Songs of Innocence and Songs of Experience

Songs of Innocence (1789) Songs of Experience (1794)

William Blake  English poet, painter, engraver, and visionary whose hand- illustrated series of lyrical poems, beginning with Songs of Innocence (1789) and Songs of Experience (1794), form one of the most original and independent bodies of work in the Western cultural tradition.  Blake is now regarded as one of the earliest and greatest figures of Romanticism. Yet Blake was ignored by the public of his day and was called mad, living on the edge of poverty and dying in neglect.

 Songs of Innocence (1789) contains eloquent lyrics that make fresh, direct observations. In 1794, disillusioned with the possibility of human perfection, Blake issued Songs of Experience. Both series of poems take on deeper resonances when read in conjunction.  Innocence and Experience, "the two contrary states of the human soul," are contrasted in such companion pieces as "The Lamb" and "The Tyger." Blake's poetry develops the implication that true innocence is impossible without experience, transformed by the creative force of the imagination.  Blake illustrated the Songs and other works with designs that demand an imaginative reading of the dialogue between word and picture.

Victorian Views of Children  On the one hand the child was the source of hope, of virtue, or emotion: along with the angelic wife, he was the holder of family values which seemed otherwise to be disappearing from the world....  But at the same time, the child was a hardship, an obstacle to adult pleasure, and a reminder of one's baser self. He might be innocent, untainted by sexual knowledge, uncorrupted by the world of business, free from the agony of religious doubt; yet he was also potentially wicked and needed constant guidance and discipline.