The Reverie of "Poor" Susan: Financially or Emotionally?

William Wordsworths poem, “A Reverie of Poor Susan”, is one that is full of dream like images while still having a bitter tone. At first glimpse of the title, I assumed that the speaker, Susan, was financially deprived seeing as she was described as “poor”. After critically analyzing the poem, it was significant that Susan seemed to be bereaved and full of depression. I then began to decide whether or not Susan is poor economically, or emotionally.

In the poem, we see that Susan may be economically poor for a handful of reasons. In the first line of the poem, we see that Susan is “at the corner or Wood Street”. Although I am not familiar with the streets of England, my professor informed my class and I that this is a street in an urban, impoverished area of London. So right from the beginning, we see Susan walking around in a poor part of the city which is most likely where she is living. Her location also makes her seem financially poor in line eight where she states that she was looking around “Cheapside”. Now again, I am not aware of the streets of London, but just the name, Cheapside, gives a clue that this part of the city is “cheap” or poor.

Susan may also be financially poor because of the growth of the cities in England. In her dream like states in lines eleven and twelve, Susan is seeing the “small cottage” which is “the only one dwelling on Earth that she loves”. In my opinion, Susan seems to have lived in the rural part of England before moving to the city. This was where the cottage was, and like many others, was forced to move to the urban part of England so she could make money. Most people in England who lived in the rural parts were farmers and hen cities began to grow, they were not doing as well as they had before. This, of course, forced them to move to the city so they could provide for themselves and their families.

It is also a possibility that Susan was emotionally “poor” and that this feeling had nothing to do with finances or money. She may have just been sad that she is not living in that cottage she loved so much in the rural area. She may also had been forced to move to the city (which I am sure made many people sad), and was depressed because of the big change of her live. Susan was most likely depressed because she was not living a urban life and her heart was no longer in heaven like it was when she thought about her rural life.