LIFE AND WORKS William Blake → London, 1757 = Pre-romantic, because of the themes he dealt with and the original symbols he used; because of his interest in the contemporary social conditions. → his origins were humble → he was trained as an engraver when he was a boy After completing his apprentice ship, he studied at the Royal Academy of Arts → as a painter and an engraver, he broke with the conventions of perspective and proportions, and created a new kind of art which emphasised the power of the imagination. A political freethinker→ he supported the French Revolution and remained a radical throughout his life Blake had a strong sense of religion = the most important literary influence in his life was the Bible His experiences contributed to the development of his poetry → is regarded as early Romantic because he rejected neoclassical literary style and themes → he emphasised the importance of imagination over reason He created the method of ‘illuminated printing’ which combined picture and poetic text. → The Tyger, 1794 The poetic collections: o Songs of Innocence (1789) o Songs of Experience (1794) Blake also published prophetic books in which he created a complex personal mythology: o The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1790s) o Visions of the daughters of Albion (1793) o America: A Prophecy (1793) o Europe: A Prophecy (1794) London, 1827 → died SONGS OF INNOCENCE AND SONGS OF EXPERIENCE Songs of Innocence → produced before the outbreak of the French Revolution = when Blake’s enthusiasm for the liberal ideas was high. The narrator = is a shepherd → receives inspiration from a child to pipe his songs celebrating the divine in all creation. symbols = lambs, flowers and children playing on the village green. childhood = as the symbol of innocence, a state of the soul connected with happiness, freedom and imagination. language = is simple and musical.

Songs of Experience → appeared during the period of the Terror in France. = Blake created the counterpart of the songs of the innocent shepherd. → a more pessimistic view of life emerges in these ‘songs’ → ‘Experience’ = identified with adulthood, coexists with and completes two opposite states of the soul, related to, respectively, childhood and adulthood. The older, the more experienced (= corrupted). The child is the emblem of innocence, therefore connected with happiness, freedom and imagination. The adult has experience of the world and consequently grows pessimistic by knowing what suffering, violence and injustice are. IMAGINATION AND THE POET Blake → considered imagination as the means through which man could know the world. Imagination, or ‘the Divine Vision’ = means ‘to see more, beyond material reality, into the life of things’. God, the child and the poet = share this power of vision, which is also the power of creating things. BLAKE’S INTEREST IN SOCIAL PROBLEMS Blake = was concerned with the political and social problems of his time → he supported the abolition of slavery and the egalitarian principles of the French Revolution. He believed in revolution as purifying violence necessary for the redemption of man. Later, disillusioned, he focused his attention on the evil consequences of the Industrial Revolution: the injustices caused by a materialistic attitude and the commercial exploitation of human beings. STYLE Blake’s poems → have a simple structure and an original use of symbols. His verse → is linear and rhythmical = it shows a close relationship between sound and meaning and is characterised by the frequent use of repetition. COMPLEMENTARY OPPOSITE Blake’s Christianity was not liturgical or moralistic. → He believed in the reality of a spiritual world but regarded Christianity, and the Church as responsible for the fragmentation of consciousness and the dualism characterising man’s life. To this dualistic view he substituted his vision of ‘complementary opposites’: good and evil, male and female, reason and imagination, cruelty and kindness. For Blake contrary states exist not in linear sequence, but in parallel → they are simultaneous. = The possibility of progress, of achieving the knowledge of what we are, lies in the tension between opposite states of mind. → THE LAMB Themes: innocence, the child, creation, God, the poet.