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The chimney sweeper analysis essay
Conclusion to the critical analysis of william blake the chimney sweeper
The chimney sweeper” by William Blake Analysis
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History is a huge part of mankind’s existence as it reminds them what they have accomplished and tells stories to their little ones about the things humans have created in their short lives. Moreover, history is key to civilization here on earth but sometimes humans have a bad habit of only writing about their victories and forgetting to mention their failures. No matter what the case, mankind knows that there are always two sides to every story because they know they are far from perfect. However, it is the handful of individuals that come along once in a life time that reminds every one of their flaws and immoral ways and opens human’s eyes and changes their ways. In 1757, on the 28th of November in Soho London, a man by the name of William …show more content…
Williams use of colors in “The Chimney Sweeper” is not just added into the story for our imagination, all the meanings of the colors the reader is shown from the child’s eyes are revealed and exposed from the experience or adult side of the story. Moreover, in this story the color white is used to show purity in a person or their thoughts. Tom Dacre is depicted with having white hair, meaning he is pure as he is nearly just a child, but William brilliantly shows the loss of innocence in this seen as Toms hair is shaved off, symbolizing his purity being stripped from life. Although colors are very symbolic in this poem, the few key words the reader notices are very important as well. William writes that when Tom was getting his hair cut that he “cried when his head, That curl’d like a lamb’s back, was shav’d”, rest assured that the word lamb was no mistake when it was written (Lines 5-6). Mrs. Dianne Heath writes about Blake’s choice of words here saying “Moreover, yet again humans are shown Williams genius ways as the lamb in this passage symbolizes the Christian theme of Christs purity and sacrifice to humanity and temporal neglect of his father” (Heath 116). Although Blake is not comparing these children to Jesus Christ, he is making parallels in their lives, showing the reader that these children are sacrificed for their society just as Christ was sacrificed for all of mankind. Nonetheless, while God painfully had to turn away from his son for a moment to let him be the ultimate sacrifice for everyone’s sins, these children’s parents willfully turn away from their children, and sacrifice them and their innocence to work without reward or love. Clearly people today can see the flame of passion William had for rebelling against the status-quo, for his people sacrificed and tortured
The setting is London in 1854, which is very different to anything we know today. Johnson’s description of this time and place makes it seem like a whole other world from the here and now....
[1] Walter Benjamin in Illuminations reminds his readers that each history of civilization is tainted by barbarism since the prevailing civilization's history is dependent upon the suppression and eradication of alternative histories that might challenge the legitimacy of the existing civilization's rule. The problem with traditional history that asserts a stance of "objectivity," according to Benjamin, is that it overlooks how the existing powers-that-be superimpose upon past events a history that justifies the present ideological structure's control; or, put more simply, history is always viewed through the biased lenses of the victor. Colonization and history go hand and hand. History is always written by the colonizer, since the colonizer owns and controls the means of production that allows history texts to be reproduced and proliferate. As a result, "The history which he [the colonizer] writes is not the history of the country which he plunders but the history of his own nation in regard to all that she skims off, all that she violates and starves" (Fanon 51).
“Oh, it was a mistake.” People always say that and a large number of people don’t learn from their mistakes. Same mistakes keep happening even though the world keeps on saying I promise. People just let things happen because they are selfish and full of greed. There is a book called “Night”. This book shows the greed and selfishness which leads to a disaster that will hurt millions of people. The question is why is it important for young people today to read Night? The answer is we should learn the mistakes from the past and take it seriously and take actions not only by saying I will not do it again. We should succor the victim of oppression and tyranny by being on their side and do what is right. I believe repeating the past is the worst thing you can do.
In Harry Mulisch’s novel The Assault, the author not only informs society of the variance in perception of good and evil, but also provides evidence on how important it is for an innocent person experiencing guilt to come to terms with their personal past. First, Mulisch uses the characters Takes, Coster, and Ploeg to express the differences in perspective on the night of the assault. Then he uses Anton to express how one cannot hide from the past because of their guilt. Both of these lessons are important to Mulisch and worth sharing with his readers.
The atrocities of the Belgian Congo and the Holocaust are two of the main events in history that have been responsible for the mass murdering of millions of people. Although these events significantly changed the course of humanity, and the story behind each one is very different, there are significant factors that make them alike as well as different. Many would agree that comparing two atrocities that affected the lives of so many people and gave a 180-degree turn to each of their countries would be something very difficult to achieve. However, by comparing the behavior of both the perpetrators and the victims of both cases we might be able to further understand the lack of morality and the inspiration that led to these awful events. The perpetrators in both atrocities tended to have a similar pattern of behavior when it came to the way they saw their victims. But, they also acted in ways where you can draw the conclusion that one set of events was not inspired by the other. These two sets of atrocities were reported to have a very similar number of victims. However, the Holocaust is one of the most reminded events in history as a period of shame, tragedy and sadness, while many still ignore the atrocities in the Belgian Congo.
In her novel The Daughter of Time Josephine Tey looks at how history can be misconstrued through the more convenient reinterpretation of the person in power, and as such, can become part of our common understanding, not being true knowledge at all, but simply hearsay. In The Daughter of Time Josephine claims that 40 million school books can’t be wrong but then goes on to argue that the traditional view of Richard III as a power obsessed, blood thirsty monster is fiction made credible by Thomas More and given authenticity by William Shakespeare. Inspector Alan Grant looks into the murder of the princes in the tower out of boredom. Tey uses Grant to critique the way history is delivered to the public and the ability of historians to shape facts to present the argument they believe.
If only time travel were possible, the past would no longer be an entity to regret. Every single person on this planet has regrets of unfulfilled past opportunities, and that is no exaggeration. No human can honestly say they have lived a life with no regrets. One of the main flaws of human nature is hindsight, or the ability to look back on past mistakes and form new ideas as to how the situation could have better been handled. In the story All the King’s Men, Jack Burden is his own worst enemy. Jack takes everything to the heart, no matter how menial the comment or action. He allows his past to rule his life as though history repeats itself without fail. The person allowing the past to repeat itself is Jack, however his so-called best friend Willie shares the blame. Willie is the reason for most of Jack’s misfortunes although Jack always has the option to walk away but never does. The downfall of man will be none other than himself. For example, no critic but the artist who created the work will see each and every flaw. In All the King’s Men, Robert Penn Warren utilizes a myriad of characters and their emotions to display morose obsessions with previous faults.
In some societies it is the actions of many men that change the environment to which they belong and this in turn makes up history. However in other societies such as the United States and R...
“One is astonished in the study of history at the recurrence of the idea that evil must be forgotten, distorted, skimmed over. The difficulty, of course, with this philosophy is that history loses its value as an incentive and example; it paints perfect men and noble nations, but it does not tell the truth.”
The color white is associated with purity, and innocence. In the novel Nick describes the room in Tom’s house where Daisy and Jordan are introduced. He describes the room as “bright” and the windows as “gleaming white against the grass”. The dresses Jordan and Daisy are wearing are also white. In the first chapter, Daisy and Jordan’s “girlhood” is described as “beautiful and white”. Childhood represents innocence and because the color white is associated with it, white becomes a representation of innocence as well. The affect the color white makes is the impression of a pure, clea...
...an extremely difficult concept to grasp. However, history must always be remembered correctly. Otherwise, as Geoffrey Keynes stated, “history will repeat itself”.
Back in the late 1300’s, Geoffrey Chaucer, a famous English poet, wrote a book called The Canterbury Tales. The Canterbury was about a man named Chaucer and a group of his close friends that were traveling to the city Canterbury and had time to kill so each person started multiple short stories and made a competition out of it. As a result as to who won the story telling competition, the rest of the people in the trip had to pay for one of their meals. Boring rides to the destination might be boring but not when Chaucer is around. The Canterbury Tales shows crime, punishment and justice medieval style. Through Chaucer’s various tales he demonstrates corruption, deception, and karma.
Throughout the course of history documentation of important events and specific individuals has always seen an abundance of attention. Various characters throughout history however, are sometimes painted in a false light due to having characteristics that are either shameful or portray the individual in a different way than the author intends them to be. This often leads to embellished storytelling, deletion of certain aspects of an individuals personality or a complete adjustment of an important event. The pairs of people that we have gone over this semester are not excluded from this type of documentation. It is my goal of this research paper to examine two pairs of the individuals we have gone over and decide whether or not we could be receiving
Starting with the first stanza, Blake creates a dark and depressing tone. He uses words such as died, weep, soot, and cry to support this tone. In the first two lines the child shares his family with us, stating his mother’s death and the fact that his father sold him sharing that the child must come from a poor background “When my mother died I was very young, And my father sold me while yet my tongue”(Lines 1-2). The image of a poor child getting tossed into another unhappy place sets the tone for the beginning of this poem. Blake uses the word “weep”, instead of “sweep” in the first stanza to show the innocence of the child “Could scarcely cry weep weep weep weep”(3). The fact that the child cried “weep” instead of sweep shows that the child could not be any older than four. Blake describes that they sleep in soot also meaning they are sleeping in their death bed. The average life span of children who work in chimneys is ten years due to the harsh work environment. The child portrays sorrow in the last line of the first stanza “So your chimneys I sweep & in soot I sleep.”(4)
In the poem, “The Chimney Sweeper” by William Blake, the author attempts to educate the reader about the horrors experienced by young children who are forced into labor at an early age cleaning chimneys for the wealthy. The poem begins with a young boy who has lost his mother but has no time to properly grieve because his father has sold him into a life of filth and despair. The child weeps not only for the loss of his mother and father’s betrayal, but also for the loss of his childhood and innocence. Blake uses poetry in an attempt to provoke outrage over the inhumane and dangerous practice of exploiting children and attempts to shine a light on the plight of the children by appealing to the reader’s conscience in order to free the children from their nightmare existence. Right away in the first lines of the poem we learn through the child narrator that his life is about to change dramatically for the worse.