London Structure Flashcards
Describe the rhyme scheme of London
Regular ABAB
Describe the meter of London
Primarily iambic tetrameter with sporadic 7 syllable lines
What effect does “marks of weakness, marks of woe” being only 7 syllables have?
It emulates the weakness of London’s suffering people
Why may Blake have used sporadic 7 syllable lines?
To emulate the weakness of London’s suffering people but also to remove from the reader comfortable regularity, illustrating the cripling effect the desperate will ultimately have on society
The regular rhyme scheme juxtaposes the irregular …
meter
What could the juxtaposition of London’s regular ryhme scheme and irreguler meter show?
London may look organised (“chartered”) and wonderful from afar but, close up, it’s in chaos.
Describe the structure of London
Cyclical structure
Quatrains 1+ 2 focus on people’s suffering
Quatrain 3 shifts focus to suffering’s institutional causes
Quatrain 4 returns to people’s suffering
What does London’s cyclical structure portray?
The inescapable horrors of oppression
How the lower classes are immorally trapped in newly industrialised London
Perpetually restrictive nature of suffering
The inescapable horrors of newly industrialised London and suffereing’s perpetually restrictive nature are shown by Blake primarily through which structural feature and which alliterative phrase
Cyclical structure
“mind-forged manacles”