Write an article based on this "Choose your location. Scrutinize the title. Read through the poem start to finish. Write down your impressions. Look up unknown words. Identify parts that are significant to you. Contemplate the parts in terms of the whole. Analyze the minute particulars. Re-read the poem."
You may be the type that can focus best in well lit, public areas, like a park or coffee shop. Or maybe you need absolute silence, dim lighting, and the privacy of your home. In either case, a prime location will help you do your best at puzzling out the meaning of a poem. Titles can be very misleading, and what you might have suspected the title to indicate before you read the poem might change considerably afterwards. Note any impressions you have, potential double or hidden meanings, and potential inferences. The title of William Blake's The Book of Urizen is, at first glance, perhaps a book belonged to someone or thing called "Urizen." However, thinking about that name with regard to pronunciation, the title could be conceived as a book of "Your Reason" or "You're risen." That's right - don't allow anything to distract you. Don't stop to look up a word, don't distract yourself by stopping to figure out the rhyme scheme. Read the poem start to finish without a pause in between. This is for many reasons: Poetry, even poetry that doesn't rhyme, is usually written with a certain rhythm in mind. Stopping mid-read to look something up can disturb your sense of the poem's rhythm. Poetry is a highly inventive medium, with some poems like Lewis Carroll's Jabberwocky being almost completely constructed out of "nonsense" words. Stopping to look up a word no only interrupts, it might also be fruitless. Imagery is often in sequence, the language of a poem leads the reader through images from start to finish. You may miss something important if you distract yourself. The context of a poem will frequently reveal the meaning of even obscure words. Have faith in your mind's ability to use context clues; this is good intellectual exercise. Now that you've read the poem all the way through, writing any intuitions you might have can be very helpful in guiding your poetic investigations. Does anything seem strange or out of the ordinary? Is there a place where the rhythm seems unnatural? These may all be indications from the writer of something significant. Take inventory of the obvious literary devices you noticed. Now that you've read the poem all the way through, why do you think these were used over other choices? With relation to the choices of the author, also ask yourself, "Why here? Why in this particular place did the author use this technique?" At this point you can crack open your dictionary (or power on your computer) and start digging for meaning. Try to use a dictionary that includes information supplemental to the mere definition; etymology (the origin of the word) and the first known usage of that word can provide you clues for your investigations. Likely, during your reading, a particular part or parts will have struck you as being more important than the rest. What supports this inkling of yours? What literary devices surround these parts? Do they attract or detract focus from these? Any unsubstantiated feeling you have, especially in an academic setting, will likely result in a poor grade. You must build an argument to support your position if your peers or instructor are going to take you seriously. Think of all the literary devices you've discovered on your first reading and think about these in terms of the entire work. How do these move the poem forward from beginning to conclusion? As an example: "Earth was not, nor globes of attraction. / The will of the Immortal expanded / Or contracted his all flexible senses. / Death was not, but eternal life sprung." ~ Book of Urizen, 36 - 39. This stanza represents an idyllic state, alludes to the biblical story of Genesis and paradise before the fall, and the "Immortal" might be symbolic of man, or man before gaining the faculty of reason. With this information, you can conclude that Blake was likely hinting at this being a book about "Your Reason" in the title. Now that you've thought of things in terms of the "big picture," look at the parts you've deemed significant and the elements surrounding these. How do the tiny building blocks of words work together to form a grand metaphor? This, too, can be illuminating. As an example: "Earth was not, nor globes of attraction. / The will of the Immortal expanded / Or contracted his all flexible senses. / Death was not, but eternal life sprung." ~ Book of Urizen, 36 - 39. Reading this section closely, it is strange that the "Immortal" is given god-like powers by existing when "Earth was not, nor globes of attraction," in addition to being a capitalized term. It is notable that the later pronoun (his) is not capitalized, as one might expect from the god-figure of text imitating Genesis (biblically, God and God-referring pronouns are capitalized). You might surmise this contradiction of terms was intended for a purpose, possibly because the "Immortal" is not really God, but man, who has qualities like God, as man was made in God's image in Genesis. However, man, trapped in his body and five physical senses, cannot expand or "[contract] his all flexible senses," like he might have been able to before birth. You've got a big picture. You've got a basic understanding of the flow of the writing. You know the uncommon words and you've started thinking about the mechanics of the poem - it's time to read it again! Search actively while you read for missed signs, literary devices, or quirks that might indicate the author is trying to get your attention.