William Blake: Experience Poems

Question 1

Holy Thursday:

Answer 1

Summary:
- A procession of poor children.
- Poverty and suffering are evident.
- The speaker criticises the religious ceremony, questioning the children being miserable.
- The appearance of wealth and dignity with the harsh reality of poverty.
- This poem highlights the hypocrisy of using religion to cover up social inequality and injustice.

Question 2

Key Quotations:

Answer 2

“Is this a holy thing to see, / In a rich and fruitful land, / Babes reduced to misery, / Fed with cold and usurous hand?”
- This questions the morality of a society that allows children to live in misery.
- Emphasises the people in power as being almost thief-like.
- Hypocrisy and using religion to cover up systematic inequality.

“For where’er the sun does shine, / And where’er the rain does fall. / Babe can never hunger there, / Nor poverty the mind appall”.