Moon’s Day, April 8: Chariot of Fire
EQ: How did Blake imagine that “contraries” and “corrosives” would free us?
- Welcome! Gather pen/pencil, paper, Friday’s work, wits!
- Opening Freewrite: “And Did Those Feet”
- Lecture/Presentation: The Visions and Methods of William Blake
- CLOZE
- Read/Respond: William Blake, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell
- Plate 3: Contraries
- Plates 7-10: Proverbs
- Plate 14: “The Doors”
ELACC12RL-RI2: Analyze two or more themes or central ideas of text
ELACC12RI3: Analyze and explain how individuals, ideas, or events interact and develop
ELACC12RL6: Distinguish what is directly stated in a text from what is really meant
ELACC12RI6: Determine an author’s point of view or purpose in a text
ELACC12W2: Write informative/explanatory texts to examine and convey complex ideas
ELACC12W4: Produce clear and coherent writing appropriate to task, purpose, and audience
ELACC12W10: Write routinely over extended and shorter time frames
ELACC12SL1: Initiate and participate effectively in a range of collaborative discussions
ELACC12L1: Demonstrate standard English grammar and usage in speaking and writing.
ELACC12L2: Use standard English capitalization, punctuation, spelling in writing.
ELACC12L5: Demonstrate understanding of figurative language, word relationships, nuances
ELACC12L6: Acquire and use general academic and domain-specific words and phrases
fromWilliam Blake, Milton: A Poem (1808)
“England’s Unofficial National Anthem”
Anddid those feet in ancient time
Walk upon England's mountains green?
And was the holy Lamb of God
On England's pleasant pastures seen?
And did the Countenance Divine
Shine forth upon our clouded hills?
And was Jerusalem builded here
Among these dark satanic mills?
Bring me my bow of burning gold!
Bring me my arrows of desire!
Bring me my spear! O clouds, unfold!
Bring me my chariot of fire!
I will not cease from mental fight,
Nor shall my sword sleep in my hand,
Till we have built Jerusalem
In England's green and pleasant land.
Freewrite 100 words: What about this seems odd for a “national anthem”?
William Blake (1757 - 1829)
- HUGELY important toboth poetry and visual art; maybe ONLY such artist
- Fiercely independent: didn’t care if NO ONE “got”him: “That which can be made explicit to the idiot is not worth my care.”
- Deeply religious, but believed governments, capitalism, religion – ANY organized system of thinking – work to destroy Individual Vision
- SO – distrusted traditional publishers; famous artist, but few knew his writing because his publication method was intentionally NOT mass production.
Blake did not “write” in the “usual way.”
To do so would be to bow to conformity. So he did this:
- Covered a 5x7 copper plate with wax, allowed wax to set;
- Etched words, designs, pictures into the wax;
- Pourednitric acid onto plate to eat away the exposed copper;
- Scraped away all of the wax, leaving etched/layered plate;
- Painted designs on the etched sections of the plate;
- Pressed the painted plate onto printing paper, and hung to dry;
- Washed plate, paints plate, prints again for each new copy – so different versions exist of “same” “poem” – which therefore is not the “same” – which is the “real”?
- After maybe twenty copies printed, threw away copper plate and started over on a new plate to create page 2 of his book.
VERY slow, VERY expensive – the OPPOSITE of “mass production.” COULD NOT be mass-produced, so would ALWAYS be individual.
In other words, the method he used to put his art and poetry before the world reinforced their philosophy. INTEGRITY!
That led to “books” of “poetry” like this:
- Reuniteslogos, iconos, making him forerunner of Graphic Novels, Web Design, etc.
- “melting apparent surfaces away, and displaying the infinite which was hid” – perfect union of poetic mission and artistic method
- Dozens of “books”; we will look at two:
- The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1785)
- Songs of Innocence and Experience (1794)
The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1785) is, like Blake’s other works of poetry, also a work of visual art.
There are not “verses” or pages; there are “plates” – literally, the prints made from the copper plates he painted during his laborious process.
There are about twenty different versions of each of Blake’s books – different because of his process: each printed version will look different from every other printed version, and so will “mean” something different.
As you look at each of the following Plates, respond as indicated on the Reading Guide.
The Marriage of Heaven and Hell: Plate 3
Without Contraries is no Progression. Attraction and Repulsion, Reason and Energy, Love and Hate, are necessary to Human existence. From Contraries spring what the religious call Good and Evil. Good is the passive thatobeys Reason. Evil is the active springing from Energy. Good is Heaven. Evil is Hell.
The Marriage of Heaven and Hell
Plates 7-10: Proverbs of Hell
The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom.
A fool sees not the same tree that a wise man sees.
If the fool would persist in his folly he would become wise.
Prisons are built with stones of Law, Brothels with bricks of Religion.
The cistern contains; the fountain overflows. Expect poison from the standing water.
Every thing possible to be believ'd is an image of truth.
Damn braces: Bless relaxes.
Truth can never be told so as to be understood, and not be believ'd.
The Marriage of Heaven and Hell
Plate 14: A Memorable Fancy
The ancient tradition that the world will be consumed in fire at the end of six thousand years is true, as I have heard from Hell.
For the cherub with his flaming sword is hereby commanded to leave his guard at tree of life, and when he does, the whole creation will be consumed, and appear infinite, and holy whereas it now appears finite & corrupt.
This will come to pass by an improvement of sensual enjoyment.
But first the notion that man has a body distinct from his soul, is to be expunged: this I shall do, by printing in the infernal method, by corrosives, which in Hell are salutary and medicinal, melting apparent surfaces away, and displaying the infinite which was hid.
If the doors of perception were cleansed every thing would appear to man as it is, infinite.
For man has closed himself up, till he sees all things thro' narrow chinks of his cavern.
Turn In Today:
- Opening Freewrite: “And Did Those Feet”
- Blake Freewrites – on handouts or on paper
More Blake:
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Two different copies of “The Lamb” from Songs of Innocence and Experience
“Newton”
The Spirit of Creativity, from The Book of Los
The Red Dragon The Ghost of a Flea
Turn In Today:
- Opening Freewrite: “And Did Those Feet”
- CLOZE and Reading Guide
More Blake:
- (100 words)
In Essay on Man Alexander Pope says that our ability to think is limited to what we can see, hear, smell, touch, taste:
Say first, of God above, or Man below,
What can we reason, but from what we know?
…and that therefore “’Tis but a Part we see, and not the Whole,” and that therefore “Whatever IS, is RIGHT.”
William Blake says in The Marriage of Heaven and Hell that Man has an infinite mind, that the imagination is limitless:
If the doors of perception were cleansed every thing would appear to man as it is, infinite.
But as a consequence of living in a fallen world, says Blake,
man has closed himself up, till he sees all things through narrow chinks of his cavern.
In short, says Blake, it is Man who has limited Man – not God.
Who’s right – Pope or Blake?
CLOZE: The Art and Method of William Blake
- Blake is probably the only artist recognized as revolutionary and influential in BOTH ______and ______.
- What did Blake say to those who thought he was too independent to be understood?
- Blake believed that capitalism, religion and government worked to destroy what?
- Blake’s poetry was not well-known in his lifetime because his process for ______was the opposite of ______.
- Outline this process:
a)______
b)______
c)______
d)______
e)______
f)______
g)______
h)______
- His famous description of his process – “______apparent ______away, ______the ______which was ______” – describes both his ______mission and his ______method.
William Blake, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell
- On Plate 3 Blake declared that “Without ______is no ______.”
Agree/Disagree (20-30 words):
- Write down and respond (20-30 words): to one of the “Proverbs of Hell” from Plates 7-10:
- Write down and respond (20-30 words): to a passage from Plate 14:
Title Your Reaction (20 – 30 words)