William Blake's Songs of Innocence & Experience
This is an excerpt from the paper...
William Blake is considered a creator of ôgreatö poetry, defined by Laurence Perrine (1982) as poetry that ôengages the whole personùsenses, imagination, emotion, intellect; it does not touch him merely on one or two sides of his nature,ö (239). In BlakeÆs Songs of Innocence and Experience we are treated to a pair of companion poems that try to resolve the polar opposites of human nature, good and evil. In The Lamb and The Tyger, Blake symbolizes human ôinnocenceö and ôexperienceö in the respective forms of a lamb and a tiger. However, we do not see Blake attempt to posit human beings in an eternal struggle between good and evil. Instead, BlakeÆs poems celebrate the good and evil within human experience and the tension produced by manÆs futile attempt to resolve such contraries of his nature. Yet in the appreciation of the innocence manifested by the creator as well as the experience, a creative force evolves in the individual that gains awareness that such contraries are the ôstuffö of life.In The Lamb, Blake pays homage to the innocence of human nature during youth. Like we shall see the speaker do in The Tyger, this speaker is inquisitive. In The Lamb, the speaker wonders ôDost thou know who made thee, / Gave thee life, and bid thee feedàö (Blake 1). This questioning of the creative power or force behind life directly compares to the questioning of the speaker in The Tyger. In this poem Blake pays homage to the ôfearful symmetryö o
. . .
and is ômeekö and ômild,ö (Blake 1). The symbol of the lamb is also a powerful Christian symbol and reference to the son of God, Jesus Christ. It also symbolizes the flocks of faithful who are all ôlambsö of God. In The Tyger, Christian imagery is also evoked because experience breeds a loss of innocence, a reference to manÆs fall from paradise but also a reference to temptation and Satan. As such the images and word choice connote a fiery environment ala Hell and are in stark contrast to those of The Lamb. In The Tyger, we have the Tyger who is ôburning brightö, of ôfearful symmetryö, has ôfireö in its eyes and ôdread handö and ôdread feet,ö (Blake 1). Such imagery calls into doubt the promise of joy and peace everlasting offered by our beliefs and innocence in childhood.
Other poetic devices are used in both poems to show the contrary nature of innocence and experience, belief and doubt, and good and evil in human existence. In The Lamb Blake achieves a rhythm that is soft and melodically pleasing. The rhythm almost mirrors a religious hymn or chant, praise to God the creator. Blake achieves this by the use of site and sound rhyme in addition to the use of repetition. In the final stanza, he utilizes repetition at th
. . .
Some common words found in the essay are:
Lamb Blake, Tyger BlakeÆs, Tyger Lamb, Lamb Lamb, God Blake, Tyger Blake, Little Lamb, Tyger Tyger, Lamb God, Instead BlakeÆs, blake 1, lamb tyger, innocence experience, / little, human nature, / little lamb, creative force, tyger speaker, thee /, little lamb, blake achieves, theeö blake 1, blake 1 blake, thee / little, lamb god bless,
Approximate Word count = 1890
Approximate Pages = 8 (250 words per page)
More Essays on William Blake Songs of Innocence & Experience
|
Customer Service
to Over
32,000 Professionally Written Papers!!!
