William Blake

Education: he was born in London in 1757

He went to a drawing school and then to the Royal Academy of Arts

Main works: prophetic books “America: A Prophecy” and “Europe: A Prophecy”

“Songs of Innocence and Experience” (1794) in which the most famous poems are “The Lamb” and “The
Tyger”

Themes: the poetry of the child, the philosophy of contrasts

Language and style: apparently simple, naive language. He uses Anglo-Saxon words and complex
symbols

Literary Movement: Romanticism

Reputation: during his life he lived in relative obscurity. He became famous only after his death.

The Lamb
This poem is an invocation to the lamb.
In the first stanza the lamb is happy and free, unspotted from the corruption of the world. In a beautiful
setting it receives and gives pleasure. Its innocence and the perfect harmony in which it lives make the poet
ask who made it.
In the second stanza there is the answer. The lamb is identified with Christ and it is united in God’s name
with the child in a world made up of light, grass and water.

Subgenre: poem
Structure: 2 stanza of 10 lines
Rhyme: AA BB CC
Setting: beautiful and peaceful setting on a sunny day probably in the country-side
Contents: the child (who is the poet) is speaking to the lamb about its creation.
In the first stanza he asks: “who made thee” and in the second one he gives the
answer: God is its creator.
Voice: first person
Themes: God as a good and generous creator
Language: linear, simple, naive, because B. uses symbolism
Comment: this poem is apparently simple. In fact also children can read it. For this reason
during his life he was not very famous. Instead he used symbolism in order to
identify God as a saviour and a good creator.

Summary
THE LAMB
Summary

The speaker, identifying himself as a child, asks a series of questions to a little lamb, and then answers the
questions for the lamb. He asks if the lamb knows who made it, who provides it with food to eat, or who
gave it its warm wool and pleasant voice.

The speaker then tells the lamb that the one who made it is also called “the Lamb” and He is the creator of
both the lamb and the speaker. He goes on to explain that this Creator is meek and mild, and Himself
became a little child. The speaker finishes by blessing the lamb in God’s name.

THE TYGER

“The Tyger” is the most representative poem of the famous collection “Songs of Experience” which
was published in a combined volume with “Songs of Innocence” in 1794 (with the title “Songs of
Innocence and Experience, showing the Two Contrary States of the Human Soul: the author and
printer, W. Blake”).

Analysis:

Sub-genre: Lyric poetry

Structure: 6 quatrains

Metre: Septenaries

Rhyme: Rhyming couplet (AABB CCDD EEFF GGHH IILL AABB)

Setting: The forests of the night, i.e. metaphor of the condition of eternal chaos before the
Creation, and the blacksmith’s furnace

Contents: In the poem, the tiger is shown as antithesis of the lamb (which was described in the
poem “The Lamb”). The animal represents both the danger and the fascination of the
“world of experience”: in fact the poem is based on the contrast between darkness with
the atmosphere of the night and the forests, on one side, and the light and the energy of
the fire, on the other. But Blake also introduces some questions about the origin of the
tiger, which, unlike “The Lamb”, do not receive any answer. Only in the fourth and fifth
stanzas we can understand that also this animal is a creature made by the same God
who has created the lamb.

Voice: Second and third person

Themes: The Creation and God, the contrast between the lamb and the tiger (darkness/light)

Language: Apparently simple and plain, similar to naïve style typical of ballads and songs for
 children. Actually the language is based on a complex symbolism.

Comment: “The Tyger” together with “The Lamb” illustrates the concept of the two contrasting
states of the human soul, which is the basis of all Blake's poetry.

COMPARISON: The Lamb and The Tyger

William Blake’s “The Lamb” and “The Tyger” have a similar style and a similar theme: the Christian
religion and creation. Both poems are parallel to each other, one is from “Songs of Innocence”
while the other from “Songs of Experience”. The narrator of “The Lamb” is a child who asks a lamb
about its origins, (“Little Lamb who made thee Dost thou know who made thee” (1-2).) The child
continues to describe the lamb and then, in the second part, the child begins to answer the
question: “God made thee.” (19). The God of “The Lamb” is Jesus, the lamb of God, and is
associated with the idea of innocence and happiness. Blake used the Bible as his inspiration as a
poet and an artist.

In “The Tyger” the narrator asks questions about the creator of this animal and of its different parts
(eyes, hands, feet and heart) and compares God to a blacksmith, a craftsman who makes his
creations using fire and violence, and wonders how it is possible that the same God made both the
lamb and the tiger. The two animals are both beautiful but one is meek and innocent while the
other is violent and frightening. The question receives no answer.