Blake quotes Flashcards
“A chapel was built in the midst where I used to play on the green”
The Garden of Love.
Juxtaposes urbanisation and nature, a chapel built where nature once thrived - shows how industrialised religion and urbanisation were destroying nature - the epitome of freedom and therefore emphasises how industrialisation represses and confines us.
The modal verb “used to” shows strong sense of nostalgia
The green is a motif which recurs throughout Blske’s poetry - The green alludes to a paradisiacal state - A pre-lapsarian state which is the epitome of freedom and happiness - associated with chilhood
The gates of this chapel were shut and “Though shalt not” writ on the door
Shows hostility and cold-heartedness of religion, it is austere and unwelcoming
Biblical reference - history of oppressive religion
And priests in black gowns were walking their rounds and binding with briars my joys and desires
“Black” symbolises death, grief and impurity, showing priests do not bring happiness they bring repression and control
They destroy true desires of humans with strict rules and doctrines
“walking tehir rounds’ connotes prison guard - emphasises oppression
In every voice, in every ban
the mind- forg’d manacles I hear
Every ban - so many laws and regulations banning people of simple aspects of life
mind -forg’d manacles - connotes chains we are imprisoned by a repressive society yet we are also victims of our own minds - as Marxist would argue we think we have the ability to think freely but we do not - we are merely enslaves in our minds
Runs in blood down palace walls
Alludes to french revolution - how social reform was desperately needed yet also the prevalence of violence, death and destruction: the contrast between royalty and the poor conditions of the external world
How the youthful harlots curse blasts the new-born infants tear
Emphasises extent of prostition problem and how young the women who were sexually exploited were by comparing their curses to an infants cry - showing their innocence and vulnerability and how it has been affected
Such, Such were the joys when we all - girls and boys - were seen on the echoing green
Once again motif of green alluding to paradise prelapsarian state
past tense shows nostalgia
perhaps suggests that in childhood the genders are less segregated and in adulthood they cannot associate
Struggling in my fathers hands
striving against my swaddling bands
Shows oppression is always present - even from birth he is confined by father - struggling to get away
swaddling bands suggest clothing is confining as Blake believed true epitome of freedom was nakedness which is often seen trhoughout his poems
And we are put on earth a little space that we may learn to bear the beams of love
our time on earth is fleeting
love is a painful experience
We are born experiencing pain until the day we die
O Rose thou art sick. the invisible worm, that flies in the night in the howling storm
Condemns church and society for repressing sensuality and desire and regarding it as sinful, as something that makes you sick - blake argues that it is only natural like a rose. Mocks sentimental convention as rose for symbol of love
Old john with white hair does laugh away care
white of John’s hair symbolises innocence and the comparison between young and old
Your spring and your day are wasted in play and your winter and night in disguise
Jealous of children’s innocence and freedom as she has been confined to job of a nurse - wished for the innocence of her childhood again
The seasons of life - humans are a part of nature - should not be seperated as our lives our cyclical just like nature.
The nurse’s song - experience
Twas on a holy thursday their innocent faces clean / the children walking two and two in red and blue and green
Alludes to Noah’s ark - christian doctrine
The innocent voice speaks in rhyming couplets, showing how the christian doctrine of noah’s ark, of two and two has been engrained into speaker
Holy Thursday - innocence
Come come leave off play, and let us away til the morning appears in the skies.”
“Go & play till the light fades away”
The little ones leaped & shouted & laugh’d”
Example of what constitutes a good nurse to Blake, perfect harmony between humans and nature. Lets children spend time in nature - he believed this was crucial for their healthy development.
THE NURse’S SONG
I wander thro’ each charter’d street/
near where the charter’d thames does flow
diacope of charter’d - emphasises oppression and constraint is everywhere
allusion to Thomas Paine’s Rights of Man. This book argued in favor of the principles of the French Revolution (1789). In it, Paine makes a remark that quite possibly informs Blake’s use of “charter’d” here: “Every chartered town is an aristocratical monopoly of itself.”
