イングランドの詩人。カンブリア州(Cumbria)コカマス(Cockermouth)に生まれる。1798年、コールリッジ(Samuel Taylor Coleridge, 1772-1834)と共同で Lyrical Ballads with a Few Other Poems を出版、「イギリスロマン主義の画期的事件」と称された。第２版（1801年１月）に付されたワーズワースの「序文」も「ロマン派宣言書」と言われている。コールリッジは、この詩集における二人の役割分担について、Biographia Literaria (1817)で次のように述べている。

"[I]t was agreed, that my endeavours should be directed to persons and characters supernatural, or at least romantic; yet so as to transfer from our inward nature a human interest and a semblance of truth sufficient to procure for these shadows of imagination that willing suspension of disbelief for the moment, which constitutes poetic faith. Mr. Wordsworth, on the other hand, was to propose to himself as his object, to give the charm of novelty to things of every day, and to excite a feeling analogous to the supernatural, by awakening the mind's attention from the lethargy of custom, and directing it to the loveliness and the wonders of the world before us; an inexhaustible treasure, but for which, in consequence of the film of familiarity and selfish solicitude we have eyes, yet see not, ears that hear not, and hearts that neither feel nor understand." [S. T. Coleridge, Biographia Literaria, ed. J. Shawcross (1907; Oxford, 1958) 2: 5-6]

"Contrast, in this respect, the effect of Macpherson's publication with the Reliques of Percy, so unassuming, so modest in their pretensions! — I have already stated how much Germany is indebted to this latter work; and for our own country, its poetry has been absolutely redeemed by it. I do not think that there is an able writer in verse of the present day who would not be proud to acknowledge his obligations to the Reliques; I know that it is so with my friends; and, for myself, I am happy in this occasion to make a public avowal of my own." [W. J. B. Owen, and Jane Worthington Smyser, eds., The Prose Works of William Wordsworth, 3 vols. (Oxford, 1974) 3: 78]

1843年、サウジー(Robert Southey, 1774-1843)の後を受けて桂冠詩人となり、50年4月23日に亡くなったが、同年、1798年に書き始められていた大作自伝詩 The Prelude, or, Growth of a Poet's Mind の最終版が死後出版された。 (M. Y.)