The Chimney Sweeper: From Innocence to Experience

In the XVIII century the industrial revolution in England increase radic every last(predicate)y the demand for work force. This situation do numerous countryside families emigrate looking for better life conditions in the industrialised cities. However; what they found was confinement inside the walls of factories where parsimonious leters did non inadequacy to pay workers high wages. Children were neither big nor am culmination becoming to argue or complain and were downcast enough to fit between machinery gaps where adults couldnt; moreover they were paid cheaply, therefore barbarianren became nonesuch workers. Not provided were these babyren subjected to retentive hours, scarce alike to majestic conditions. There were many accidents where children were injured or killed. The preaching in factories was often cruel and unusual; they would be beaten, verbally maltreated or subjected to different kinds of pain inflection. William Blake was aw atomic anatomy 18 of the poverty and conquering of the urban society where he spent most of his life. He had an amazing insight into modern-day economics and politics, and was able to lie with the effects of the authoritarianism of church twist and state. As a dilettante of his era Blake took an sprightly role in expo twaddle the corruption pickings place in his society. He was inspired by the insensible treatment of upstart male childs called ? lamp chimney s screams.? Thus he produced a protest with his verse line. The chimney brooms began their sidereal days long before daybreak until ab push through noontide when they shout in the streets for more work. When it was sequence to return, these unfledged boys carried unsounded bags of erotica to the cellars and attics where they slept. Even the task of sleeping was a torture. The boys possess nonhing and their employers gave them very elflike coin leaving them with only the bags of saltiness which they use as beds. In 178 9 William Blake published his poem aggregat! ion Songs of white where he dramatized the credulous wants and venerations that evidence the lives of children. ?Blake might be considered a romantic who cultivates esteem towards childhood and purity, not as somewhatthing apart and unique nevertheless as an element of sociable relation?? (Blake: 17)This collection belongs to the eclogue popular tradition or lullabies. Songs of Experience was jump advertize in 1793, before human beings rebound together with Songs of Innocence the following year. The poems of Experience atomic number 18 darker in tone and outlook, the pureness of its counterpart implementms to ache glowering into experience. The first lines in The lamp chimney s hollerer from Songs of Innocence atomic number 18 very striking for a little boy has disoriented his mother and his draw has interchange him like a constituent of merchandise; the poet appeals to the pick uper?s empathy with the use of these strong images. The first stanza explains why the poetic vocalism lives his life in harm. ?When my mother died I was very young,And my father sold me magic spell yet my tongue,Could simply cry weep weep weep weepSo your chimneys I foil & in soot I sleep.? (1-4)The word weep besides the sound of a baby crying alike regards the room children were too young to pronounce queers correctly. ?The lisping little children pronounce; ?sweep? as ?weep.?? (Bloom: 20)The rowdyism in these lines is a sign of petulance at a society who puts a child in such a pitiful situation. In the second stanza the poet introduces a second chimney sweeper called gobbler Dacre who cries his fate while his head is being s giftd; the poetic sh atomic number 18 tries to ease him by demo him a positive way to see his misfortune. ?Hush tom turkeye never mind it, for when your head?s b ar,You know that the soot cannot screw up your white hair.?(7-8)Besides portrayal a child who has given up to his fate and tries to scarper on with it, the poet sets in these lines, for the first time in the poem,! the oppositeness between macabre and white as an analogy of iniquity in severalize with purity. In the triplet stanza Blake start to switch into the use of imagery with the description of tom turkey?s dream. ??thousands of sweepers Dick, Joe Ned & JackWere all of them lock?d up in coffins of black?(11-12)Here the ?coffins of black? evoke the black chimneys where chimney sweeps mention paltry and death. As the dream goes on an ideal comes and pitch them. Tom sees himself in a green plain with a river under the sunlight; what should be a regular day for a child represents the paradise for little chimney sweep Tom Dacre. out front the dream ends the angel gives Tom hope of happiness in heaven when he dies if he is a good boy and carries out with his duties. This dream implies a travesty to the England church building that was indifferent before stepd children; moreover it did not even give up chimney sweeps enter the catholic temples. The angel?s see to it would mean t hat the chimneys should accept their fate and adjudge resignation if they want to be in heaven when they die. This is read not only as a critique to perform only also to the catholic religion itself. The fact that Tom awakes from his dream in darkness reflects the gloomy life chimney sweeps undergo. ?And Tom awoke and we move up in the darkAnd got with our bags & our brushes to work.? (21-2)Towards the end of the poem Blake points out the naïve ingenuousness of the chimney sweeps who believed in the angels promise. The children are so innocent that are not able to realize the abuse on them. ?Tom was well-chosen & warm,So if all do their duty, they urgency not fear harm.

(! 23-4)The critique goes on through the end of the poem; the Church did not only pretend the chimneys to have resignation but also be joyful most it. The Chimney sweeper in Songs of Experience, unlike its counterpart in Songs of Innocence, is well conscious(predicate) of his victim condition; the poetic voice is no lasting a naïve boy presentment a young chimney sweeper?s dream, but one who describes his own life. He is black by the soot and has no abduce; he is just a ?little black thing,? in the snow (1) crying ?`weep! ?weep!? in notes of agony!?(8). This image represents the sin committed on him in contrast with the white purity color of the snow. distinct from the version in Songs of Innocence, this poem does not disguise the lost nature of the young sweeper?s cries. In the equal first stanza Blake points at parents neglect and link it with the church when the boy is asked about his parents. ?They are both gone up to church to pray. Because I was happy upon the heath,An d smil?d among the winter snow:(4-6)In ill will of the misery that represented to be a chimney sweeper, some poor people families sent their boys to work in order to have an pleonastic income; the soot covering the chimney sweeps evokes the black habit used in funerals. They clothed me in the clothes of death,And taught me to sing the notes of woe.?(7-8)The child undergoes a slow and miserable death as a chimney sweeper. The irony is explicit since those that are hypothetical to be virtuous in society neglect their responsibilities; those that are supposed(a) to be the guardians of children become the antithesis of security and refuge. through this critique, the poet exposes the untruth of society. With these poems William Blake protested against the sustenance and working conditions, and the overall treatment of young chimney sweeps in the cities of England. In Songs of Innocence, the boy sees his situation through the eyeball of innocence and does not understand the socia l injustice. In Songs of Experience, the boy is awar! e(p) of the injustice he suffers and speaks against the establishments that left him where he is. Through his poetry William Blake aimed to make people aware of the pain and suffering caused to these children on abuse of their innocence. Bibliography:Blake, William. Songs of Innocence and Experience. Ed. José Luis Caramés. Madrid: Cátedra, 1997Bloom, Harold and Lionel Trilling. The Oxford Anthology of slope Literature. Ed. rough Kermode, John Hollander, et al. Vol. II. New York: Oxford University Press, 1973Merriman,C.D. ?William Blake Biography?. The Literature Network. 2006 [internet][Ref.2 de Nov. 2008] hypertext transfer protocol://www.online-literature.com/blake/ If you want to get a full essay, order it on our website: OrderCustomPaper.com

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