The Importance of Blake in Today’s World :: Biography Biographies Essays

The Importance of Blake in todays World William Blake, who lived in the latter half of the eighteenth speed of light and the early part of the nineteenth, was a healthyly stirring poet who was, in erect part, responsible for bringing about the Romantic movement in poem was able to achieve remarkable results with the simplest means and was wiz of several poets of the era who restored rich musicality to the language (Appelbaum v). His research and introspection into the human foreland and soul has resulted in his being c every(prenominal)ed the Columbus of the psyche, and because no language existed at the time to describe what he discovered on his voyages, he created his witness mythology to describe what he found there (Damon ix). He was an accomplished poet, painter, and engraver. Blake scholars discord on whether or not Blake was a mystic. In the Norton Anthology, he is expound as an acknowledged mystic, who saw visions from the age of four (Mack 783). Frye, however, who seems to be one of the most influential Blake scholars, disagrees, saying that Blake was a visionary rather than a mystic. Mysticism . . . means a certain kind of religious techniques difficult to pay off with anyones poetry, says Frye (Frye 8). He next says that visionary is a word that Blake uses, and uses constantly and cites the prototype of Plotinus, the mystic, who experienced a direct apprehension of God four quantify in his life, and then only with great effort and relentless discipline. He finally cites Blakes poem I rose up at the track of day, in which Blake states, I am in Gods presence night & day, And he never turns his face away (Frye 9). Besides all of these achievements, Blake was a kindly critic of his own time and considered himself a prophet of times to come. Frye says that all his poetry was written as though it were about to have the present(prenominal) social impact of a new play (Frye 4). His social check is not only representative of his own c ountry and era, but strikes profound chords in our own time as well. As Appelbaum said in the introduction to his anthology English Romantic Poetry, Blake was not wide-cuty rediscovered and rehabilitated until a full atomic number 6 after his death (Appelbaum v). For Blake was not truly appreciated during his life, provided by small cliques of individuals, and was not well-known during the rest of the nineteenth century (Appelbaum v).