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"And I wrote my happy songs every child may joy to hear"
Introduction
More benevolent reflection, not imposing the doctrine of theological constraints (didactive),
Choosing an open mind to imaginative freedom
written to be accessible to children as Blake wants anyone to take what they can from his creative process
“Drop they pipe, thy happy pipe; sing thy songs of happy cheer.”
“And I made a rural pen, and I stained the water clear”
Subversion of the authority of adulthood on children
Imprint on the natural world, becomes chartered and restrained as his imagination is something commanded rather than intuitive
Blake as a prophet like figure as the piper
“my father sold me while yet my tongue could scarcely cry “ ‘weep! ‘weep! ‘weep! ‘weep!”
Chimney sweeper (I)
Narrator: unable to comprehend the world in which he finds himself, both internalised the language of abuse and don’t have the vocabulary to criticise it
Children not appreciated by commodified into social ill of child labour
Poetic strategy ‘weep’- Blake suggests as these words sound similar to us there is little difference in their meaning to the child- he does not know he has been taught a false language that conditions him into believing that sadness is a part of everyday life
Metre: unstressed-change in anapestic metre, emphasises childhood innocence and naivety and blind acceptance of oppression- subverting the joy they should experience by making light of it
removal of protection- forced into state of experience
“his head that curled like a lamb’s back, was shaved”
“Hush, Tom! never mind it, for when your head’s bare, You know that the soot cannot spoil your white hair.”
Chimney sweeper (I)
‘lamb’ critique of accepting lot in life- criticising submission as not a true martyrdom
allusion to biblical sacrifice for voluntary moral purpose (Jesus) contrasts their forced sacrifice for capitalist purpose- sense of corruption to loss of innocence
‘soot’ man made corruption tainted the natural state of innocence- tainted by reality- innate vulnerability of children
Narrator as an inadvertent agent of indoctrination- lulling him to accept his state as a false parental figure- silencing his freedom of speech and ability to question institutions- false consciousness without freedom of mind
“thousands of sweepers, Dick, Joe, Ned, & Jack, were all of them locked up in coffins of black;”
Chimney sweeper (I)
lexis of death and constraint
“And by came an Angel who had a bright key, and he opened the coffins & set them all free”
Chimney sweeper (I)
illusory promise of afterlife and salvation
Angel- figure of salvation and oppression- no true intervention , position of power as the only one that can liberate as a manifestation of the power of the church, facilitating their death- becomes inevitable
‘bright key’ image of freedom as blinding- god as the light of the world exploiting innocence to restrict and make them unquestioning (of the validity of the power of the church)
“down a green plain, leaping, laughing they run, and wash in a river and shine in the sun”
Chimney sweeper (I)
pastoral dream- harmony between man and nature
biblical Garden of Eden-before the fall- transcendental imagery
Only attained as a form of utopia as industrialism removed the beauty/accessibility of nature and can now only be dreamed of/ found in death
shedding burden and distorted view of the world to return to the innocent state, can only escape labour in death/reclaim bodily freedom
“the Angel told Tom, if he’d be a good boy, he’d have God for his father & never want joy.”
Chimney sweeper (I)
conditional relationship with god- subverts the benevolence of God
reduced to a transaction- not omnibenevolent god- encouraging submission
conditioned to accept abuse by religion
“we rose in the dark”
“So if all do their duty, they need not fear harm”
Chimney sweeper (I)
Satirical- self perpetuating cycle, ignorance and passivity towards capitalist exploitation and complicity from the church
Christian doctrine justifying class inequality- Angel as a metaphor for the church’s manipulation and distortion of religion as a mode of social control- preying on vulnerable in society
mistreatment as a way of life- religious ideology weaponised as a mouthpiece of the upper class
Bleak view of the world- fall- contrasts the idlylic picture of innocence in “shine”
Makes suffering endurable, suppresses lower classes to accept oppression
“A little black thing among the snow, crying “weep! ‘weep!” in notes of woe!”
Chimney sweeper (E)
“They are both gone up to the church to pray”
Chimney sweeper (E)
“They clothed me in the clothes of death, and taught me to sing the notes of woe”
Chimney sweeper (E)
“Are gone to praise God and his Priest and King, who make up a heaven of our misery”
Chimney Sweeper (E)
“The merry bells ring to welcome the spring. The sky-lark and thrush, the birds of the bush, sing louder around, to the bells’ cheerful sound.”
The Echoing Green (I)
man-made music in harmony with the natural soundscape
Subverts the oppressive nature of the church- what christianity should be in recognising the authority of nature by allowing it to become louder
“Old John, with the white hair does laugh away with care, sitting under the oak among the old folk”
The Echoing Green (I)
Seasons of regeneration- positivity to experience as wisdom comes with age and brings protection
Symbolises the benevolent authority figures of adults through the Oak- uncorrupted by man and withstands the cycles whilst retaining its natural state
Fascillitates the joy and childhood of youth in aging
“ ‘Such were the joys. When we all girls & boys, in our youth were seen, on the Echoing Green.’ “
The Echoing Green (I)
Communal experience- natural process that doesn’t separate the generations or isolate individuals
“The sun does descend, and our sports have an end”
The Echoing Green (I)
Play and creative imagination as a learning/developmental experience
Inevitability of day and the continuation of play and joy
“Round the laps of their mothers, many sisters and brothers, like birds in their nest are ready for rest”
The Echoing Green (I)
Sense of community
Still retain freedom under protection- ornithological imagery of birds having the propensity to leave the nest/ explore- parental authority is benevolent and unrestrictive
“And sport no more seen, on the darkening Green”
The Echoing Green (I)
Natural cycles of the day- allows the sunrise to become visible and catalyses the regeneration- cyclical ending- positive progression into nighttime
Ending of the state of innocence- innocence as transient which makes progression inevitable, yet you are still able to inhabit and reclaim a sense of innocence within experience - doesn’t have to be a devouring force
“I wander thro’ each chartered street, near where the charter’d Thames does flow”
London (E)
Blake himself has freedom- aimlessness in being free from constraints and acts as an observer/flaneur as an educated individual he can recognise plights yet he calls to action for collective power
“chartered” alludes to the ownsership by the rich/crown as a symbol of control to split up london and make individuals pay- shows hoe institutions have taken over the city and the natural river. Also the inescapability of social and political constraints
Natural world shackled by human institutions of suffering
Commodification and imposed restriction to the natural entity of the river stresses Blake’s criticism of the ruling classes domination of the city
“mark in every face I meet, marks of weakness, marks of woe
London (E)
sense of permanence- branded by their suffering
Antanaclasis- collective homegenity of oppression
Metaphorical scars left by the controlling oppressive system- makes them vulnerable through visible weaknesses such as sexually transmitted diseases or visible poverty and malnourishment
Alliteration links their despair to their weakness amplifying the damage- syntactic parallelism to create a semantic field of suffering
“In every cry of man, in every Infant’s cry of fear, in every voice in every man”
London (E)
Anaphora- all humans are imprisoned and there is no individuality in suffering
“The mind- forged manacles I hear”
London (E)
The regular meter is upset here adding a sense of suffering and effort
“How the Chimney-sweeper’s cry every blackning church appals; and the hapless Soldier’s sigh runs in blood down Palace walls”
London (E)
Their cry figuratively blackens the church due to its abuse and exploitation of the vulnerable- they authorise the sweeper’s suffering making the establishment culpable
Soldier is helpless and does nothing to diminish his own suffering
the hypocrisy appals Blake
“But most tho’ midnight streets I hear how the youthful harlot’s curse blasts the new-born infant’s tear”
London (E)
Oxymoron- no future or vitality to youth- cycles of opression
“and blights with plagues with the marriage hearse”
London (E)
Marriage is a restrictive christian construction used as a means of control- likened to a death sentence
Marriage as a fallacy- manufactured to make suffering more endurable- beuracratic control over human emotions- shackling love
When the voices of children are heard on the green and laughing is heard on the hill”
Nurses song (I)
“My heart is at rest within my breast and everything else is still”
Nurses song (I)
“Come, come leave of play and let us away, till the morning appears in the skies”
Nurses song (I)
“No, no let us play, for it is yet day and we cannot go to sleep. Besides, in the sky the little birds fly, and the hills are all covered with sheep”
Nurses song (I)
“Well we’ll go and play till the light fades away”
Nurses song (I)
“The little ones leaped & shouted & laughed and all the hills echoed”
Nurses song (I)
“When the voices of children are heard on the green, and whisperings are in the dale”
Nurses song (E)
“The days of my youth rise fresh in my mind, my face turns green and pale”
Nurses song (E)
“Then come home my children the sun is gone down, and the dews of night arise”
Nurses song (E)
“Your spring and your day are wasted in play, and your winter and night in disguise”
Nurses song (E)
