London Flashcards
Structure: Theme of each quatrain
First: People suffering
Second: People suffering
Third: Cause of the suffering
Fourth: People suffering
Cyclical structure
Structure: Rhyme scheme
Simple ABAB rhyme scheme, reflects how London appears to be organised, but upon further analysis (reading the poem), it is actually quite chaotic.
Form: Meter
Iambic tetrameter, reflecting the repetitive life people in London have.
“Marks of weakness, marks of woe” has 7 syllables not 8, which makes the line itself weak to reflect the weakness of the people.
LA: Power of nature vs power of humans
“Each charter’d street … the charter’d Thames”
LA: People are oppressed and trapped in every way even by thoughts
“Mind-forged manacles”
Alliteration
LA: Corruption of the Church
“Every black’ning church appals”
Blake loved God and Jesus, but expressed great dislike for the Church and its failure to serve and help the poor.
Colour imagery
Context: Intertextual reference to convey how man is trapped
“Man is born free, but everywhere he is in chains”
- Jean Jacques Rousseau
LA + Context: Unhappiness and mistreatment of British soldiers could lead to an uprising similar to the French revolution
“The hapless soldier’s sigh runs in blood down palace walls”
Hyperbole
LA: The old London which Blake loved is destined to be destroyed
“Marriage hearse”
Oxymoron
