworth was an indefatigable letter writer. In his and their correspondence, we see the development from rebellious child to radical poet, who, after years of rejection, obscurity and financial hardship, became sage and seer to a generation - and yet, aged sixty, was still the expert skater on Rydal Lake. Newly transcribed from the manuscripts, this edition of Wordsworth's letters contains previously unpublished material from almost six hundred letters and journals, drawn from fifty different locations in the UK and the US which will make it essential reading for every lover of English literature.