A De Manian Reading of
Tintern Abbey
4
Paul de Man repeatedly turns to Romantic poetry—especially Wordsworth—not because it is rhetorically weak, but because it is rhetorically ambitious. Romantic lyric attempts to assert unity between mind and nature, self and world, memory and presence. It articulates claims about consciousness, history, and transcendence. For de Man, such claims are precisely where rhetoric intervenes to undo philosophical assurance. Wordsworth’s “Tintern Abbey,” often read as affirmation of recovered unity and spiritual maturation, becomes—under de Manian scrutiny—an allegory of belatedness and rhetorical instability.
This essay argues that “Tintern Abbey” does not achieve symbolic reconciliation between self and nature; rather, it allegorizes the impossibility of such reconciliation. Its rhetoric reveals that presence is always mediated, that identity is temporally fractured, and that memory functions not as recovery but as figural substitution.
I. Symbolic Aspiration and Allegorical Temporality
De Man distinguishes sharply between symbol and allegory. Symbol implies simultaneity—an organic fusion of sign and meaning, part and whole. Allegory, by contrast, marks temporal distance; it acknowledges that meaning is deferred, that representation stands in for what cannot be present.
“Tintern Abbey” appears to enact symbolic unity. The poet revisits a landscape after five years and claims a deepened communion with nature. He describes “a sense sublime / Of something far more deeply interfused,” suggesting transcendental integration.
Yet the poem’s temporal structure destabilizes this unity. The present scene is immediately mediated by recollection of earlier visits. The opening assertion—“Five years have passed”—establishes temporal distance as foundational. The landscape is not encountered freshly; it is already layered by memory.
Thus, the poem’s claim to unity unfolds through belatedness. The present moment depends upon absence.
II. Memory as Rhetorical Supplement
Wordsworth credits memory with sustaining him during urban exile. The remembered image of nature provided “tranquil restoration.” Memory appears restorative, secondary to original perception yet capable of reanimating it.
From a de Manian perspective, memory functions as supplement—a concept also central to Derrida but deployed rhetorically by de Man. The supplement claims to add to something complete, yet reveals that the original was incomplete from the start.
If nature required memory to sustain it, then immediacy was never sufficient. The remembered image replaces the original perception, but this replacement signals lack. Memory does not recover presence; it produces a new textualized version of experience.
Thus, the poem allegorizes not unity but substitution.
III. The Divided Self
The speaker contrasts his youthful passion with his present maturity. Earlier, nature stirred “aching joys” and “dizzy raptures.” Now, he experiences reflective calm.
This temporal comparison appears developmental—a narrative of growth. Yet de Man would emphasize that this growth requires division. The earlier self becomes object of contemplation. The speaker cannot coincide with his past identity.
Identity is therefore not continuous but split across time. The present self interprets the past self as other.
This temporal fracture undermines the symbolic ideal of unified subjectivity. The self is allegorical—defined by its distance from itself.
IV. The Rhetoric of Transcendence
One of the poem’s most frequently cited passages describes:
“A sense sublime
Of something far more deeply interfused…”
The abstraction here is notable. The phrase “something far more deeply interfused” gestures toward transcendence yet refuses precise definition. The rhetoric depends on vagueness.
For de Man, such abstraction signals the triumph of trope over reference. The poem aspires to philosophical insight, yet its language cannot anchor the referent. “Something” remains indeterminate.
The transcendental claim dissolves into rhetorical gesture.
V. Apostrophe and Prosopopoeia
In the latter section, the speaker addresses his sister Dorothy, projecting onto her his own earlier passion. This apostrophe appears to stabilize meaning through shared emotional continuity.
However, apostrophe is inherently rhetorical—it animates an addressee who remains silent. Dorothy does not speak. Her interiority is inaccessible.
De Man often highlights prosopopoeia, the figure by which language gives face or voice to the absent. In “Tintern Abbey,” nature itself is personified as teacher and guardian. Yet this animation is rhetorical construction.
The poem’s appeal to living presence depends on figurative language that exposes its artificiality.
VI. The Illusion of Ethical Closure
The poem concludes with a benediction. The speaker hopes Dorothy will remember this moment as he remembers his past. This recursive structure appears consoling.
Yet the gesture projects the present into future memory in advance. Experience becomes immediately subject to repetition and reinterpretation.
Closure is therefore illusory. The poem ends by institutionalizing deferral.
VII. Blindness and Insight
De Man’s concept of “blindness and insight” suggests that texts articulate truths they cannot fully comprehend.
“Tintern Abbey” seeks to demonstrate reconciliation between mind and nature. Yet its rhetoric—temporal layering, figurative abstraction, apostrophic animation—reveals that such reconciliation depends on substitution and distance.
The poem’s insight into continuity is shadowed by blindness to its rhetorical mediation.
De Manian Structural Summary
| De Man Concept | Manifestation in “Tintern Abbey” | Deconstructive Effect |
|---|---|---|
| Symbol vs Allegory | Claim of unity with nature | Unity undermined by temporal distance |
| Supplement | Memory replacing perception | Presence revealed as incomplete |
| Divided Self | Youth vs maturity | Identity fractured across time |
| Rhetoric vs Reference | “Something far more deeply interfused” | Transcendence indeterminate |
| Prosopopoeia | Nature and Dorothy addressed | Presence constructed rhetorically |
| Blindness/Insight | Poem asserts harmony | Rhetoric exposes mediation |
| Allegory of Reading | Self interpreting past self | Meaning always belated |
Conclusion
From a de Manian perspective, “Tintern Abbey” is not a triumphant articulation of Romantic transcendence but an allegory of rhetorical temporality. Wordsworth’s poem aspires to symbolic unity, yet its language continually defers presence, divides identity, and substitutes memory for immediacy.
Romantic insight becomes inseparable from rhetorical blindness. The poem teaches not the stability of self and nature, but the inevitability of mediation.
In this sense, Wordsworth becomes exemplary for de Man: Romanticism reveals the impossibility of the unity it proclaims.
