Selected poetry and letters [of] William Blake

by William Blake

William Blake's first biographer, Alexander Gilchrist, wanted to believe that Blake was a "new kind of man; and hence his was a new kind of art, and a new kind of poetry." However, what sets William Blake apart as a great poet and artist was not that he was so "new," but that he was so "old." He was a part of a mytho-poetic and Vatic tradition as old as poetry itself. Blake was heir to a mytho-poetic tradition that can be traced back to the very foundations of human thought and speech. The extraordinary in William Blake was not the "man," but his Vision and how he expressed it. But most (if not all) of Blake's contemporaries, and a great many since, wrote Blake's genius off as madness. Gilchrist explained, "it is only within that last century and a half [that] the faculty of seeing visions could have been one to bring a man's sanity into question." But divine inspiration has always been the hallmark of mythological poetry and religious prophetic utterance, and Daemonic inspiration was even the source of Socrates’ rationalism. It is realizing and perfecting the "visionary" component of the human mind, which is the central focus of most Visionary’s work - sometimes to the point of alienating those do not share in the Visionary understanding. But Blake "claimed the possession of some powers only in a greater degree that all men possessed and which they undervalued in themselves & lost through love of sordid pursuits." The Visionary, while seen as extraordinary and a genius, is only a glimpse of what all human beings can experience for themselves. Blake's poetry needs to be read as the expression of a visionary genius who saw what others could not see. He is an enduring testament to the creative powers of the human mind. The book Selected Poetry of William Blake Songs of Innocence Songs of Experience The Book of Thel The Marriage of Heaven and Hell All Religions are One There is NO Natural Religion The Book of Urizen Jerusalem Selected Letters of William Blake

Genres: Poetry

268 pages, Paperback

Published January 1, 1976

About the author

William Blake was an English poet, painter, and printmaker. Largely unrecognised during his lifetime, Blake's work is today considered seminal and significant in the history of both poetry and the visual arts.

Blake's prophetic poetry has been said to form "what is in proportion to its merits the least read body of poetry in the language". His visual artistry has led one modern critic to proclaim him "far and away the greatest artist Britain has ever produced." Although he only once travelled any further than a day's walk outside London over the course of his life, his creative vision engendered a diverse and symbolically rich corpus, which embraced 'imagination' as "the body of God", or "Human existence itself".

Once considered mad for his idiosyncratic views, Blake is highly regarded today for his expressiveness and creativity, and the philosophical and mystical currents that underlie his work. His work has been characterized as part of the Romantic movement, or even "Pre-Romantic", for its largely having appeared in the 18th century. Reverent of the Bible but hostile to the established Church, Blake was influenced by the ideals and ambitions of the French and American revolutions, as well as by such thinkers as Emanuel Swedenborg.

Despite these known influences, the originality and singularity of Blake's work make it difficult to classify. One 19th century scholar characterised Blake as a "glorious luminary", "a man not forestalled by predecessors, nor to be classed with contemporaries, nor to be replaced by known or readily surmisable successors."

Reviews

[ZaRi]

Earth rais'd up her head,
From the darkness dread & drear.
Her light fled:
Stony dread!
And her locks cover'd with grey despair.

Prison'd on watry shore
Starry Jealousy does keep my den
Cold and hoar
Weeping o'er
I hear the Father of the ancient men

Selfish father of men
Cruel, jealous, selfish fear
Can delight
Chain'd in night
The virgins of youth and morning bear.

Does spring hide its joy
When buds and blossoms grow?
Does the sower?
Sow by night?
Or the plowman in darkness plow?

Break this heavy chain,
That does freeze my bones around
Selfish! vain!
Eternal bane!
That free Love with bondage bound.

[Billy Sheppard · Rating 4 out of 5]

Blake is fearless imagination in luminous form.

[Pavla Rudolfová · Rating 5 out of 5]

Love at the first page.