William Blake Essay -- Biography William Blake Papers

William BlakeWilliam Blake was born in 1757 during a time when Romanticism was on the rise. Romantic poets of this day and jump on, living in England, experienced changes from a wealth-centered aristocracy to a modern industrial nation where power shifted to large-scale employers thus leading to the enlargement of the working class. Although Blake is seen as a very skillful writer his greatest successes were his engravings taught to him by a skilled sculpture. Blake differed from other poets in that he never received a formal education. His solo education consisted of the arts, and therefore he enrolled in the olympian Academy of the Arts around the age of twelve. It was only in his redundant time that he showed any interest in poetry. At the age of twenty-four he married Catherine Boucher who in fact had been illiterate at the time but Blake soon taught her to read. From there he pursued statement in drawing and painting, illustrated books, and engraved designs made by other a rtists. It was only after many failures at the attempt of public recognition, and after historic period of isolation, that Blake had experienced his first audience. It was a small group of painters that admired his work and listened to every one of his talks. Blake is best known for intertwining his artistic talent and poetical flow. Proof of such success is seen in Songs of pureness and Songs of Experience, in which almost every poem has been engraved and beautifully sculpted onto a plaque. These two sets of poems represented what Blake believed to be the two contrary states of the human head. Blake was considered a social critic of his own time and often apprehension of himself as a prophet. His criticism was a reflection of his own expanse and of an era in time that... ...rth to awake, he is asking not to physically wake up but to really open your eyes to the land around you and see what you maintain become. See how materialistic and self-centered you have become. He sa ys not to turn away because turning away wont solve your problems only surpress them for the time being. The poem is drawn in a nights sky to give the Earth the prospect to wake up with the new morning.http//members.aa.net/urizen/experience/soe02.html When Blake combined the two titles Songs of Innocence and Songs of Experience he added a phrase that sums up the meaning of the two. He added Shewing the Two Contrary States of the Human Soul, these two states being childishness and adulthood. Childhood represents Innocence and adulthood represents Experience and what we do with our lives comes from childhood supposition and adulthood determination and judgment.