William Blake, (Born on 28th Nov., 1757, and died on 12th August, 1827).
William Blake was an English engraver, artist, poet, and visionary, and mainly known for his exquisite lyrics in Songs of Innocence (1789) and Songs of Experience (1794). He was born in London and spent most of his life there. He was first educated at home, mainly by his mother. His parents encouraged him to collect the prints of the Italian masters’ paintings and in 1767 sent him to Henry Pars’ drawing school.
He experienced visions of angels and ghostly monks from his early years. He claimed that he saw and conversed with the angel Gabriel, the Virgin Mary, and various other historical figures. These memories never left him and influenced his poetry throughout his life. He authored insightful and difficult “prophecies,” such as Visions of the Daughters of Albion (1793) and The First Book of Urizen (1794).
He published his poems as the integrated works of poetic and visual art, etching words and drawings onto copper plates. He colored the individual prints by hand. Among his best-known lyrics today are “The Lamb,” “The Tyger,” “London,” and the “Jerusalem” and ‘Milton’.In the early 21st century, Blake was regarded as the earliest and most original of the Romantic poets, but in his lifetime, he was generally neglected or dismissed as mad.
Songs of Innocence was originally a complete work first printed in 1789. It is a conceptual collection of 19 poems, engraved with artwork. This collection mainly shows happy, innocent perception in pastoral harmony.
Songs of Experience is a poetry collection of 26 poems forming the second part of William Blake's Songs of Innocence and of Experience. The poems were published in 1794. The poems lament the ways in which the harsh experiences of adult life destroy what is good in innocence.
William Blake: The Tiger
Stanza 1
Tyger Tyger, burning bright,
In the forests of the night;
What immortal hand or eye,
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?
Stanza 2
In what distant deeps or skies.
Burnt the fire of thine eyes?
On what wings dare he aspire?
What the hand, dare seize the fire?
In the next stanza, the poet talks about the eyes of the tiger. He admires where from the fire has been brought and put into the eyes of the tiger. The fire has been brought either from distant skies (i.e., either sun or heaven) or from deep oceans (means either core of the earth or hell) because it must be a divine fire that makes the eyes of the tiger so fierce.
In the third line, the poet wonders which wings the creator (God) used to bring fire from distant places. Similarly, which hands dared to catch that divine fire. The first two lines appreciate the fire in the eyes of the tiger and the 3rd and 4th lines appreciate the wings and hands of the Creator.
Stanza 3
And what shoulder, & what art,
Could twist the sinews of thy heart?
And when thy heart began to beat,
What dread hand? & what dread feet?
In the third stanza, the poet talks about the heart of the tiger. He marvels at the shoulders and the art the Creator would have used to shape the muscles of the tiger’s heart. Here the poet is praising the power and amazing art of God which helped Him create tiger’s heart.
In the third and fourth lines, he speculates how powerful the Creator’s hands and feet are, which made Him stand in front of the tiger when its heart began to beat. In this stanza, the poet seems to praise the Creator’s physical power, audacious nature and His astounding art.
Stanza 4
What the hammer? what the chain,
In what furnace was thy brain?
What the anvil? what dread grasp,
Dare its deadly terrors clasp!
In the fourth stanza, the poet praises the brain of the tiger. He is in awe about the hammer, the chain and the anvil the Creator would have used to create the brain of the tiger. These tools are used by the iron-smith to create solid and heavy items.
The poet imagines that the brain of the tiger must be as hard as iron. Hence, he thinks about the divine tools the creator would have used to create the brain of such a deadly animal. Again, the poet admires how powerful would be the grasp of the Creator which could hold the strong brain of this animal.
Stanza 5
When the stars threw down their spears
And water'd heaven with their tears:
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the Lamb make thee?
In this stanza, the poet tends to compare the ferocious tiger to the lamb which is meek, innocent and quite opposite to the former.
There is also a reference to a Biblical incidence as mentioned in Paradise Lost by John Milton, which need attention to have a better comprehension. Milton describes the host of angels under the leadership of Satan who revolted against god. ‘The stars’ can be taken as the rebel angels. The first two lines in this stanza refer to the fall of angels as described by John Milton in his Paradise Lost.
They, astonished, all resistance lost,
All courage, down their weapons dropt.
The rebel angels were driven to hell. They watered heaven with their tears.
The poet says that when God created the tiger, the stars (here means Satan and his followers) which were in war with Him were so frightened by its (Tiger’s) sight that they accepted their defeat and threw down their weapons and made the sky wet with their tears.
In the third line, the poet asks if God smiled with satisfaction after creating the Tiger, as it was beyond words for Satanic forces. It’s amazing that the same creator created the lamb and tiger. Lamb is quite innocent and meek while the tiger is ferocious and merciless.
Stanza 6
Tyger Tyger burning bright,
In the forests of the night:
What immortal hand or eye,
Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?
The final stanza is a repetition of the first one. The only word changing here is ‘dare’ instead of ‘could’ which is quite significant. In the first stanza, the poet seems to be less amazed by the powers of tiger and God but after going through all the features of the tiger he wonders it is only God who can dare to create such an animal.
Poetic Devices used in ‘The Tyger’
Blake used carefully measured and chosen vocabulary in this poem. He also used several poetic techniques in these lines. Let’s examine them.
1. Anaphora: The term anaphora refers to a poetic technique in which successive phrases or lines get repeated. The repetition can be as simple as a single word or as long as an entire phrase.
Eg: Tyger, tyger…
2. Refrain: Refrain in poetry is a repeated part of a poem that appears either at the end of a stanza or between two stanzas. It can be a verse, a line, a set or a group of lines. [Here the first stanza repeated at the end of the poem]
3. Alliteration: Alliteration is the repetition of the same letter sound across the start of several words in a line of text. [burning bright, frame thy fearful]
4. Rhetorical Question: Rhetorical questions are asked to create a dramatic effect, rather than to get an answer
In the third line, the poet raises a rhetorical question, what immortal hand or eye that is capable of framing or building its fearful symmetry.
5. Allusion: An allusion is a reference, typically brief, to a person, place, thing, event, or other literary work with which the reader is presumably familiar.
On what wings dare he aspire?
This may be a reference to Icarus in Greek mythology who perished by flying too near the Sun with his waxen wings.
“What the hand dare seize the fire” refers to Prometheus from Greek mythology who was punished for stealing fire for mankind.
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