Tyr’s Day, 3/24:

Songs of Innocence

and Experience

EQ: How does Blake collide

contraries to find Truth?

Welcome! Gather pen/cil, paper, Blake poems, wits!

William Blake, Songs of Innocence & Experience o Review & Introduction o Students read, talk, write

on Blake’s poems

ELACC12RL-RI2: Analyze two/more

theme/central ideas of text

ELACC12RI3: Analyze and explain how

individuals, ideas, or events interact and develop

ELACC12RL6: Distinguish what is directly stated

in a text from what is really meant

ELACC12RI6: Determine an author’s point of

view or purpose in a text

ELACC12RI8: Delineate and evaluate the reasoning in seminal British texts

ELACC12RL-RI9: Analyze for theme, purpose rhetoric, and how texts treat similar themes or topics

ELACC12RL10: Read and comprehend complex literature independently and proficiently.

ELACC12W4: Produce clear and coherent writing appropriate to task, purpose, and audience

ELACC12W9: Draw evidence from literary or informational texts to support analysis

ELACC12W10: Write routinely over extended and shorter time frames

ELACC12SL1: Initiate and participate effectively in a range of collaborative discussions

ELACC12L6: Acquire and use general academic and domain-specific words and phrases

William Blake,

Songs of Innocence (1794): “Introduction”

Piping down the valleys wild,

Piping songs of pleasant glee,

On a cloud I saw a child,

And he laughing said to me:

'Pipe a song about a lamb!'

So I piped with merry cheer.

'Piper, pipe that song again.'

So I piped: he wept to hear.

'Drop thy pipe, thy happy pipe;

Sing thy songs of happy cheer.'

So I sung the same again,

While he wept with joy to hear.

'Piper, sit thee down and write

In a book, that all may read.'

So he vanished from my sight,

And I plucked a hollow reed,

And I made a rural pen,

And I stained the water clear,

And I wrote my happy songs

Every child may joy to hear.

What happens to the

song?

REVIEW – William Blake (1757 - 1829)

HUGELY important to poetry, philosophy, art

Deep faith in Christ, but believed governments,

capitalism, religion

destroy Individual Vision

Production not “mass” but costly, “corrosive”:

“melting apparent

surfaces, displaying

infinite which was hid”;

INTEGRITY of poetic

mission, artistic method

The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1785)

Songs of Innocence and Experience (1794)

Songs of Innocence and Experience (1794)

Again, “contraries”; here, companion poems: same

topic, opposite viewpoints

Songs of Innocence o Narrator is child or naïve

adult who sees world as full

of love and possibility

o Narrator thinks Reality reflects their highest hopes

o Lots of “positive thinking” o Narrators often victims or

victimizers who don’t know it

Songs of Experience o Narrator is child or adult who

sees world as full of danger

o Narrators think Reality reflects worst “cruel world”

o Lots of “negative thinking” o Speakers often victims who

realize it, speak out against

victimizers (i.e., reader!)

William Blake, Songs of Innocence and Experience From Songs of Innocence: “The Lamb” From Songs of Experience: “The Tyger”

Little Lamb, who made thee?

Dost thou know who made thee?

Gave thee life & bid thee feed,

By the stream & o'er the mead;

Gave thee clothing of delight,

Softest clothing, wooly, bright;

Gave thee such a tender voice,

Making all the vales rejoice?

Little Lamb, who made thee?

Dost thou know who made thee?

Little Lamb, I'll tell thee,

Little Lamb, I'll tell thee:

He is called by thy name,

For he calls himself a Lamb.

He is meek & he is mild;

He became a little child.

I a child & thou a lamb.

We are called by his name.

Little Lamb, God bless thee!

Little Lamb, God bless thee!

Tyger Tyger, burning bright,

In the forests of the night;

What immortal hand or eye,

Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

In what distant deeps or skies.

Burnt the fire of thine eyes?

On what wings dare he aspire?

What the hand, dare sieze the fire?

And what shoulder, & what art.

Could twist the sinews of thy heart?

And when thy heart began to beat,

What dread hand! & what dread feet?

What the hammer? what the chain?

In what furnace was thy brain?

What the anvil? what dread grasp

Dare its deadly terrors clasp?

When the stars threw down their spears

And water'd heaven with their tears,

Did he smile his work to see?

Did he who made the Lamb make thee?

Tyger Tyger, burning bright,

In the forests of the night;

What immortal hand or eye,

Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?

From Songs of Innocence: “The Blossom” From Songs of Experience: “The Sick Rose”

Merry Merry Sparrow!

Under leaves so green.

A happy Blossom

Sees you, swift as arrow,

Seek your cradle narrow

Near my Bosom.

Pretty Pretty Robin!

Under leaves so green,

A happy Blossom

Hears you sobbing, sobbing,

Pretty Pretty Robin.

Near my Bosom.

O Rose, thou art sick;

The invisible worm

That flies through the night

In the howling storm

Has found out thy bed

Of crimson joy;

And his dark secret love

Does thy life destroy.

from Songs of Experience: “London”

I wander thro' each charter'd street.

Near where the charter'd Thames does flow

And mark in every face I meet

Marks of weakness, marks of woe.

In every cry of every Man,

In every Infants cry of fear,

In every voice: in every ban,

The mind-forg'd manacles I hear.

How the Chimney-sweepers cry

Every blackning Church appalls,

And the hapless Soldiers sigh

Runs in blood down Palace walls.

But most thro' midnight streets I hear

How the youthful Harlots curse

Blasts the new-born Infants tear

And blights with plagues the Marriage hearse.

Blake was not a politician, but there is

more understanding of the nature of

capitalist society in a poem like

“London” than in three-quarters of

Socialist literature. – George Orwell

Wm

Blake, Songs of Innocence and Experience (1794)

“The Lamb”

Little Lamb, who made thee?

Dost thou know who made thee?

Gave thee life & bid thee feed,

By the stream & o'er the mead;

Gave thee clothing of delight,

Softest clothing, wooly, bright;

Gave thee such a tender voice,

Making all the vales rejoice?

Little Lamb, who made thee?

Dost thou know who made thee?

Little Lamb, I'll tell thee,

Little Lamb, I'll tell thee:

He is called by thy name,

For he calls himself a Lamb.

He is meek & he is mild;

He became a little child.

I a child & thou a lamb.

We are called by his name.

Little Lamb, God bless thee!

Little Lamb, God bless thee!

“The Tyger”

Tyger Tyger, burning bright,

In the forests of the night;

What immortal hand or eye,

Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

In what distant deeps or skies.

Burnt the fire of thine eyes?

On what wings dare he aspire?

What the hand, dare sieze the fire?

And what shoulder, & what art.

Could twist the sinews of thy heart?

And when thy heart began to beat,

What dread hand! & what dread feet?

What the hammer? what the chain?

In what furnace was thy brain?

What the anvil? what dread grasp

Dare its deadly terrors clasp?

When the stars threw down their spears

And water'd heaven with their tears,

Did he smile his work to see?

Did he who made the Lamb make thee?

Tyger Tyger, burning bright,

In the forests of the night;

What immortal hand or eye,

Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?

“The Blossom”

Merry Merry Sparrow!

Under leaves so green.

A happy Blossom

Sees you, swift as arrow,

Seek your cradle narrow

Near my Bosom.

Pretty Pretty Robin!

Under leaves so green,

A happy Blossom

Hears you sobbing, sobbing,

Pretty Pretty Robin.

Near my Bosom.

“The Sick Rose”

O Rose, thou art sick;

The invisible worm

That flies through the night

In the howling storm

Has found out thy bed

Of crimson joy;

And his dark secret love

Does thy life destroy.

Wm

Blake, Songs of Innocence and Experience (1794)

“Introduction”

Piping down the valleys wild,

Piping songs of pleasant glee,

On a cloud I saw a child,

And he laughing said to me:

'Pipe a song about a lamb!'

So I piped with merry cheer.

'Piper, pipe that song again.'

So I piped: he wept to hear.

'Drop thy pipe, thy happy pipe;

Sing thy songs of happy cheer.'

So I sung the same again,

While he wept with joy to hear.

'Piper, sit thee down and write

In a book, that all may read.'

So he vanished from my sight,

And I plucked a hollow reed,

And I made a rural pen,

And I stained the water clear,

And I wrote my happy songs

Every child may joy to hear.

“London”

I wander thro' each charter'd street.

Near where the charter'd Thames does flow

And mark in every face I meet

Marks of weakness, marks of woe.

In every cry of every Man,

In every Infants cry of fear,

In every voice: in every ban,

The mind-forg'd manacles I hear.

How the Chimney-sweepers cry

Every blackning Church appalls,

And the hapless Soldiers sigh

Runs in blood down Palace walls.

But most thro' midnight streets I hear

How the youthful Harlots curse

Blasts the new-born Infants tear

And blights with plagues the Marriage hearse.

“The Divine Image”

To Mercy, Pity, Peace, and Love

All pray in their distress;

An to these virtues of delight

Return their thankfulness.

For Mercy, Pity, Peace, and Love

Is God, our father dear,

And Mercy, Pity, Peace, and Love

Is Man, his child and care.

For Mercy has a human heart,

Pity a human face,

And Love, the human form divine,

And Peace, the human dress.

Then every man, of every dime

That prays in his distress,

Prays to the human form divine,

Love, Mercy, Pity, Peace.

And all must love the human form,

In heathen, turk, or jew;

Where Mercy, Love & Pity dwell

There God is dwelling too.

“The Human Abstract” Pity would be no more,

If we did not make somebody Poor:

And Mercy no more could be,

If all were as happy as we;

And mutual fear brings peace;

Till the selfish loves increase.

Then Cruelty knits a snare,

And spreads his baits with care.

He sits down with holy fears,

And waters the ground with tears:

Then Humility takes its root

Underneath his foot.

Soon spreads the dismal shade

Of Mystery over his head;

And the Catterpiller and Fly,

Feed on the Mystery.

And it bears the fruit of Deceit,

Ruddy and sweet to eat;

And the Raven his nest has made

In its thickest shade.

The Gods of the earth and sea,

Sought thro' Nature to find this Tree

But their search was all in vain:

There grows one in the Human Brain

Turn In Today: Freewrites:

o Pope vs. Blake o “Introduction” –

song?

o Two More of your choice –typical of

Blake?

From Songs of Innocence:

“The Divine Image”

From Songs of Experience:

“The Human Abstract”

To Mercy, Pity, Peace, and Love All pray in their distress;

An to these virtues of delight

Return their thankfulness.

For Mercy, Pity, Peace, and Love

Is God, our father dear,

And Mercy, Pity, Peace, and Love

Is Man, his child and care.

For Mercy has a human heart,

Pity a human face,

And Love, the human form divine,

And Peace, the human dress.

Then every man, of every dime

That prays in his distress,

Prays to the human form divine,

Love, Mercy, Pity, Peace.

And all must love the human form,

In heathen, turk, or jew;

Where Mercy, Love & Pity dwell

There God is dwelling too.

Pity would be no more,

If we did not make somebody Poor:

And Mercy no more could be,

If all were as happy as we;

And mutual fear brings peace;

Till the selfish loves increase.

Then Cruelty knits a snare,

And spreads his baits with care.

He sits down with holy fears,

And waters the ground with tears:

Then Humility takes its root

Underneath his foot.

Soon spreads the dismal shade

Of Mystery over his head;

And the Catterpiller and Fly,

Feed on the Mystery.

And it bears the fruit of Deceit,

Ruddy and sweet to eat;

And the Raven his nest has made

In its thickest shade.

The Gods of the earth and sea,

Sought thro' Nature to find this Tree

But their search was all in vain:

There grows one in the Human Brain