Comparing The Lamb and The Tyger by William Blake
In this essay I am going to analyse, compare and contrast two poems by
William Blake. They are called 'The Lamb' and 'The Tyger'. I will be
looking at how Blake uses imagery, structure and form to create
effects and how the environment that Blake lived in affected the way
he wrote his poems.
In the late 18th century, the world was changing and developing into a
new world quite fast.
Blake was born in London, the third of five children. Because of the
relatively lower middle class status of his fathers line of work,
Blake was raised in a state of not quite poverty, but he saw what life
could really be like if he was down on his luck, and this he would
experience for the rest of his life.
When he was nineteen the American Revolution happened and this caused
great social unrest in the high and wealthy classes. Then, when he was
32, the French Revolution occurred which signalled the end of the
monarchy and aristocracy in France. This, not surprisingly, caused the
same area of society in Britain to fear that the same would happen in
their back yard.
Blake was still writing at the start of the Industrial Revolution,
this time became the primary phase in which heavy machinery was used
in factories and mines. This created a feeling of great political
upheaval and paranoia, shown by the appearance of the Luddites.
All these events affected the way Blake wrote, in the way that he
spoke about how the power of God can influence us, the world being a
beautiful place, but man not being in harmony with it all. Where he
lived was an awful place, he lived next to a graveyard and a
workhouse. People died in the street and he witnessed it all, but he
was stil...
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...bles as the one that preceded it. "By the
stream & and o'er mead" the missing 'v' in over reduces the amount of
syllables from two to one. This is so that the rhyming pattern will be
even (6,6,7,7,7,7,7,7,6,6) instead of (6,6,7,8,7,7,7,7,6,6), also most
of the rhymes in this poem are visual as well as oral this emphasizes
the poems rhymes and thus allowing the message to get through clearer.
The language used in 'the Tyger' is, in places, very similar to that
of 'the lamb'. It uses alliteration in the phrase, "burning bright" to
emphasize how striking the colour of this animals coat is.
It also uses the old forms of address and it too has visual rhymes as
well as oral ones.
But what it has that 'the lamb' doesn't is, it repeats words one after
the other in the phrase "Tyger, Tyger", this is used the same way
alliteration is to stress the metaphor.
William Blake was born to Catherine Wright and her second husband James Blake on November 28, 1757. Both Catherine’s first husband Thomas Armitage and Blake’s father James Blake were hosiers. This allowed Blakes family to live in a less fashionable, yet respectable neighborhood(). It is speculated that Wright and Armitage were members of the Moravian church; this early influence from his mother affected Blake’s later works as some readers “detect echoes of Moravian hymns in Blake’s poetry” (blake archive). Even as a child, Blake was a level headed and spiritual individual. Because his parents recognized these qualities as different from others his age, he was allowed to skip all forma...
William Blake, was born in 1757 and died in 1827, created the poems “The Lamb,” “The Tyger,” and Proverbs of Hell. Blake grew up in a poor environment. He studied to become an Engraver and a professional artist. His engraving took part in the Romanticism era. The Romanticism is a movement that developed during the 18th and early 19th century as a reaction against the Restoration and Enlightenment periods focuses on logic and reason. Blake’s poetry would focus on imagination. When Blake created his work, it gained very little attention. Blake’s artistic and poetic vision consists in his creations. Blake was against the Church of England because he thought the doctrines were being misused as a form of social control, it meant the people were taught to be passively obedient and accept oppression, poverty, and inequality. In Blake’s poems “The Lamb,” “The Tyger,” and Proverbs of Hell, he shows that good requires evil in order to exist through imagery animals and man.
In the two well known stories, “Lamb to the Slaughter” and “The Lady or the Tiger,” both deal with relationships that have gone wrong. The story for “Lamb to the Slaughter,” starts out with Mary Maloney, who is pregnant and sews and waits for her husband to come home everyday. When her husband comes home one day and tells her that he is leaving her, she gets upset and ends up killing him with a frozen lamb leg. By the end of the story she is able to also get away with doing it. As for “The Lady or the Tiger,” this story deals with a King, whose daughter has fallen in love with a man who is not of the same status as she is. When the king finds out of this, he sends him to their version of a court system, which consists of choosing between two doors. One that has a tiger that will kill them and one that has a girl that the man will get to marry. The princess knows which door has each option in it and has the power to tell him which one to choose. Although in the end, the story never actually tells you which one she picks, and leaves it up to you to imagine what she does. Both of these stories have a lot in common, such as dealing with complicated relationships, as well as both of these women end up losing no matter what they choose.
William Blake, a unique poet of the literary canon, is one of the most critiqued poets of all time. Having a rather unique stylistic approach to topics, especially religion, Blake seems to contradict himself in his own writing and, therefore, sparks questions in the readers’ minds on specific subjects. Two of his poems in particular have been widely critiqued and viewed in various lights. “The Tyger,” written in 1774, and “The Lamb,” written five years later in 1789, are considered companion poems due to their similar humanistic topic and stark differences of each other. Through the use of specific titillation and use of rhetorical questioning, Blake sets up an ultimatum between the two poems, creating the illusion that each creature in the poems may have different creators. In this way, Blake questions traditional Christian doctrine in such a way that initiates curiosity of the identity of the creator, or creators, and the nature of each; thus, the reader is opened up to a more broad pattern of thought.
There are thousands of fictional short stories written by many different authors, but some stories are more enjoyable and stay with people than other stories. One fictional story that truly is enjoyable more than others is “Lamb to the Slaughter”. Roald Dahl’s short story “Lamb to the Slaughter” is the greatest story due to its Plot and Theme. The story of Mary Maloney who sits home and waits for her husband to get home from work ends up murdering her husband and the events that take place make “Lamb to the Slaughter” the greatest story.
In this essay I am going to be looking at two poems from the Songs of innocence and experience works. These poems are The Lamb and The Tyger written by William Blake. Both these poems have many underlying meanings and are cryptic in ways and both poems are very different to each other. In this essay I will be analysing the two poems, showing my opinions of the underlying themes and backing them up with quotes from the poems. I will compare the poems looking at the similarities and differences between them and also look at each one individually focusing on the imagery, structure and the poetic devices William Blake has used. Firstly I will look at the Tyger a poem about experience.
Keynes, Sir Geoffrey. Introduction to William Blake's Songs of Innocence and of Experience. Shewing the Two Contrary States of the Human Soul. Ed. Geoffrey Keynes. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1967.
The ideas that are presented in poems are often the same ideas everyone is thinking but are too afraid to speak their mind for fear that they might be judged. Allen Ginsberg explained this predicament when he said “[p]oetry is the one place where people can speak their original human mind. It is the outlet for people to say in public what is known in private” (Ginsberg). This quote applies especially to “The Tyger” by William Blake. William Blake’s poem “The Tyger” at the surface is very simplistic; however, with further analysis the story’s theme of religion asks fundamental questions that pertain to one’s worldview with the use of symbolism.
Blake was educated at home by his mother, whom he was very fond of. his poem "Cradle Song" was about his memories of his upbringing.
Why did William Blake decide to illustrate his own poems? In 1789, he published Songs of Innocence, and in 1794, he published its partner Songs of Experience. While it is not unusual for authors to publish their poems, Blake’s sets are different because he not only wrote the poems but illustrated and printed them himself. Blake could have done this because he could. He had experience and skills as a printer, but because he created the illustrations himself, it is possible to use them to find a deeper meaning for each poem (Lynch). This could have possibly been his intention. Using this, one can find more meanings for his pieces even when the illustrations do not necessarily compare with their poem.
During the British Romantic period, some writers used material from the Bible or imitated the Bible in style of writing or content. William Blake, a Romantic writer, engraver, and painter, believed that “the Bible was the greatest work of poetry ever written” (Barker 2004). The Bible influenced him throughout this life, specifically influencing both his writing and his art. There are many references to Biblical themes within his writing, and there are also many references to specific passages of Scripture (Barker 2004).
An exploited and mistreated society that 's tyrannical monarchy leaves its people without any hope left. To be poor defines being oppressed, this poem shows through the ranks that there is unification among everyone, in the fact that no matter who they are, society is repressed by the government. William Blake, in his poem London, uses rhyme, repetition and imagery paint the picture of social oppression in London.
Blake and Brent Staples were raised in the same angry, heavily poor city where violence and deaths were an everyday routine. Staples explain this by saying “I was introduced to mortality, not by the old and failing, but by beautiful young
Blake is saying to the lamb, I'll tell you who made you, and it is
...me when greedy upper class capitalists exploited the working class for personal profit and we are living in a time where the nuclear family, with the one working parent and the one stay at home parent, is almost becoming obsolete. Both parents need to work in order to keep up with the increasing living expenses. Blake was around during the time of deism, a faith that denied any direct experience with God, in which the minds of the more intellectual people were fascinated. In our modern times, many people have denounced religion in search of a more tangible resource. William Blake's personal beliefs in defining the individuals search for freedom offers as much in context today, as it did back then. The new question of whether or not Blake's contribution will be enough to save our television, internet and cellular phone pop culture, is another question altogether.