William Blake (1757 - 1827) was an English poet, painter and printmaker whose work combined lyric verse with original engraved illustration. [1] Almost unknown as an artist during his life, he produced the illuminated books Songs of Innocence and of Experience, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell and a series of prophetic poems, and is now considered a central figure of the Romantic period in both British poetry and visual art. [2]
Early life and training
Blake was born in London on 28 November 1757, the son of a hosier, and spent almost his entire life in the city. He reported visionary experiences from childhood, including seeing angels in a tree at Peckham Rye, and these visions remained the declared source of his work. [1] He was sent to Henry Pars's drawing school and at fourteen was apprenticed to the engraver James Basire, for whom he spent years drawing monuments in Westminster Abbey, an experience that shaped his lifelong attachment to Gothic line.
In 1779 he entered the Royal Academy of Arts, where he clashed with the prevailing taste associated with its president, Sir Joshua Reynolds. In 1782 he married Catherine Boucher, who learned to print and colour his plates and worked alongside him for the rest of his life. [3]
Illuminated printing
Blake developed a technique of relief etching that allowed text and image to be printed together from a single copper plate, which he and Catherine then coloured by hand. Each copy of a book was therefore slightly different, and the editions were tiny. [2]
Songs of Innocence appeared in 1789 and was later combined with Songs of Experience in 1794 under the subtitle "Shewing the Two Contrary States of the Human Soul," pairing poems such as "The Lamb" with "The Tyger." The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, produced around the same period, set out in aphorism and parody his objection to conventional religious and moral authority. [4]
Prophetic books and later work
Blake went on to compose a series of long symbolic poems, among them America a Prophecy, The Book of Urizen, Milton and Jerusalem, elaborating a personal mythology of figures such as Urizen and Los to describe the fall and possible restoration of human imagination. [1] He was radical in sympathy, supporting the American and French revolutionary causes, and in 1803 was tried for sedition after an altercation with a soldier at Felpham in Sussex; he was acquitted.
His visual work included large colour prints, watercolour illustrations to the Bible, to Dante's Divine Comedy, to Milton and to the Book of Job, the last engraved in his final years. Commercial success eluded him; a one-man exhibition in 1809 drew almost no attention, and he lived in poverty. [3]
Death and legacy
Blake died in London on 12 August 1827, still at work on the Dante illustrations, and was buried in an unmarked grave at Bunhill Fields. In his last years he was supported by a group of young admirers who called themselves the Ancients. [1]
Recognition came chiefly after 1863, when Alexander Gilchrist's biography brought his work to a wider audience, and the Pre-Raphaelites, W. B. Yeats and later twentieth-century critics secured his standing. [2] His lyric "And did those feet in ancient time," set to music by Hubert Parry as Jerusalem, became one of the best-known songs in Britain, and his designs continue to influence poets, artists and illustrators. [4]
