William Blake Analysis Essay

Danielle Rose
English 192
Prof. J Perl
William Blake
Like so many before and after him, Blake falls into the category of artists whose creative genius went unaddressed in their own lifetime. It was only after his death that the broad scope of his literary and artistic aptitude was acknowledged. But his scathing social critiques and insights into the nature of the human psyche are made no less relevant by their time spent in obscurity. Chronological analysis of a set of Blake poems, “The Lamb”, “The Tyger” and “Jerusalem” reveal the deeply relevant insights that Blake failed to impress upon the people of his own time.
In the poem “The Lamb”, a child asks a lamb who it was that made him, with the unassuming naiveté so particular to children. The

The innocence poems were the products of a mind in a state of innocence and of an imagination unstained by strains of worldliness. Public events and private emotions soon converted Innocence into Experience, producing Blake’s preoccupation with the problem of Good and Evil. This, with his feelings of indignation and pity for the sufferings of mankind as he saw them in the streets of London, resulted in his composing the second set.”
Whether Blake’s intentions for Experience were already present during his composition of Innocence or were a later stroke of inspiration, the message of inevitable corruption and the scathing social critique are just as relevant. “The Lamb” is the natural state into which we are born, childish innocent and virtuous. But in a society strife with corruption, social injustices and moral oppression, time will take its toll, stripping away much of the innocence, leaving in its stead the cynical disenchantment of experience, as found in “The