SONGS OF INNOCENCE AND EXPERIENCE

Blake believed that arts could change people’s mind. He believed that through poetry, he could convince
the readers to move away from passive conformism to political or religious ideologies. He developed the
theory of contraries according to which psychic or mental opposites can coexist, for example good and evil.
He elaborated this theory in his poetry collection “Songs of Innocence and of Experience”. The speaker of
these poems is a child who sings the contact between the world and the divine. Innocence for Blake is a
condition where evil is not present, while, on the other hand, experience is an acceptance that good and
evil might coexist. These poems to be understood, they should be considered with their respective
illustrations.

THE LAMB
The poem The Lamb speaks about the creation and the figure of the poet, there are 2
stanzas which are related to each other because the first is a question about the creation,
while the second is the answer. Blake asks to the lamb if it knows who made it, but it isn't
the lamb which answer, the poet himself does it. The lamb is a metaphor of innocence, like
the creature in which there isn’t evil, it is the symbol of God's innocence. In the second
stanza, the poet reveal that the creator is the lamb because he's tender, sweet and innocent,
he's a little child.

DIFFERENZE
Blake focuses the attention on the two animals and their symbolic power. The lamb is a symbol of
innocence and purity while the tiger, conversely, is a dangerous creature that does not belong to
Christian symbolism. The tiger, is the symbol of suffering because of human experience, to this,
there are connected the questions about the nature and identity of this creature, to which Blake can’t
answer. The two texts are an excellent example of Blake's poetics and conception of reality, he
believes that the world should be "read" like a book composed by God; in this sense, every
presence takes on a symbolic value that helps to understand the reasons for human existence.
Furthermore, for Blake, is important the role of imagination, whit this man can "see" beyond the
reality.

LONDON BLAKE
‘London’ is a poem that speaks about the devastating consequences of the city during the
Industrial Revolution, and the condition of man compared to ‘mind-forged manacles’.
There is a personification between the poet and the speaker, in fact the poet perceives the
scene through his senses. He sees a soldier, that is the victim of the political power and a
prostitute, a woman forced to prostitute herself because of poverty. Children were also the
victims of their own families who decided to use them to earn money. Blake criticizes the
institutions that oppress man, depriving him of the innocence and happiness of childhood.
He uses the repetition of the word ‘chartered’ to underline the corruption of a materialistic
society based on profit; and the condition of suffering that contributes to man’s repression.
The poet’s tone is indignant, accusing and bitter.