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Meaning of the poem the tyger and the lamb by william blake
Social criticism and social satire in william blake's poetry
Societal issues in blake poems
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In William Blake’s poems, “The Lamb,” “The Tyger,” “The Chimney Sweeper,” and “Infant Sorrows,” there is something very blatantly wrong with society. William Blake wrote all of these poems to change society. We’ve seen this when studying many other authors. A very common way to make a change in society is to write poems or stories that make people feel sympathy for the ones who are being oppressed or mistreated. Some do it through satire. Others, like Blake, just write simple poems which clearly criticize society. William Blake saw problems in his society, and used his skills, as a writer, to influence the way people looked at society.
The two poems, “The Tyger” and “The Lamb,” deal with the difference between different types of people. A tiger is a person who goes and gets whatever he or she wants, and won’t let anything get in his or her way. Tigers are the rich people. Lambs are the ones who are content to get bossed around. They are scared to disobey orders. Lambs are the poor people. Blake writes, “Little lamb God bless thee.” Lambs are the people of God. Blake...
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.
The theme of authority is possibly the most important theme and the most popular theme concerning William Blake’s poetry. Blake explores authority in a variety of different ways particularly through religion, education and God. Blake was profoundly concerned with the concept of social justice. He was also profoundly a religious man. His dissenting background led him to view the power structures and legalism that surrounded religious establishments with distrust. He saw these as unwarranted controls over the freedom of the individual and contrary to the nature of a God of liberty. Figures such as the school master in the ‘schoolboy’, the parents in the ‘chimney sweeper’ poems, the guardians of the poor in the ‘Holy Thursday’, Ona’s father in ‘A Little girl lost’ and the priestly representatives of organised religion in many of the poems, are for Blake the embodiment of evil restriction.
Blake’s poetry focuses on imagination. When Blake created his work, it gained very little attention. Blake’s artistic and poetic vision is reflected in his creations. Blake was against the Church of England because he thought the doctrines were being misused as a form of social control, it meant the people were taught to be passively obedient and accept oppression, poverty, and inequality. In Blake’s poems “The Lamb,” “The Tyger,” and Proverbs of Hell, he shows that good requires evil in order to exist through imagery of animals and man.
The theme of the suffering innocent person, dying and being diseased, throws a dark light onto the London seen through the eyes of William Blake. He shows us his experiences, fears and hopes with passionate images and metaphors creating a sensibility against oppression hypocrisy. His words come alive and ask for changes in society, government and church. But they remind us also that the continued renewal of society begins with new ideas, imagination and new works in every area of human experience.
Blake had an uncanny ability to use his work to illustrate the unpleasant and often painful realities around him. His poetry consistently embodies an attitude of revolt against the abuse of class and power that appears guided by a unique brand of spirituality. His spiritual beliefs reached outside the boundaries of religious elites loyal to the monarchy. “He was inspired by dissident religious ideas rooted in the thinking of the most radical opponents of the monarchy during the English Civil War “(E. P. Thompson). Concern with war and the blighting effects of the industrial revolution were displayed in much of his work.
The ideas that are presented in poems are often the same ideas everyone is thinking but are too afraid to speak their mind for fear that they might be judged. Allen Ginsberg explained this predicament when he said “[p]oetry is the one place where people can speak their original human mind. It is the outlet for people to say in public what is known in private” (Ginsberg). This quote applies especially to “The Tyger” by William Blake. William Blake’s poem “The Tyger” at the surface is very simplistic; however, with further analysis the story’s theme of religion asks fundamental questions that pertain to one’s worldview with the use of symbolism.
Sir William Blake was known for his lucid writings and childlike imagination when it came down to his writings. Some will say that his writings were like day and night; for example, "The Lamb" and "The Tiger" or "The Little Boy Lost" and "The Little Boy Found." Born in the 18th century, Blake witnessed the cruel acts of the French and American Revolutions so his writings also, "revealed and exposed the harsh realities of life (Biography William Blake)". Although he never gained fame during his lifetime, Blake's work is thought of as to be genius and well respected today. "The lack of public recognition sent him into a severe depression which lasted from 1810-1817, and even his close friends thought him insane (William Blake,)". Blake once stated, "Always be ready to speak your mind, and a base man will avoid you (http://brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/w/william_blake.html )."
This is as Blake is. aware of everything that goes on in the society, and the poem clearly expresses his repulsiveness towards the political oppression imposed by the monarchy. However, Blake does not solely blame the monarcy, but he does. also the people of his country. This is because he saw all the other countries that previously suffered the oppression of a monarchy, fight.
William Blake’s 1793 poem “The Tyger” has many interpretations, but its main purpose is to question God as a creator. Its poetic techniques generate a vivid picture that encourages the reader to see the Tyger as a horrifying and terrible being. The speaker addresses the question of whether or not the same God who made the lamb, a gentle creature, could have also formed the Tyger and all its darkness. This issue is addressed through many poetic devices including rhyme, repetition, allusion, and symbolism, all of which show up throughout the poem and are combined to create a strong image of the Tyger and a less than thorough interpretation of its maker.
He disapproved the use of black slaves as he believed that it was immoral to exploit people on the basis of their appearance. Blake was an advanced and modern thinker who did not accept the typical Christian point of view. When we dwell deeper in the poem we realize that it also depicts colonialism, Blake wrote this poem at a time when slavery was persisting in London and many black people were working for English aristocrat families. It wouldn 't be wrong to say that the boy and his mother were also taken away from the “southern wild” presumably Africa to England and the whole poem revolves around their life in England. Blake’s motivation to write this poem was to create awareness among people that they should condemn such activities. He wanted to eliminate the mental block which was persisting among people in the
There are often two sides to everything: chocolate and vanilla, water and fire, woman and man, innocence and experience. The presence of two opposing items allows for harmony and balance in the world. Without water, fire cannot be put out and without woman there can be no man. William Blake’s poetry collection Songs of Innocence and of Experience draws parallels between poems of “innocence” and poems of “experience”. His poem The Lamb is mirrored by his poem The Tyger. Although Blake’s poem The Tyger revolved around the idea of a ferocious mammal, its illustration of a sheepish tiger complicates and alters Blake’s message in the poem by suggesting that good and evil simultaneously exist.
In William Blake’s poem “The Lamb” the speaker begins with the ultimate question, “Little Lamb, who made thee?/ Dost though know who made thee?/” (Blake lines 1-2). The speaker then continues to elaborate on the question in a playful, innocent, singsong manner describing the kindness and thoughtfulness that the creator put in to producing this ever so gentle lamb. The tone of this poem is soft and lulling, the tender, calm rhyme scheme puts the reader in a soothing, dreamlike state. “The words and images presented - stream, mead, delight, softest, tender and rejoice - are positive and pastoral. One can picture a lamb frolicking in the green grass…” (Smith).
giving the tiger an even more awe-inspiring quality. The stanza finishes with "Did he who made the lamb make thee?" Which gives the idea of disbelief at the prospect of a creator making a harmless pleasant creature such as the lamb and a dangerous mighty and awful creature like the tiger. b) Explore the ways Blake uses imagery and repetition in this poem. The most obvious repetition in this poem is the "Tiger"!
The poem at first glance looks to be about a Tyger but after reading through
Sociological criticism emphasizes the political, economic, and cultural aspects of literature, and one of its main focuses is evaluating writing from a Marxist perspective, which examines the writing in mostly political and economic fashion, including ideas such as communism and social inequality. The idea of class oppression is clearly represented in many of William Blake’s writings. Blake’s opposition to the exploitation of the proletariat by the capitalists is obvious in many of his poems. Blake’s ideology of an equalitarian society could be described in the sayings of Karl Marx. Marxist criticism explains the reasons behind Blake’s anger towards social inequality. Poems like “The Chimney Sweeper” and “London” illustrate Blake’s despairing sadness towards the phenomena produced by the unjust inequality in 18th century England. In “The Chimney Sweeper,” Blake expresses his anger at the late 18th and 19th century's use of child labor in urban England. In “London,” Blake illustrates the depressing class oppression that could be easily seen through the streets of London.