My Visionâs Greatest Enemy - Culture in Blake
Discusses the representation of cultural identity in Blake's work, including 'The Everlasting Gospel', 'The Tyger', 'Mock on' and 'The Crystal Cabinet'
In 1803, William Blake was arrested and charged with high treason, for having ?uttered seditious and treasonable expressions, such as D-n the King, d-n all his subjects??, a powerful reminder of the extent to which Blake?s ideologies were at odds with those of his society. Throughout his life, Blake championed imaginative spontaneity and emotional self-expression. In doing so, he became one of the first poets of the Romantic movement; rejecting almost entirely the cultural constructs of the Enlightenment and the Industrial Revolution. Blake?s visions challenged the dominant materialism of the time, confronted the Church?s teachings of puritanical Christianity and questioned the legitimacy of the social hierarchy. Most significantly, Blake?s poetry is concerned with the corrupting and repressive morality that State and Church had imposed on humanity. He used the world of imagination to explore the possibility of liberation from this oppressive state, and encouraged his readers to step beyond the confines of their society and discover and empower themselves in a boundless world with no societal restrictions.
Blake was a religious dissenter. He was vehemently critical of the repressive interpretation of Christianity preached by the Church; his poems represent God the Father as a symbol of tyranny and Christ as a fallible man. The poet rejected the dominant religious belief that Jesus is gentle, humble and chaste, insisting that Jesus ?acted from impulse, not from rules?. In doing so, he questioned the belief of the British people in organised religion; a pivotal cultural identity of his society. The last important poem that Blake wrote was ?The Everlasting Gospel?, which with an extraordinary clarity and brevity demonstrates the way in which he responded to the culturally constructed understanding of Christ.
The poem begins with a statement which exemplifies Blake?s response to this construct: ?The Vision of Christ that thou dost see | Is my vision?s greatest enemy?. Blake is attempting to liberate Jesus from the prison of reason that the Church had erected around him. His Jesus is the transcendent creative being who unites all threads of the human soul; above rigid dogma, logic, and even morality. In a historical allusion, Blake compares Meletus? criticism of Socrates to Caiaphas, the most powerful member of the Church at the time of Jesus? crucifixion. The implication is to present Jesus ? like Socrates ? as largely misunderstood. Blake?s life was largely Socratic ? he spent much of his life contemplating the social order without actually engaging it. The poet felt close to both Socrates and Jesus, and saw both as liberators of the mind who were inappropriately persecuted by their societies. Furthermore, ?The Everlasting Gospel? suggests that we need to infer truths from the Bible rather than interpret it literally ? his contemporary society ?read?st black where I read white?.
Similarly, ?The Tyger? is a poem that consists entirely of questions relating to the nature of creation and a supreme being. The opening question, ?what immortal hand or eye?? implies that it was a god in human form who made the Tyger. Each stanza reveals more about the nature of the creator. ?In what distant deeps or skies | Burnt the fire of thine eyes?, first poses the question of whether the creator is evil, like Satan from the deeps; or good, like God of the skies. The change in wording of the first and last stanzas from ?Could frame thy fearful symmetry? to ?Dare frame thy fearful symmetry? suggests that the questioner has become increasingly concerned about the righteousness of the creator, but the poem remains an enigma. The allusions to the myths of Prometheus and Icarus, who were punished by the gods for their hubris, and the reference to divine retributive justice in ?When the stars threw down their spears?, also suggest that the poem is questioning the morality of a supreme being.
Historical readings of ?The Tyger? consider the parallels between the poem and events of the French Revolution, which was gaining momentum when it was written. The revolutionists had been termed ?tigers? by the media, and it is possible that the poem was written as a treatise on complex human nature. Regardless of the impact they had on this specific poem, the American and French revolutions unquestionably had cultural significance in Blake?s time. Both were precipitated by dissatisfaction with the ruling class, and Blake ? not surprisingly ? registered his support for change in these countries. In this way, he engaged in the politically liberal spirit of the Enlightenment, and challenged the cultural myth that the status quo of monarchical and upper-class control would forever oppress the British people.
Blake?s theology is intrinsically connected to his theory of imagination. ?I know of no other Christianity?, he wrote, ?than the liberty of both body and mind to exercise the Divine Arts of Imagination?. ?The Crystal Cabinet? is an outstanding example of Blake?s use of an alternative reality to evoke readers to contemplate the boundaries of their society in light of knowledge about another world where these boundaries do not exist. The poem catapults the reader into a realm of the persona?s imagination. The cabinet in which the persona finds himself is ?form?d of gold, and pearl and crystal shining bright?, a contrast to the largely dull world of nineteenth century London. Inside the cabinet, we find ?another London with its tower? ? forgotten temporarily are the evils of the real city which Blake highlights in many of his Songs of Experience. The images inside the crystal cabinet are ?translucent, lovely shining, clear?; all people and places are presented in their perfect form. Blake subscribed to Plato?s philosophy that a world of ideal forms exists beyond our perception. He remarked, ?knowledge of ideal beauty? is born with us. Innate ideas are in Every Man?. His poems present encounters with this world, in the hope that readers will realise the potential to escape their repressive society.
When the persona breaks the crystal cabinet, having tried to ?seize the inmost form?, the world is shattered; and the reader is convinced that imagination and reason are incompatible. The poem suggests that our lives have been so dominated by the doctrines of society and the Church that if we try to find reason in anything beyond the confines of our familiar lives, we will fail. The realm of the imagination transcends cannot be quantified by science or mathematics, and cannot be philosophised according to the State?s laws or the Church?s teaching.
?Mock on? is a poem that simultaneously champions intellectual thought and denounces science. A growing cultural myth of the nineteenth century was that science offers the answers to the questions of human existence. In his poetry, Blake identifies the extent to which this myth was influencing his society, and condemns it. He makes a reference to Isaac Newton, whose ideas were not only influencing all fields of science but also penetrating the European consciousness. To Blake, Newton?s laws of gravitation were merely another construction that would keep us tied to our limited perception of the world. In a letter, Blake writes ?I believe the souls of 500 Sir Isaac Newtons would go to the making up of a Shakespeare or a Milton?. Blake advocates instead the work of Voltaire, whose philosophical tales tell of the cleverness and precision of the human mind; and Rousseau, who believed that institutionalisation had corrupted humanity.
Sand is used as a metaphor in ?Mock on?, representing the abstract notion of the ideas purported by Voltaire, Rousseau and Newton. In the second stanza, the sand that the former two had thrown ?against the wind? is transformed into a Gem, ?reflected in the beams divine?. Newton?s ?Particles of light?, however, are merely sands upon a shore. The effect is to elevate the significance of these philosophers? theories, which shine ?in Israel?s paths?, symbolising of the changing direction our world and our relationship with the divine will take as a result of their work.
The economic changes that took place during the industrialisation of Britain had a marked impact on its social structure. The aristocracy became even more powerful than before, and a middle-class capitalistic group developed almost overnight, progressing at the expense of men, women and children whom they overworked in their factories. The ruling classes legitimised their poor treatment of the working class by creating the cultural myth that life for people was better in industrialised cities than it was prior to the Industrial Revolution. One of Blake?s most famous poems, ?London?, questions this myth. The poet traces unhappy people to the institutions that oppress them ? the persona identifies ?mind-forg?d manacles? in ?every man?. This metaphor is extraordinary in its depiction of the way that industrialised society has enslaved its members. The repetition of the word ?marks? draws attention to the way that people are marked like slaves by the mercantile system; and the repetition of ?every? in the second stanza emphasises misery?s total permeation of society.
Our own experiences as members of the developed world in the twenty-first century are quite different. In many respects, Blake?s ideals have been realised in our society. The last hundred years has seen a shift in our perceptions of the world; and now our society is concerned, to a much larger extent, with the inner self rather than the social human being. Freedom of speech and religion, suffrage and relative egalitarianism are ideologies that are informing our society more than any before it. As a young member of society, my response to Blake?s works are couched in an almost na?ve acceptance of these ideologies. The effect is that the social milieu presented in Blake?s poems is more startling but less plausible; and Blake?s remedies seem less controversial. Nevertheless, Blake?s catalyst for the exploration of the human being ? the realm of the imagination ? still manages to thrust me into a state of social contemplation and ideological doubt. Blake?s world will forever offer a way to launch us beyond the familiar prison of our own social persona.
William Blake was profoundly affected by the consciousness of nineteenth century European society. He reacted fervently to the way in which Church and State had conspired to restrict the life of individuals. His poems identify the cultural constructs of his society, and, in true visionary style, offer an alternative ? the realm of the imagination. In ?The Crystal Cabinet?, the remarkable nature of imagination is examined, and in many of Blake?s other works imagination is purported as a substitute to cultural identities and cultural myths of the time. In ?Mock on?, science and reason are replaced with philosophy and in ?The Everlasting Gospel?, Blake insists that we must contemplate Jesus for ourselves rather than blindly accepting the Church?s doctrines. Blake?s works champion this imaginative freedom, the foundation of the visionary poet?s extraordinary power to provoke his readers into contemplating their social presumptions.
