Which of the following is not true about “Lyrical ballads”?

The correct option is: It is very particular about the form and structure of a poem.

Lyrical Ballads, first published in 1798 by William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge, is a landmark work that marked the beginning of the Romantic movement in English literature. It represented a major rebellion against the prevailing neoclassical poetic standards of the eighteenth century.

Let us break down why the chosen option is correct by examining the truth of each statement:

1. It is a manifesto of romantic poetry (True):
The famous Preface to the Lyrical Ballads (added in the 1800 edition) serves as the primary manifesto of Romanticism. In it, Wordsworth outlines the revolutionary principles of the new poetry, defining it as "the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings."

2. It turns English poetry away from the social and intellectual sophistication of the seventeenth and the eighteenth-century poetry (True):
Neoclassical poetry (by writers like Alexander Pope and John Dryden) focused heavily on wit, social decorum, intellectual satire, and urban life. Lyrical Ballads consciously turned away from this elitist sophistication, choosing instead to focus on the incidents and situations of common, rustic, and humble life.

3. It takes poetry out of the confines of reason and intellect to the unravished and unspoilt beauties of nature (True):
The poems reject the rigid rationality of the Enlightenment era, elevating imagination, intuition, and the emotional, sublime experience of the natural world.

4. It is very particular about the form and structure of a poem (Not True / Correct Answer):
Wordsworth and Coleridge sought to break free from the artificial rules, rigid structures (such as heroic couplets), and elevated poetic diction of the past. Wordsworth advocated for using "the language really used by men" and believed that a poem's form should shape itself organically based on the emotion being expressed, rather than conforming to strict, pre-established structural templates. Because Lyrical Ballads pushed for liberation from rigid poetic forms, this statement is false, making it the correct option for this question.