Enclosure and Productivity in Simon Lee

Like "Goody Blake and Harry Gill," "Simon Lee," also addresses the enclosure movement but seems to criticize different aspects of its ideology. As we learned in class, the reason members of Parliament were convinced to divide up and privatize common land was because they thought this would lead to a more productive use of the plots. Yet Wordsworth argues that enclosing land doesn't always lead to increased productivity. Wordsworth explains how Simon Lee enclosed his patch of land in his youth but is no longer able to farm it, "This scrap of land he from the heath / Enclosed when he was stronger; / But what avails the land to them, / Which they can till no longer?" Wordsworth repeatedly emphasizes how lean and sick Simon Lee has grown in contrast to his days as a stout huntsman and how he is unable to produce much of anything despite how hard he works. This fact is mirrored in the structure of the Ballad. The Ballad form is usually used to tell a story, but "Simon Lee" fails to achieve this end, just like Simon Lee's work fails to produce any returns.