WILLIAM BLAKE AND THE COMPLETE BREAK FROM CLASSICAL POETRY
(1757-1827)
GABRIELA FLOARE
SECOND YEAR
ROMANIAN –ENGLISH
NO. 5284
• 1. WILLIAM BLAKE’S PERSONA -THE PAINTER / THE POET / THE PHILOSOPHER
CONTENT • 2. BODY OF WORKS
• 3. CONCLUSIONS
WILLIAM BLAKE’S PERSONA
THE POET/THE PAINTER/THE PHILOSOPHER
• REBEL IN THE AGE OF REASON AND EMPIRISM –REALM OF PERCEPTIONS/‘DOORS OF PERCEPTION’
• REBEL AGAINST CLASSICS IN ARTS & INDUSTRY & STATE & CHURCH / MERCANTILISM,
MATERIALISM, HYPOCRISY AND CENSORSHIP
• INNOVATOR AND UNIQUE VOICE
• GENDER AND SEXUAL EQUALITY
• FREEDOM
• Poetical Sketches (Composed c. 1769-77) - teenage years BODY OF WORKS /
• Songs of Innocence (Composed 1789) – child like view - linked with SELECTION OF POEMS
( shifting perceptions)
• Songs of Experience (Composed 1794) -maturity
• Milton- a poem (Composed 1804)
• Prophetic Books (Composed 1804 – 20)
THE LAMB Little Lamb who made thee
Dost thou know who made thee
Gave thee life & bid thee feed.
By the stream & o’er the mead;
Gave thee clothing of delight,
Softest clothing wooly bright;
Gave thee such a tender voice,
Making all the vales rejoice!
Little Lamb who made thee
Dost thou know who made thee
Little Lamb I’ll tell thee,
Little Lamb I’ll tell thee!
He is called by thy name,
For he calls himself a Lamb:
He is meek & he is mild,
He became a little child:
I a child & thou a lamb,
We are called by his name.
Little Lamb God bless thee.
Little Lamb God bless thee
When the voices of children are heard on the green
“THE NURSE’S SONG”
And laughing is heard on the hill,
My heart is at rest within my breast
And every thing else is still
Then come home my children, the sun is gone down
And the dews of night arise
Come come leave off play, and let us away
Till the morning appears in the skies
No no let us play, for it is yet day
And we cannot go to sleep
Besides in the sky, the little birds fly
And the hills are all cover’d with sheep
Well well go & play till the light fades away
And then go home to bed
The little ones leaped & shouted & laugh’d
And all the hills ecchoed
To Mercy Pity Peace and Love, THE DIVINE IMAGE
All pray in their distress:
And to these virtues of delight
Return their thankfulness.
For Mercy Pity Peace and Love,
Is God our father dear:
And Mercy Pity Peace and Love,
Is Man his child and care.
For Mercy has a human heart
Pity, a human face:
And Love, the human form divine,
And Peace, the human dress.
Then every man of every clime,
That prays in his distress,
Prays to the human form divine
Love Mercy Pity Peace.
And all must love the human form,
In heathen, turk or jew.
Where Mercy, Love & Pity dwell,
There God is dwelling too
HOLY THURSDAY ’Twas on a Holy Thursday their innocent faces clean
The children walking two & two in red & blue & green
Grey headed beadles walk’d before with wands as white as
snow
Till into the high dome of Pauls they like Thames waters flow
O what a multitude they seem’d these flowers of London town
Seated in companies they sit with radiance all their own
The hum of multitudes was there but multitudes of lambs
Thousands of little boys & girls raising their innocent hands
Now like a mighty wind they raise to heaven the voice of song
Or like harmonious thunderings the seats of heaven among
Beneath them sit the aged men wise guardians of the poor
Then cherish pity, lest you drive an angel from your door
• Tyger Tyger, burning bright, “THE TYGER”
In the forests of the night;
What immortal hand or eye,
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?
In what distant deeps or skies.
Burnt the fire of thine eyes?
On what wings dare he aspire?
What the hand, dare seize the fire?
And what shoulder, & what art,
Could twist the sinews of thy heart?
And when thy heart began to beat,
What dread hand? & what dread feet?
What the hammer? what the chain,
In what furnace was thy brain?
What the anvil? what dread grasp,
Dare its deadly terrors clasp!
When the stars threw down their spears
And water’d heaven with their tears:
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the Lamb make thee?
Tyger Tyger burning bright,
In the forests of the night:
What immortal hand or eye,
Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?
LONDON I wander thro’ each charter’d street,
Near where the charter’d Thames does flow.
And mark in every face I meet
Marks of weakness, marks of woe.
In every cry of every Man,
In every Infants cry of fear,
In every voice: in every ban,
The mind-forg’d manacles I hear
How the Chimney-sweepers cry
Every black’ning Church appalls,
And the hapless Soldiers sigh
Runs in blood down Palace walls
But most thro’ midnight streets I hear
How the youthful Harlots curse
Blasts the new-born Infants tear
THE SICK
ROSE
O Rose thou art sick.
The invisible worm,
That flies in the night
In the howling storm:
Has found out thy bed
Of crimson joy:
And his dark secret love
Does thy life destroy.
JERUSALEM
And did those feet in ancient time
Walk upon England's mountains green?
And was the Holy Lamb of God
On England's pleasant pastures seen?
And did the Countenance Divine
Shine forth upon our clouded hills?
And was Jerusalem build here
Amongst these dark satanic mills?
Bring me my bow of burning gold
Bring me my arrows of desire
Bring me my spear: O clouds unfold!
Bring me my Chariot of Fire.
I will not cease from mental fight
Nor shall my sword sleep in my hand
Till we have built Jerusalem
In England's green and pleasant land.
CONCLUSIONS
• (PRE)ROMANTIC ?
• HAUNTING MEANING
• SIMBOLS
• IMPORTANCE
SOURCES
• "William Blake." Encyclopedia-type introduction to Blake, his biography, themes, and techniques, with
text for some of his most famous poems. Published by The Poetry Foundation, a project of
(Poetry magazine).
• "William Blake." A brief biography and introduction to William Blake, and text for some of his best-
known poems. From the prestigious Academy of American Poets.
• "Poet's Corner - William Blake." A short biography from educational publisher Gale/Cengage.
• "William Blake Online." Contents: "One of the Gothic artists" (a chronology of Blake's life); "In the
furnace of Lambeth's Vale" (maps sites in London that have a link to Blake); "Chambers of the
Imagination" (examines the characters in Blake's work);
