London - William Blake

One third of my English Literature exams is to study William Blake's Songs of Innocence and Experience, a collection of poems published in the late 18th century that explored what Blake believed to be the two contrary states of the human soul: Innocence and Experience. Blake believed that, "Without contraries there is no progression", meaning that we need both Innocence and Experience to see the world for what it is.

One of his most notable pieces in this collection is a Song of Experience called London. London was written during the French and Industrial Revolutions, and this is evident with the themes of violence and corruption running throughout. REMEMBER: it is always important to note the context of a literary piece in order to understand the messages being conveyed by its author.

London

I wander thro' each charter'd street,

Near where the charter'd Thames does flow

And mark in every face I meet

Marks of weakness, marks of woe.

In every cry of every Man,

In every Infants cry of fear,

In every voice; in every ban,

The mind-forg'd manacles I hear

How the Chimney-sweepers cry

Every blackning Church appalls,

And the hapless Soldiers sigh

Runs in blood down Palace walls

But most thro' midnight streets I hear

How the youthful Harlots curse

Blasts the new-born Infants tear

And blights with plagues the Marriage hearse

I would say that this is Blake's most striking and powerful poem of the entire collection; the tone of social indictment carries weight and relentlessly targets the Church and the State, their hypocrisy and utter corruption. It is so distinctive from Blake's work, that even the American playwright Arthur Miller, who was accused of writing works with Communist themes, stated the following:

"There is more understanding of the nature of Capitalist society in a poem like, "I wander thro' each charter'd street" than in the whole of Socialist literature."

So what is it about London that led Miller to draw this conclusion?

Bring on the analysis...

Form and Structure
The consistent iambic tetrameter with a regular ABAB rhyme scheme gives the poem a rigid structure and an insistent drum-like beat which puts stresses on important points of the poem, and it also serves as a slight variation of the ballad form.

Stanza One

The poem starts with the personal pronoun "I", immediately turning the poem into a first-person narrative to make it a personal experience of the speaker.

In the poem's original draft, the word "charter'd" was dirty, which would have presented the imagery of a black, dirty, decrepit London transformed by the Industrial Revolution. Instead, the repetition of "charter'd" communicates the restrictive effects of charters and the corporations of the business world forced on the individual.

The repetition of "mark" has been interpreted as the Seal of God in Ezekiel 9:4.

"He said to him, "Walk through the streets of Jerusalem and put a mark on the foreheads of all who weep and sigh because of the detestable sins being committed in their city."

It may also reference the mark of the beast, i.e. the sinners. Some have also interpreted it to be the brand of a slave, as if the people of London are enslaved to the State.

Stanza Two

The anaphora of "In every cry" illustrates the social evils that were condoned by the Church in their utter hypocrisy, while building up to the climax of the final line.

The accumulation of stresses on "mind-forg'd manacles" emphasises this phrase as a key point of the poem. The "manacles" are shackles, or a means of oppression, and because they are "mind-forg'd", this suggests they are self-imposed. This line has caught the attention of many Marxist critics, including Louis Althusser who said:

"Ideology represents the imaginary relationship of individuals to their real conditions of existence."

Therefore, these manacles are a restriction of false consciousness that Blake wishes Londoners would break away from so they may recognise the political forces oppressing them and seek freedom. As Blake wrote in The Marriage of Heaven and Hell:

"If the doors of perception were cleansed, every thing would appear to man as it is, infinite."

Stanza Three
This stanza transforms intangible woe into tangible imprints on society. The sweep's "cry" becomes a stain of the "blackning" Church, whose walls are "appalled" by the social injustices the Church self-servingly condones.

The soldiers' "sigh" transforms into "blood" running down "Palace walls", which is Blake indicting the King and despotic leaders in killing soldiers in their wars. The metre changes to trochaic to emphasise this point.

This line also holds contextual significance as the French Revolution was taking place at the time of its publication, which initially inspired Blake as a radical libertarian.

Stanza Four

The poem reaches a climax in this final stanza as it reaches its most important point.

Blake presents an uncomfortable imagery in describing "youthful Harlots", AKA young prostitutes who have had their childhood robbed from them as they have been forced into prostitution.

Their "curse" can be interpreted literally; that they are swearing. Or this "curse" can be interpreted as being their job.

Blake then presents an apocalyptic vision: the consequences of regulating free love. Blake uses plosive sounds in "Blasts", "plagues", "blights" to create a harsh tone in this section. "Blasts" are a reference to the venereal disease gonorrhea, with which the prostitutes have infected the "Infant", and the reference to "tear" is blindness, which was a common symptom of the disease.

It was then passed on to their clientele, who were typically married, and then passed on to their wives and children, thereby creating a "plague" of the disease.

In the final line, Blake unites the two sacraments, marriage and love, in a macabre oxymoron subversion of the marriage bed; instead it becomes a "Marriage hearse" of death in marriage because of venereal disease.

So that's London "summed up", I hope this helps! I'll be posting more of my notes from the Songs.