In the Preface to Lyrical Ballads which is considered the Manifesto of Romantic Poetry, Wordsworth indicates the main characteristics the new kind of poetry shoul have.

Accordind to Wordsworth, the subject matter of Romantic Poetry should deal with incidents (something happened without a specific reason) and situations from ordinary/common/ everyday life.

The poets should chose low and rustic life because in that condition the immediate passions can reach their fulness and are less conditional.

Poetry should use a language really used by common people, a language made by simple words and expressions, direct, immediate, more effective, natural, emphatic and unrestrained.

The poet has to use a selected language (because he should chose or delete some elements) in order to present ordinary events to the mind in a unusual manner.

This is because is necessary to use immagination applied to the language to catch the reader's attention, to rise couriosity and interest.

The subject matter of the poems becomes more interesting if the poet uses the same kind of expressions of a man who is emotionally involved.

This is because poetry has to act on the emotions, it has to provoke feelings.

The language poets should use is without artifices because it is born from the direct contact with nature. Nature represents also the way a man feels inside.

Furthermore, the feelings coexist in a state of greater simplicity when a man is in contact with humple people.

In that condition a man is truer and can be actually himself.

The emotions can be contemplated and communicated with more efficacy.

Wordsworth exposes the poet's qualities which are a higher level of sensibility, of enthusiasm and tenderness. The poet has an inclusive attitude, he is proactive and delighted by volitions and passions. He is also affected by absent things because he is able to imagine them.

All this qualities concern the human sphere.

Wordsworth describes the creative act of poetry as a process which grows from the poet's ability to recreate and to evoke emotions in his mind just remembering a stricking situation or experience he has already lived. The emotions and feelings recreated by the poet are similar to those he has already felt. The creative act happens only when the poet is in tranquillity. The poet is able to trasform his thoughts and passions into a written form so a poem can be created.