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Impacts of industrial revolution on society
Analysis of poem london by william blake
Analysis of poem london by william blake
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Critical Appreciation of William Blake's London
William Blake who lived in the latter half of the eighteenth century and the early part of the nineteenth century was a poet, a philosopher, a radical, an artist, and a great thinker; who was able to bring about "remarkable results with the simplest of means" in all of his work. He wrote his poems with deep personal emotions but if we look further and ignore the prophetic qualities we discover a further intended meanings of a strong political and social level. He was a critic of his own era but his poetry also strikes a chord in ours. He was one of several poets of the time who restored emotion and feelings into poetry, and so was one of the first "romantics." Blake lived during a period of intense social changes, the industrial revolution, the French revolution and the American revolution all happened during his lifetime. Blake was witness to the transformation of a agricultural society to an industrial society, which is where the basis for some of his poems stand.
As an example, we may look towards William Blake’s "London" from his songs of experience, here Blake comments on a city he both loves and hates, it shows his disapproval of changes which occurred in his times. Blake describes the woes that the Industrial revolution and the breaking of the common mans ties to the land results in. He uses many methods to gain the perfect description of how he saw industrial "London" but the most outstanding method is his use of imagery.
His first use of imagery is the first and second lines of the first stanza, he uses the words "charter’d streets" and "charter’d Thames." A charter is a legal document which gives legal powers to the council of a town or city which allows them to be able to create there own laws within the boundaries of that place. The imagery suggests that not only do the streets of London have to follow the rules but that the River Thames has to be regulated as well. The lawmakers have tamed and controlled a free flowing river. This use of imagery emphasises that everything in the city including natural forces are enslaved by the city. In the next line, "Marks of weakness, marks of woe," there could be a play on words, "Mark" means both "to see" or "to notice" but then again there could be another meaning; like a physical mark upon someone’s face like a sign of grief or misery.
Through the streets and alleyways of Nineveh the prophet Jonah trudged. At every marketplace and city gate he joyously roared his tidings of evil, “forty more days and Nineveh will be overturned!” Two and a half millennia after the great fish vomited Jonah back onto dry land, William Blake faithfully follows that path of bilge and seaweed, bile and gall, into the fraternity of prophets and oracles. Just as Jonah was reluctant to prophesy to the Ninevites for fear that his enemies would hear and repent, Blake has a vested interest in perpetuating the blindness of his readers. In fact, even as he works his metaphysics to impose his “phantasy” as the prophet who proclaims the liberation of the world, he shows a full awareness that true success can only lead to his demise as a poet. Thus, standing upon his apple-crate in the marketplace, he chokes back his voice a little and mumbles in ciphers, desperately praying that he would not be understood.
William Blake was probably more concerned than any other major Romantic author with the process of publication and its implications for the interpretation of his artistic creations. He paid a price for this degree of control over the process of printing, however: Blake lived in poverty and artistic obscurity throughout his entire life. Later, when his poems began to be distributed among a wider audience, they were frequently shorn of their original contexts. For William Blake, there has been a trade-off between the size of the audience he has reached and the degree of control he exerted over the publication process.
godly misery. But it could also be the pain of the people as not only
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 in next month's issue of Wired.
William Blake is a literature genius. Most of his work speaks volume to the readers. Blake’s poem “The Mental Traveller” features a conflict between a male and female that all readers can relate to because of the lessons learned as you read. The poet William Blake isn’t just known for just writing. He was also a well-known painter and a printmaker. Blake is considered a seminal figure in the history of poetry. His poems are from the Romantic age (The end of the 18th Century). He was born in Soho, London, Great Britain. He was the third of seven children. Even though Blake was such an inspiration as a writer he only went to school just enough to read and write. According to Bloom’s critical views on William Blake; one of Blake’s inspirations was the Bible because he believed and belonged to the Moravian Church.
William Blake, born in 1757 and died in 1827, created the poems “The Lamb,” “The Tyger,” and Proverbs of Hell. Blake grew up in a poor environment. He studied to become an engraver and a professional artist. His engraving took part in the Romanticism era. Romanticism is a movement that developed during the 18th and early 19th century as a reaction against the Restoration and Enlightenment periods focusing on logic and reason.
The Theme of the Suffering Innocent in Blake's London The poem "London" by William Blake paints a frightening, dark picture of the eighteenth century London, a picture of war, poverty and pain. Written in the historical context of the English crusade against France in 1793, William Blake cries out with vivid analogies and images against the repressive and hypocritical English society. He accuses the government, the clergy and the crown of failing their mandate to serve people. Blake confronts the reader in an apocalyptic picture with the devastating consequences of diseasing the creative capabilities of a society.
William Blake was an English romantic poet who lived from 1757 to 1827 through both the American and the French revolutions. Although he lived during the Romantic Age, and was clearly part of the movement, Blake was a modern thinker who had a rebellious political spirit. He was the first to turn poetry and art into sociopolitical weapons to be raised rebelliously against the establishment. His poetry exemplified many of the same topics being discussed today. Although he was known as both a madman and a mystic, (Elliott) his poetry is both relevant and radical. He employed a brilliant approach as he took in the uncomfortable political and moral topics of his day and from them he created unique artistic representations. His poetry recounts in symbolic allegory the negative effects of the French and American revolutions and his visual art portrays the violence and sadistic nature of slavery. Blake was arguably one of the most stubbornly anti-oppression and anti-establishment writers in the English canon.
I think that William Blake is an important person because his poetry worked to help people find a way to express themselves about how they feel about war. His poetry also helped people see how the kings dominated the people. This world is different because William Blake lived because he made up two new movements like the “Romantic movement” and the “Pre-Romantic movement.” Knowing about William is helpful in my life because he taught me that determination and want will take you far. He also taught me that you don’t have to change the way you do things in order for people to like it as long as you like it yourself. In my point of view William was one of the best poets of his time with not that much recognition.
Blake was angered by what he saw in his homeland as other countries started fighting for their independence and equality whilst his country stayed dormant, even though he felt that there was a serious need for serious action. Even though Blake wasn't a typical romantic writer, he too possessed the same. beliefs of fighting for what one believes in, and the urge to be. liberated from the oppression of society. So, by being a writer of the romantic period, watching a controlled and restricted society not showing an intent to break free and fight against the monarchy.
The point of view in which Blake employs to London is significant to the understanding of the poem. Blake chooses to give the poem a persona, a person who appears to have extensive knowledge of the city and helps give credibility to the poem. (Foster, 1924) The use of first person in all three stanzas allows the poem to be more opinionated and less objective, drawing the reader's attention by making it more personal. Blake's London is to be the reader's London as well. In addition to point of view, Blake further sophisticates his piece by presenting specific tone to each section of the poem. Blake sets the tone early in the poem by using the word charter?d which shows the condition of London as repressive. The speaker refers to the people or ?faces? he meets with ?Marks of weakness, marks of woe.? This diction advocates the probability of the city being controlled by a higher authority. The faces of the people, or the face of society reveals the feelings of entrapment and misery in the population. This in itself could propose, "humanity itself is being commercialized" (Damon, 1965). One of the interesting aspects of Blake's poetry is the layers of meaning his words connote.
The location of the poem contributes greatly to each citizen's frame of mind because surroundings influence how people react in their environment. "London" is described as confined, creating the illusion that the citizens are trapped in their misery. "I wander thro' each charter'd street, / Near where the charter'd Thames does flow,..." During Blake's time, the word "charter'd" carried the denotative definition of restriction and confinement creating an image of a city that only allows limited movement and freedom. The repetition of the word "charter'd" emphasizes how cramped the city is. Even a river, a part of nature known to be free, is kept imprisoned and res...
William Blake’s works’ were simpler than Lord Byron’s. Blake took a softer approach as he expressed his ideas without saying too much. His works included phrases that had more meaning to its simple message. He took what he had learned in the world and added it into his poetry. He was able to capture all sides of life whether it dealt with a child or the unknown presence of an object. He was bale to take the little and turn it into something big that would be remembered for a long time.
One piece of the poem hints towards imagery involving slavery, this occurs when the speaker talks about the “charter’d street….charter’d Thames” and later on mentioning “The mind-forg’d manacles”. The street and Thames being described as charter’d shows the power of the government having the control of parts of the city such as a river and the streets. The use of “the mind-forg’d manacles” is symbolic by showing that their brains or minds are being controlled and limited by the government and is a symbol of enslavement. The poem seems to express a lot of imagery about death and sadness, terms such as cry, curse, plagues and hearse are used. The use of such words tells the reader that the soldiers are being forced by the government to kill. Therefore, causing the soldiers despair. Another portion of the poem uses phrases such as “in very infants cry of fear” and “how the chimney sweepers cry” to show an image of child labor. The term “appalls” is used to describe the “blackning Church” to allow the audience to realize that the church is horrified of the child labor. The chimney sweepers are a specific example of child labor. And the use of the word “blackning” suggests that a sin such as child labor is occurring. Lastly, imagery is used in the last stanza to show the horrifying cycle of living in London, England. “How the youthful Harlots curse, blasts the new-born Infants tear” describes how prostitutes are
wondering if today he will die up a chimney. It has robbed him of a