The most interesting part of Wordsworth’s “Tintern Abbey,” in my opinon, was towards the end of the poem, where he makes it clear that he is speaking to his sister. Up until this point, the poem focuses on the speaker’s changing relationship with nature: he compares his youthful love of pretty, pastoral scenes to his new relationship with nature, which involves a more emotional experience and inner connection. The speaker paints this as a consequence of life’s burden, the “heavy and weary weight/of all this unintelligible world” (ll. 39-40). However, the speaker’s sister is a living reminder of his younger perception of the world. Her presence brings back his younger self – he describes, “in thy voice I catch/ The language of my former heart, and read/My former pleasures in the shooting lights/Of thy wild eyes” (ll. 116-118). I think there is an interesting tension there – it’s never made explicit whether the sister is younger or older, and I think that distinction gives weight to different interpretations. If the sister is younger than the author, then it is possible that their relationship is similar to that seen in “I Have a Young Sister” from earlier this semester – the speaker could see himself and his youthfulness in his sister and be reminded in that sense. If the sister is similar in age or older, then it lends itself to a different reading – the sister could remind the speaker of his younger self because she’s known him in both forms. In some ways, siblings are the people that you know for the longest time – you meet them (often) before having any children and say goodbye to them (again, ordinarily) after any parents. In this sense, a sister could be a living capsule of memories that would contain the speaker at every point in his life, and therefore be a living reminder of his younger self.