Talk:William Blake/Archive 1

message: There seems to be dispute as to whether Blake's brother who died in infancy was older or younger than Blake. In my reading Iv'e 
und references to both, even that Blake was the youngest of 3 sons, so which is it? Was Blake's brother older or younger?But then again...I also read he was a woman!!
:Hm, interesting. Stanley Kunitz, states in "Essential Blake" that Blake's brother Robert was his younger brother. I would call that a very reliable source. What kind of contraticting sources you've found? --Thomas 09:00, 1 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Blake's brother

message: Hey, I don't really know much about Blake or the riots, but I just noticed a discrepancy between their respective pages. Speaking of Blake's role in the riots, this article says the riots were in solidarity with the insurrection in the American colonies. The Gordon Riots page, however, says these were protestant riots demanding that some anti-Catholic legislation in Britain be repealed... Anyone know what the fuss really was about?
:There was a parliamentary Bill put forward to relieve the Catholics of certain disabilities and penalties (so it was pro-Catholic legislation, I think).  Lord George Gordon and his Prostestant Association incited the riots by way of response.  I haven't been able to find anything about blue ribbons, though.
Wouldn't it be out of character for Blake to join such a riot? My understanding was that Blake was tremendously pro-Catholic. I recall a quote by Thomas Merton, whose Masters thesis was on Blake, in his autobiography The Seven Story Mountain, (paraphrasing here): "Catholicism is the only religion which truly teaches God's love". I'm not an expert of Blake, by any means, but he was a major influence on Merton's development as a Catholic mystic. Cravenmonket 21:31, 14 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Gordon Riots? 

message: I've made some additions to the page, and sub-divided the early life section - overall, I think this is one of the better Wikipedia art entries, but its a long way from complete.  I concentrated on embellishing what was there, rather than adding new stuff, but with any luck people will approve of these edits.
I think a great deal more may be said about B's family, especially his relationship with his parents.  I recall that his siblings reportedly saw visions too, Robert especially; Blake wasn't unique in his visions, but was unique in maintaining this ability through to adulthood.  Also, the themes of oppresive fatherhood or weak and faithless motherhood in Blake's later work should be mentioned, if only to contrast this with the support granted to William by both his parents.  That is, why should Blake concentrate on these themes considering his supportive family past?
A couple of points: I'll do something similar with the rest of the article, when I have time and if people approve of what's been done so far.  Second, the caption to the illustration showing the Song of Los - Urizen wasn't Blake's 'almighty creator', but was indicative of an overly rational (broadly speaking, Lockean) frame of mind that tended to create generalized abstrations from sensory data.  Thus, I think the picture caption is a misleading oversimplification.  I wouldn't mind normally, but it's a widely-held (mis)perception that Blake was simply a Bible illustrator, whereas his art and poetry served in part as a reinterpretation of the Biblical myth, rather than a simple allegorical retelling of it.  So often with Blake, the aim is not in supplying information, but in banishing disinformation.
Visual Error 16:06, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Additions and Divisions

message: I'm sorry to be blunt, but this line reveals that the original author has a great deal of studying to do before he/she is qualified to write an article on Blake.  Dissenter, of course, is a term of very wide meaning, referring to those who dissented from the Anglican Church.  What the author is likely trying, and failing, to refer to is Blake's circumstantial but very suggestive links with the Muggletonians (see E. P. Thompson's Witness Against the Beast and other scholarship), a radical Dissenting sect with its roots in the 17th c.  Or the author is gesturing at the New Jerusalem Church of Emmanuel Swedenborg, of which Blake was briefly a member; his disillusionment with Swedenborgianism is woven into The Marriage of Heaven and Hell.  I wish I had time to actually fix this in text.   I hope someone else will do so.    
Steve Newman, Ph.D.
:I do think the best thing to do would be fix it in the article - forgive me, but the time spent noting it on the discussion page could have been spent updating the text.  You seem to be well-informed on the matter, and you have references to hand, so I think it would only be an improvement.  The intention here as throughout Wikipedia is to work towards a well-informed, corroborated article, not lament the fact that we don't have one now. Visual Error 01:27, 2 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  a radical religious sect called "Dissenters"??!! 

message: Heron- Nice revision.  I like your version much better.  Anyone want to add anything to this?KristoferM 04:07, 10 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Imagination 

message: I have a problem with this line in the intro: "Viewing Blake's accomplishments in either poetry or in the visual arts separately is to do him a disservice"
This seems to be a pure matter of opinion and un-encyclopedic. I have long been an avid reader of Blake's poetry with only a passing knowledge of his illustrations- I doubt I have done William Blake any disservice.
***Just because you've been a reader of his poetry w/out studying his visual arts doesn't mean that it's the right way to do things.  That's like a fat man justifying the consumption of Crisco because he's consumed some himself. :) DRJ 16:47, 19 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Questionable Line 

message: His life is, perhaps, summed up by his statement that "The imagination is not a State: it is the Human existence itself"; though this alone may not do justice to his thought.
Ok, so why bother with the quote in the first place? Why not substitute something that actually does justice, or just leave the thing out? Or, if the quote nevertheless does justice, leave out the disclaimer? 194.157.147.34 00:54, 10 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree, this quote seems like an attempt to write a more traditional pov biography, not a npov encyclopaedic one (it does also seem a little collage essay in tone). I vote to remove it totally. - Solar 10:06, 1 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Quote

message: "Basire seems to have been a kind master to Blake: there is no record of any serious disagreement between the two during the period of Blake's apprenticeship. However, Ackroyd's biography notes that Blake was later to add Basire's name to a list of artistic adversaries—and then cross it out (43, Blake, Peter Ackroyd, Sinclair-Stevenson, 1995). This aside, Basire's style of engraving copy images from the Gothic churches in London (it is possible that this task was set in order to break up a quarrel between Blake and James Parker, his fellow apprentice). "
Does anyone know what the bolded sentence is trying to say? I'm confused.
Jedidiah 18:07, 16 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Apprenticeship Confusion

message: 26/10/06
'While his visual art and written poetry are often considered separately, Blake perceived these two disciplines to be companions in a unified spiritual endeavour.' 
It is much more complex that a question of spirituality alone: or at least Blake's notion of spirituality is much more complex than that term usually allows even within Manichean readings of the term. Blake ensured through the 'infernal printing' of his  illuminated books that each work was individual and therefore totally unique. This was part of a desire for authentic, artistic ownership of the work against the growth of the mass market and commodification of 18th C printing. A two fingers up to the 18th C book trade, if you will.  Blake was an artist who wnated to control his works and how they were received in order to radicalise his readers. The illuminated books also allow a dazzling dialogue between text and image in a way that pertains to Blake's radical aesthetic-political project in a way that was far ahead of its time.
'Though he believed himself able to converse aloud with Old Testament prophets, and despite his work in illustrating the Book of Job, Blake's traditional Christian beliefs were modified by a fascination with Mysticism and what is often considered to be his anticipation of the Romanticism unfolding around him. [2] Nonetheless, the difficulty of placing William Blake in any one chronological stage of art history is perhaps the distinction that best defines him.'
Blake was hardly ever a traditional Christian, ( whatever that might mean exactly ? ) anymore than most other mystics or even Gnostics. He was profoundly hostile to organised religion which he believed had systematised and distorted Christ's message. He was born a dissenter - that is to say a Protestant who did not accept the Church of England as the estbalished Church - but was also part of a long visionary and prophetic tradition - allying this to a profound desire to reinterpret man's relationship to God ( he was genrally speaking against the God of the old testament) and to remake Christinaity as revolutionary discourse. He was also fond of the devil who he believed had been misrepresented by Chrstianity and admired him because he had been the nagel who had rebelled against God. Of Paradise Lost : ' Milton was of the Devil's party but he did not know it'.
'Once considered "mad" for his "single-mindedness" (he lived and died in poverty), Blake is highly regarded today for his expressiveness and creativity in both fields, and the underlying philosophical vision that unifies the intent of all his work. As he himself once indicated, "The imagination is not a State: it is the Human existence itself."
He was thought mad, by some,  mostly because he claimed to see visions and rejected the conventions of his day. Is there anything as straightforward as an underlying philosophical vision in Blake?   If so, it wasn't just imagination by any means. I doubt this univocality  - - not for nothing did he claim ' without contraries is no progression'. Blake is above all a poet of negotaited dualities and not of unified vision.  He is basically highly regarded because a) he wrote some of the greatest and most popular poems in English b) he was a truly visonary artist who felt he had something to tell the world and would change art to do so  c) he became very influential after his death and continues to be so today d) he is a model of the radical, free thinking artist who combined aesthetic innovation with a socialist-anarchist agenda. Loved by serious artists from Jim Morrison to Patti Smith  to  Ginsberg to Huxley and we could go on all year in fact. Philip Pullman is president of the Blake society. etc.
Steve Barfield
It is so unbelievably difficult to write encyclopedically about William Blake.  I keep trying to rework the opening, and I keep slipping into observation.  The work and themes are too colorful to render as data.DBaba 04:22, 27 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Keynote First Pargraphs-  Questions/ Suggestions  

message: The link above to "an essay on Auguries of Innocence" doesn't seem particularly relevant to the article, nor is it exactly an essay. Here's an extract:
"...he was absolutely nuts! As well as a great poet. Yet, even he wrote some shit. But it’s not the shit I’m going after this time- that would be too easy. I’m going after a pretty good poem that could be a bit better with just a little nipping & tucking..."
If anyone objects to me removing the link please say so. raptor 04:10, 6 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: well sussed - take it away raptor. Julia Rossi 05:33, 31 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Essay link

message: Someone was causing problems with the page... --Jasonnolan 17:35, 17 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: page abuse

message: Is it worth overhauling the Personality and psychological characteristics section? As it stands, it's pretty well one-sided pov to me and needs citation. From a medical/scientific point of view, anyone with Blake's abilities to see visions, channel and prophesy would be classified as nuts. This is usually caseworthy if the person acts on voices etc to the point where they are not functioning well and have other supporting symptoms. Blake is esteemed in other circles, being regarded as mystical, psychic and visionary. On its own, this section pathologises Blake's legitimate abilities sometimes described as 'gifted'.Julia Rossi 05:45, 31 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Mental? 

message: Whoever wrote this section has clearly only taken Blake's work at face value.
force his audiences into either accepting or rejecting his viewpoints, with little room for ambiguity in interpretation
This is completely wrong. Blake's work is some of the most mystical, varied and challenging in the English language. Part of its genius derives from the fact that it challenges conventional thinking, and the conclusions/prejudices that the reader brings. The only thing it 'forces' us to do is re-think our own moral values. If it were not so widely intepreted, it would not still be so controversial a subject of debate today.
intellectual values of great thinkers that Blake admired, such as Isaac Newton
Wrong again. As the caption to Blake's "Newton" already says, Blake opposed the "single-vision" of scientific materialism. Blake was not a rationalist thinker, as your descriptions of him promoting rational intellectual ideas and objective intellectual inquiry suggest - he frequently stressed the dangers of cold reason and the enlightenment movement (hence criticising Newton), which rejected and thus restrained essential aspects of human nature. If it is possible to impose a category on Blake, then Romantic suits him much better.
quote from the Proverbs of Hell: 'Exuberance is Beauty', whereas 'He who desires but acts not, breeds pestilence.'
attempted to explore these basic horrors of life on earth in his writings
Again, why so shallow an interpretation of his works? His aim was not to enumerate the failures of man. He uses them as a mirror, holding them up to the leader so that we may recognise our failures individually and as a whole, then (most importantly) DO something about them. His work is not typified by self-defeating pessimism, but most often by passionate appeals to throw off our 'mind-forg'd manacles' and live and love as God intended us to. His is the voice of the prophetic 'Bard', who calls the 'lapsèd soul' away from its mental 'prison', to 'break this heavy chain'. (Songs of Experience - Introduction and Earth's Answer) Again, in Proverbs, he demonstrates this aspiration/hope 'What is now proved was once only imagin'd'.
humans are not intrinsically moral in their behavior
There seems to be a huge misconception over the nature of Blake's radical and (still) progressive theological beliefs, which are definitely not given enough thought on this page. Blake repeatedly asserts that man is inherently DIVINE. He avidly rejected the Christian notion of original sin, that all men were inately sinful. Instead he argued that a man who acts as an individual, on instinct un-corrupted by the status quo, achieves almost a divinity, as Jesus (the 'greatest man') demonstrated: 'Jesus was all virtue, and acted from impulse, not from rules'. However, we have been taught by religion and state to repress our desires, distorting and perverting our intrinsic goodness and diverging from the divine path.
quote from The Marriage of Heaven and Hell: Thus men forgot that All Deities reside in the Human breast
in The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, he says that the thinker Swedenbourg did not utter a word of truth, while in his other writings he promoted Swedenbourg.
Once more, a serious misunderstanding. Blake never rejects Swedenborg's theories; he simply criticises them for not taking those theories to what he believes to be their necessary conclusion. He 'conversed with Angels, who are all religious, and not with Devils who all hate religion' - that is, Swedenborg only ever examined one side of the argument. But Blake argued that these contraries are necessary to human existence: one should not give primacy to one and reject or repress the other. Hence Blake's use of the title 'The *Marriage* of Heaven and Hell' as implicit criticism of Swedenborg's work, 'Heaven and Hell'.
To some,[attribution needed] such vacillation may suggest a mind continually refining itself, ultimately reaching a definitive, influential world-view. To others,[attribution needed] it may suggest that Blake struggled all his life to become a mature thinker and artist, and may never have reached these goals.
I agree - attribution *is* needed. Blake had an intense, lucid perception of reality and the order of things, which he developed and adhered to his whole life. A 'mature thinker' is an understatement. His 'goals' were already achieved; its simply the readers who have to catch up.
Though I did not want to outright replace the section, as (due to the controversial nature of Blake's works) I may not be adhering to the majority view, if others agree with this interpretation I will be happy to re-write the section to the best of my ability. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 80.0.62.123 (talk) 21:10, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Ah I dropped a couple of paragraphs before seeing this conversation.  I hope my changes are OK?  I killed two paragraphs that seemed particularly wild, for precisely the reasons named above, eg, Blake's Newton, on the very same page, seems to make a mockery of the analysis.  Needs more work for sure.DBaba 04:56, 21 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  'Artistic Mindset' 

message: William Blake is listed as a druid in the categories section. Would someone please substantiate it? I will remove it otherwise. Pahoran513 02:23, 19 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Druidism

message: Why is the discussion of two of the apohrisms contained in Marriage of H and H included in a section titled 'Artistic mindset'?  It doesn't seem that the information contained in these paragraphs has any bearing on Blake's artistic beliefs at all - I'll move this content to the page on the Marriage of Heaven and Hell, unless anyone can justify it's inclusion here... Visual Error 22:35, 22 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Artistic mindset and Marriage of Heaven and Hell

message: 'At one point, in accordance with the beliefs of the Swedenborgian Society, Blake suggested bringing in a concubine and perhaps making Catherine a prostitute to see which one was infertile'
Having done some research, this seems like pure conjecture. Neither Gilchrist, Ackroyd or Bentley (perhaps his three most referenced biographers) have given any support to this, and no material suggesting these events appears in the primary material that constitutes Bentley's Blake Records. Unless this is referenced to a reputable source or biography i suggest that it should be deleted.
86.129.219.86 08:32, 4 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I've never heard of the claim that he suggested "making her a prostitute", but the argument about the concubuine is nothing new. It's the centrepiece of Schuchard's book Why Mrs Blake Cried,  published last year, which goes into detail about Swedenborg's belief that concubines were acceptable in certain circumstances.  Now I don't personally trust Schuchard, who can manipulate sources in most outrageous ways, and often asserts opinons about what Catherine thought and what Blake did on the basis of no evidence whatever. However the claim about the concubine is well-known, mentioned by Swinburne in 1868. I don't have Ackroyd's book here, but I have heard him discussing it as a fact. Paul B 10:23, 4 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Catherine Blake as Concubine 

message: I feel this could be explored in more depth on this page, as should his prophetic books. I offer the text below as a starting point:
Blake's rejection of 'religiosity' was emphatically not a rejection of religion, though his attacks on conventional religion were particularly shocking in his own day. These are particularly evident in The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, where he wrote in Proverbs of Hell: 
Prisons are built with stones of Law, Brothels with bricks of Religion and As the caterpillar chooses the fairest leaves to lay her eggs on, so the priest lays his curse on the fairest joys. 
Blake's personal religion was what he termed the ‘everlasting Gospel’, the original, pre-Jesus revelation that he believed Jesus preached. In The Everlasting Gospel, Blake presents Jesus not just as a philosopher but also as a supremely creative being, above dogma, logic and even morality: 
: If he had been Antichrist, Creeping Jesus, 
: He'd have done anything to please us: 
: Gone sneaking into the Synagogues 
: And not used the Elders & Priests like Dogs, 
: But humble as a Lamb or an Ass,
: Obey himself to Caiaphas. 
: God wants not man to humble himself
Jesus becomes a symbol of the vital relationship and unity between divinity and humanity. 
As Blake said: all had originally one language and one religion: this was the religion of Jesus, the everlasting Gospel. Antiquity preaches the Gospel of Jesus. 
He designed his own mythology (based primarily upon the Bible and Greek mythology) to accompany this. This mythology appears largely in the prophetic books. Blake commented that he had to create a System, or be enslav'd by another Man's.
One of Blake's strongest objections to orthodox Christianity is that he felt it encouraged the suppression of natural desires and discouraged earthly joy. In A Vision of the Last Judgement, Blake says that Men are admitted into Heaven not because they have curbed & govern'd their Passions or have No Passions, but because they have Cultivated their Understandings. The Treasures of Heaven are not Negations of Passion, but Realities of Intellect, from which all the Passions Emanate Uncurbed in their Eternal Glory. 
Blake believed that the joy of man glorified God and that the religion of this world is actually the worship of Satan. He thought of Satan as Error and the 'State of Death’. Blake believes that orthodox Christians, partly because of their denial of earthly joy, are actually worshipping Satan. 
Blake is against all sophisticated theological thinking that excuses pain, admits evil and apologises for injustice. He abhors the attempt to buy bliss in another world with self-deprivation in this one.
The whole concept of sin was foreign to him. He saw it as a trap to bind men’s desires (the briars of Garden of Love). He believed that restraint in obedience to a moral code imposed from the outside was against the spirit of life, writing:
 
: Abstinence sows sand all over 
: The ruddy limbs & flaming hair, 
: But Desire Gratified 
: Plants fruits & beauty there.
He could not agree with any doctrine of God as a Lord, as an entity separate from and superior to mankind. This is very much in line with his belief in liberty and equality in society and between the sexes.--Guinevere50 00:21, 13 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Blake and religion

message: The introduction is meant to summarise the whole article. But the sentence in the lede "Reverent of the Bible but hostile to the Church of England (indeed, to almost all forms of organised religion), Blake was influenced by the ideals and ambitions of the French and American Revolutions.[9] " does not seem to be supported by the text of the article. It was also been suggested in a recent edit summary that: "Blake was hostile to the concept of organized religion as it existed, but attended a Swedenborgian church at one point and even defended Methodism and Enthusiasm. He almost certainly held sympathies with various denoms." Can this claim be supported/ developed in the article? Martinevans123 (talk) 23:01, 23 September 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Religious denominatiions 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: I suppose I explained myself well enough. Could you respond to that so we could get this through quick :)RotarenegEmem (talk) 13:32, 7 November 2018 (UTC)
thread_title:  Arrangement of sections 

message: It was mentioned on the news on August 10 2018 that a headstone for Blake would go over the place where he was buried. This could go in the article. Vorbee (talk) 17:33, 10 August 2018 (UTC)
replies: text: This has now been added with an image and with a sourced explanation in the image caption? Martinevans123 (talk) 13:36, 7 November 2018 (UTC)
thread_title: William Blake's gravestone

message: The paragraph that begins "In 1784, after his father's death, Blake and former fellow apprentice James Parker opened a print shop" ends with a reference to another event of 1784: "That same year, Blake composed his unfinished manuscript An Island in the Moon (1784).[citation needed]" But, in between, the paragraph explores Blake's political activism in the period following his starting the print shop, first noting his sympathy with the French Revolution (in 1789) then going on to note his disgust with the rise of Robespierre and the Terror (1794, I think). 
I'd ask that someone who knows more about Blake and this period of history fit the paragraph.
Henebry (talk) 17:09, 4 May 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Paragraph needs to be restructured 

message: I have added a "citation needed" on the claim that Blake "believed in racial and sexual equality". According to the interpretations of Northrop Frye and S. Foster Damon, Blake absolutely did NOT believe in sexual equality. Rather, according to Frye and Damon, Blake believed that while Man is divine, Woman is not a full-fledged human being but a mere "emanation" of Man. She is "born for the sport and amusement of Man" (_The Four Zoas_, Night IX) and ought to be subservient to him; any independent Female Will is an evil and destructive thing. SpectrumDT (talk) 15:10, 12 July 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Blake's view on sexual equality 

message: * This entire journal issue is all about William Blake (8 articles plus 3 book reviews): Visual Culture in Britain, vol. 19, no. 3 (2018)  (URL access: subscription, to get more than abstracts).
* 
 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  09:09, 22 July 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Additional sources