london

Question 1

author

Answer 1

william blake

Question 2

context

Answer 2

• romantics
• lived in london
• used simple language to make his work accessible
• industrial revolution
• considered to have radical political views
• 19th century

Question 3

structure

Answer 3

• iambic tentrameter - order (for most of the poem, maybe trying to break free)
• abab rhyme scheme - fixed control over the people, oppressive

Question 4

paragraph 1

Answer 4

• hopeless feelings within the people, suffering, misery
• ‘every Man’ - capitalised, suffering is universal, ubiquitous, anaphoric ‘in every’
• ‘every infants cry of fear’ - connotations to hope and innocence yet neither are present, abuse of innocence
• ‘marriage hearse’ - juxtaposition, marriage is already dead, inevitable doom, pessimistic view
• ‘youthful harlot’ - further destruction of innocence

Question 5

paragraph 2

Answer 5

• sources of misery, corruption in society, control over people, critical of these sources of power
• ‘mind forg’d manacles’ - even their thoughts are controlled, lack of freedom of though, prisonlike
• ‘charter’d street/Thames’ - repeated, they are all effectively owned, even nature, against romantic ideals
• ‘blackn’ing church appalls’ - pollution on surface level, connotations of immorality and evil found within institutions, lost sight of the true aim, dismay and horror, contradicts purity and love expected from a church