William Blake, London, from Songs of
Experience (1791)
I wander thro' each charter'd street,
Near where the charter'd
And mark in every face I meet
Marks of weakness, marks of woe.
In every cry of every man,
In every Infant's cry of fear,
In every voice, in every ban,
The mind-forg'd manacles I hear.
How the Chimney-sweeper's cry
Every black'ning Church appals;
And the hapless Soldier's sigh
Runs in blood down Palace walls.
But most thro' midnight streets I hear
How the youthful Harlot's curse
Blasts the new-born infant's tear,
And blights with plagues the Marriage hearse.
Analysis of
Blake's
In the formal approach method to critical analysis, it is essential to read
William Blake's "
William Blake's poem,
"
In the third stanza,
Blake utilizes imagery of destruction and religion. This imagery is a paradox,
which implies some religious destruction like the apocalypse. The
"chimney-sweeper's cry" symbolizes the society trying to clean the
ashes that causes their state of depression. Blake uses the religious imagery
of the "black'ning church" to represent the
loss of innocence, and the society's abandonment of religion. The use of the
soldiers creates an imagery of war. The "hapless soldier's sigh" symbolize
how men are drafted into war and have no choice but to serve their country. As
these soldiers unwilling march to the beat of the country's forceful drum, they
know their lives will be taken, as their "sigh runs in blood down palace
walls." Blake uses this sense of destruction to explain how people are
forced to repair the "weakness" and "woe" of their society.
The fourth stanza of
"
William Blake's "
http://www.bbc.co.uk/education/asguru/english/03contexts/14williamblake/index.shtml