Today's Topics:
Blake as Urizen (be careful) -Reply
Re: chaunted from lips of hunger and thirst -Reply -Reply
-Forwarded
Re: MT & the countless gold of the akeing heart
"Nature's Dross"
Fwd: MT conditional...
Nature as Art
Re: _MT_ the jewels of Orc
Re: _MT_ the jewels of Orc
Last Judgement
"Nature's Dross" -Reply
Re: Last Judgement
Re: "Nature's Dross" -Reply
Re: MT circle of states
Re: Last Judgement
Re: Last Judgement
Re: "Nature's Dross" -Reply -Reply
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Date: Mon, 23 Mar 1998 09:52:30 +0200
From: P Van Schaik
To: blake@albion.com
Subject: Blake as Urizen (be careful) -Reply
Message-Id:
Paul
You will simply think me old-fashioned if I aver that there is type of
`closure' in the circularity of Blake's cosmogony which begins in Eternity
and ends there again. Some (most?) critics insist that there is a `higher
innocence' , a type of closure for which I find slender evidence or
necessity. But, people in former ages were also not bound by our
modern closure of thought in which we insist that there sould be no
closure or apparently correct answer to questions raised by the poetic
material. I have tried to keep my own head out of all boxes of literary
theory so that I can respond as I see fit to each poet. This may be
eccentric, but it is my own idea of resisting closure, and I do not mind
coming to some firm conclusions which offend modern students.
Pam
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Date: Mon, 23 Mar 1998 10:53:11 +0200
From: P Van Schaik
To: Blake@albion.com
Subject: Re: chaunted from lips of hunger and thirst -Reply -Reply
-Forwarded
Message-Id:
This was returned to me so am posting to all at Blake online
Date: Mon, 23 Mar 1998 10:01:20 +0200
From: P Van Schaik
To: %btinternet.com@uu6.psi.com
Subject: Re: chaunted from lips of hunger and thirst -Reply -Reply
My own stance is that Blake , of course, refers to both the mortal and
immortal worlds, but that he sees the immortal realms as our original and
ultimate home. Hope nothing I carelessly phrased led to any other
impression.
Pam
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Date: Mon, 23 Mar 1998 18:07:25 EST
From: Andrewkauf
To: blake@albion.com
Subject: Re: MT & the countless gold of the akeing heart
Message-Id: <1e2b1869.3516eb2f@aol.com>
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And these are the gems of the Human Soul
The rubies & pearls of a lovesick eye
the countless gold of the akeing heart
the martyrs groan & the lovers sigh
These do recall the shining gems of Orc.
But few people, least of all the author of *Vala or The Torments of Love and
Jealousy,* would see these jewels as the "treasures of heaven."
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Date: Mon, 23 Mar 1998 19:18:27
From: Izak Bouwer
To: blake@albion.com
Subject: "Nature's Dross"
Message-Id: <3.0.1.16.19980323191827.4c9f877a@igs.net>
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> My only quibble is whether Nature itself is redeemed since
>this is the state of dross - the husk enclosing the divine sparks, which
>surely must be cast off?
>Pam
Blake uses the term "dross" only four times
in his whole canon. (K 600, K 749, K 805, K 817)
In two of the cases "dross" is used in a general
way. The third example, in a letter to Butts, reads
"Like dross purg'd away
All my mire & my clay (K 805)
You are probably referring to K 749 where in "The
Everlasting Gospel" he says the following:
"And in his Body tight does bind/
Satan & all his Hellish Crew;/
And thus with wrath he did subdue/
The Serpent Bulk of Nature's Dross,/
Till He had nail'd it to the Cross.
I think the expression "Nature's Dross" to characterize Nature
as dross has taken root in Blake criticism, but I think that it
is an oversimplification and in many cases represent a misrepre-
sentation of Blake's thought on the subject of "Nature." In his
letter to Trusler (23 Aug. 1799) he says: "But to the Eyes of
the Man of Imagination, Nature is Imagination itself." And
in Milton 29:65 there is the statement that "Nature is a Vision
of the Science of the Elohim."
I find what Teilhard de Chardin says in " Hymn to the
Universe" (p 57) very enlightening. Here Nature is talking:
"Because in my violence I sometimes slay my lovers;
because he who touches me never knows what power he
is unleashing, wise men fear and curse me. They speak
of me with scorn, calling me beggar-woman or witch or
harlot; but their words are at variance with life,and
the pharisees who condemn me, waste away in the outlook
to which they confine themselves... The supreme key to
the enigma, the dazzling utterance which is inscribed
on my brow.. is this : Nothing is precious save what
is yourself in others and others in yourself."
This is a devout Catholic priest talking, but one that
thinks in terms of millions of years, who talks of a "spindle-
shaped universe" and of a point called "omega." Yet Teilhard
gives the same intense attention to "matter" and to "nature"
as Blake does, when Blake contemplates the presence of
Vala and Jerusalem and their interaction, and gives minute
attention to the actions of Los and Enitharmon after the Fall.
Gloudina Bouwer
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Date: Tue, 24 Mar 1998 01:53:47 EST
From: Andrewkauf
To: blake@albion.com
Subject: Fwd: MT conditional...
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From: Andrewkauf
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Subject: Fwd: MT conditional...
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From: Andrewkauf
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To: ndeeter@concentric.net
Subject: Re: MT conditional...
Date: Mon, 23 Mar 1998 17:56:12 EST
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ndeeter wrote:
>it's interesting that the Female Babe just "springs" up "from the fire on the
hearth"
>one day. There is no need to go through such agony as the Boy Babe who is
>given to an old woman who nails him to a rock, binding him, piercing him,
cutting >out his heart, stealing every inch of his youth and innocence until
he grows young >and virginal and he, of course, grows virile enough to "bind
her down for his delight."
>all she must do is "come to the Man she loves" and he takes over as the
active
>element here, pursuingher until she is the old woman, restoring the male
child to
>his infantile state... She is merely a manifestation of the old woman.
Perhaps it is >the feminist critic in me, but the sympathies of the writer
clearly stick with the boy >child. If this poem is as circular as we think it
is, could Blake not have begun with >with the birth of the girl and seen her
tragically grow old because of the man and >than have ended the poem with her
reaping regenge on the male?
>Why begin where he did if this is so circular?
Interesting questions. I think the boy here represents mankind--male and
female--suffering the travails to which lapsed or "vegetative" consciousness
condemn us. The same is true of Earth in "Earth's Answer," although she is
female. If the poem were arranged differently, beginning with the rape of the
female and concluding with her taking revenge, it would have the structure of
a melodrama, or a made-for-tv-docu-drama--the wronged woman taking deserved
revenge, to the audience's relief and applause.
Beginning with the birth of the boy enables Blake to emphasize the circularity
that makes the poem so haunting. One of the points of its structure is that
the crucifixion with which it ends is that with which it begins. This
crucifixion does not result in salvation or resurrection, but in the endless
recurrence of the poem's sado-masochistic "torments of love and jealousy." I
think that's why the final line, "And all is done as I have told," is so
chilling. This is also why the Promethean echoes are important, with their
sense of unending, unredeemed pain.
Also, it is interesting to recall that in *Milton,* tyrants and victims alike
end up in the wine press of Los. For Blake, perhaps the worst consequnce of
ty