Essay on A Reading of William Blake’s London - 1688 Words

A Reading of William Blake’s London William Blake channels his general dissatisfaction of the organization of society during the late eighteenth century in his lyrical poem entitled â€Å"London† (1794). Blake uses vividly expressive language through the spoken observations of a symbolic character he created to narrate and recite social and political problems afflicting this metropolis in the late 1700’s and early 1800’s. The poem’s rhythmically patterned linear style, which is very strictly structured, reinforces its central theme: that oppression will be revisited. Blake’s use of such elements of poetry as setting and situation, diction and tone, structure and form, symbols and images, sound and rhyme, and rhythm and meter to convey this†¦show more content†¦Just as the insistence on rational, formal, and conventional subject matter that had typified neoclassicism was reversed, the authoritarian regimes that had encouraged and sustained neoclassicism in the arts were inevi tably subjected to these popular revolutions. Effected by a century of wars and citizen revolutions, the writers were stimulated by the creative activity of the French Revolution; thus literature often criticized the oppressive nature of government. Political and social causes became dominant themes in romantic poetry and prose throughout the Western world, producing many vital human documents that are still pertinent. The first stanza of Blake’s poem is critical to its central meaning because the Romantic era was marked with the indictment of the metropolis; and consequently directly sketches the political and social picture in London as that of dark, squalid, authoritative, and tyrannical city. The repetition of the word â€Å"charter† (3, 4) illustrates the municipality’s strict control over its nation. The fact that the streets, which are artificial or man-made structures, as well as the river, a natural stream of water, are both defined by law emphasizes th e state of affairs in the regulated city. Both the streets and the river follow a fixed direction in the landscape of the city, indicating the strict order of the urban center as mandated by its government. The visualShow MoreRelated How London is Portrayed in Composed upon Westminster Bridge and London531 Words   |  3 PagesHow London is Portrayed in Composed upon Westminster Bridge and London William Wordsworths poem, Composed upon Westminster Bridge written in 1904 looks at the positive side of London city and it natural Beauty. Whereas William Blake wrote the poem, London in 1794, the poem is negative towards authority and politics. The theme of the two poems is the city of London and how different people preserve it. All bright and glittering in the smokeless air (line 8) is a romantic viewRead MoreThe Human Abstract Essay1196 Words   |  5 Pagesmanifestations in Blakes manuscripts, reading it against A Divine Image, a poem w hich was never finally published by Blake, or comparing it to its Innocence counterpart, The Divine Image. 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Blake wrote his world famous Songs of Innocence in 1789 and later combined it with additional poems titled Songs of Innocence and ofRead MoreAnalysis of London by William Blake Essay991 Words   |  4 Pagesand to a point experience what it would have felt to live in that era. This is the case with William Blake’s poem London. London not only describes the horrid condition of England’s lower class during the industrial revolution but it also connects this description with a strong emotion r esponse from the speaker. Blake’s stylistic and structure choices through out the poem paint a dark and morbid view of London but the emotion of the poem remains divide. The words of the poem’s speaker evokes both sympathyRead MoreEssay about William Blake’s Poetry1541 Words   |  7 PagesWilliam Blake’s Poetry William Blake was one of those 19th century figures who could have and should have been beatniks, along with Rimbaud, Verlaine, Manet, Cezanne and Whitman. He began his career as an engraver and artist, and was an apprentice to the highly original Romantic painter Henry Fuseli. In his own time he was valued as an artist, and created a set of watercolor illustrations for the Book of Job that were so wildly but subtly colored they would have looked perfectly at home inRead MoreAnalysis Of Alasdair Gray s Songs Of Innocence And Of Experience1583 Words   |  7 Pagesself-illustrated novel Lanark (1981) and in comic books or ‘graphic novels’ by writers such as Alan Moore and Neil Gaiman. With regards to English Romantic poet William Blake, both his lyrical Songs of Innocence and of Experience (1789-94) and his prophetic poems of epic length were conceived as an intermedial work made up of text and illustration. Blake’s collection of poems; Songs of Innocence and of Experience Showing the Two Contrary States of the Human Soul (1789-94) seemingly concerns contradictoryRead MoreEssay about The Representation of the Female in William Blake1921 Words   |  8 PagesRepresentation of the Female in William Blake If William Blake was, as Northrop Frye described him in his prominent book Fearful Symmetry, a mystic enraptured with incommunicable visions, standing apart, a lonely and isolated figure, out of touch with his own age and without influence on the following one (3), time has proved to be the visionarys most celebrated ally, making him one of the most frequently written about poets of the English language. William Blake has become, in a sense