06Blake&Burns

William Blake (1757-1827)

British poet, painter, visionary mystic, and engraver, who illustrated and printed his own books.

To see a W orld in a Grain of Sand

And a Heaven in a Wild Flower,

Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand

And Eternity in an hour.

Often called a romantic poet or a forerunner of Romanticism in England, because his poetry shows some features of romantic spirit; he is opposed to neo-classicism, and his poetry is marked by imagination, feeling and originality.

Religiously a dissenter; politically a radical, sympathetic to the American and French revolutions and to the spirit of freedom. Considered eccentric and incomprehensible in his time; but in 20th c recognized as one of the greatest of English poets. Today, he is known both for his poetry and his drawings of Biblical subjects, his illustrations of Dante and other artistic works. Both an artist and a poet.

Poetic works:

Two main categories: the lyrics and the prophecies.

Of the lyrics the most important are the Songs of Innocence(1789) and Songs of Experience(1794). The two volumes form a contrast and reflect two widely different views of life. Innocence and experience represent two contrary states in the development of human soul; the two different stages of life: childhood and adulthood. The first volume

presents a happy and innocent world, though not without its evils and sufferings. The keynote is happy and delightful; the poems show the happy and carefree state of innocent children before they know anything about the hardships and misery of life and evils of society. In the eyes of children the world is beautiful and peaceful, full of kindness and sympathy.

The second volume paints a different world, a world of misery, poverty, disease, war and repression with a melancholy tone. The speakers in the second book have grown up, gained experience from reality, know enough about life and society; the orphans and the little chimney-sweepers are living in misery and coldness; London is no longer a paradise, but becomes the city of poverty and despair. The two books hold the similar subject-matter, but the tone, emphasis and conclusion differ.

The second category is the prophecies:including French Revolution, America, Europe, the Book of Los, Vala, Jerusalem, Milton, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell etc. These became more and more philosophical, symbolic and mystical; Blake tried to give his account of the creation of the world and the nature of God; even a complete account of human history, from the beginning to the present day. For these poems he is called a prophet, because he often had visions of the future and gave warnings about the development of human society. Despite their importance and high value, they are seldom read by ordinary readers.

The characteristics of Blake’s poetry:

1. plain and direct language

2. lyric beauty with immense compression of meaning

3. visual images used to embody abstract ideas

4. symbolism in wide range

London

Taken from Songs of Experience.The speaker wanders through the streets of London and comments on his observations. He sees despair in the faces of the people he meets and hears fear and repression in their voices.

It gives a comprehensive picture of the many miseries, physical and spiritual, in the English capital.

chartered--- to hire or rent for exclusive use A chartered street is a street that is rented out to some private company for exclusive use, or monopolized by it. Everything in this urban space--even the natural River Thames--submits to being "charter'd,".

the church and the palace--- institutions of power--the clergy, the government--are rendered by synecdoche, by mention of the places in which they reside.

"mind-forg'd manacles," ---more powerful than material chains could ever be.

. "Marriage hearse," ---a vehicle in which love and desire combine with death and destruction. Sexual and marital union--the place of possible regeneration and rebirth--are tainted by the blight of venereal disease. Thus the wedding is turned into a funeral.

The poem is written in quatrains, with alternate lines rhyming. Repetition is the most striking formal feature of the poem, and it serves to emphasize the prevalence of the horrors the speaker describes.

The Tiger

"The Tiger" consists entirely of unanswered questions, and the poet leaves us to awe at

the complexity of creation, the sheer magnitude of God's power, and the mysteriousness of divine will.

The tiger is strikingly beautiful yet also horrific in its capacity for violence. What kind of a God, then, could or would design such a terrifying beast as the tiger? In more general terms, what does the undeniable existence of evil and violence in the world tell us about the nature of God, and what does it mean to live in a world where a being can at once contain both beauty and horror?

Blake's tiger becomes the symbolic center for an investigation into the presence of evil in the world.

The poem is comprised of six quatrains in rhymed couplets. The meter is regular and rhythmic, its hammering beat suggestive of the smithy that is the poem's central image. Questions:

1. What are the differences of The Songs of Innocence and The Songs of Experience?

2. What are the characteristic of Blake’s poetry?

Robert Burns (1759-96)

The national poet of Scotland; wrote chiefly in Scottish dialect; published his first vo lume in 1786, “ Poems Chiefly in the Scottish Dialect”; his themes vary: love and friendship, natural beauty of his native Scotland, the life and labor of the common people, the patriotism of his people and their struggle for liberty; satires on the corruption and hypocrisy of the clergy and high society. His poetry is noted for its beautiful lyricism and sincerity of emotions, and is characterized by a profound sympathy for the down-trodden people. He ranks among the greatest poets Britain has ever produced.

A Red Red Rose

Simple language, sincere feelings, beautiful melody, written essentially in the ballad stanza, rhyming abcb

Figures: alliteration, assonance, repetition, parallelism, simile, metaphor, hyperbole.

The Scottish words give a national coloring and the archaic words (art, thee) create a sense of formality.