biography of william blake slideshare

William Blake

(1757-1827)

Who Was William Blake?

William Blake began writing at an early age and claimed to have had his first vision, of a tree full of angels, at age 10. He studied engraving and grew to love Gothic art, which he incorporated into his own unique works. A misunderstood poet, artist and visionary throughout much of his life, Blake found admirers late in life and has been vastly influential since his death in 1827.

Early Years

William Blake was born on November 28, 1757, in the Soho district of London, England. He only briefly attended school, being chiefly educated at home by his mother. The Bible had an early, profound influence on Blake, and it would remain a lifetime source of inspiration, coloring his life and works with intense spirituality.

At an early age, Blake began experiencing visions, and his friend and journalist Henry Crabb Robinson wrote that Blake saw God's head appear in a window when Blake was 4 years old. He also allegedly saw the prophet Ezekiel under a tree and had a vision of "a tree filled with angels." Blake's visions would have a lasting effect on the art and writings that he produced.

The Young Artist

Blake's artistic ability became evident in his youth, and by age 10, he was enrolled at Henry Pars' drawing school, where he sketched the human figure by copying from plaster casts of ancient statues. At age 14, he apprenticed with an engraver. Blake's master was the engraver to the London Society of Antiquaries, and Blake was sent to Westminster Abbey to make drawings of tombs and monuments, where his lifelong love of gothic art was seeded.

The Maturing Artist

In 1779, at age 21, Blake completed his seven-year apprenticeship and became a journeyman copy engraver, working on projects for book and print publishers. Also preparing himself for a career as a painter, that same year, he was admitted to the Royal Academy of Art's Schools of Design, where he began exhibiting his own works in 1780. Blake's artistic energies branched out at this point, and he privately published his Poetical Sketches (1783), a collection of poems that he had written over the previous 14 years.

In August 1782, Blake married Catherine Sophia Boucher, who was illiterate. Blake taught her how to read, write, draw and color (his designs and prints). He also helped her to experience visions, as he did. Catherine believed explicitly in her husband's visions and his genius, and supported him in everything he did, right up to his death 45 years later.

One of the most traumatic events of Blake's life occurred in 1787, when his beloved brother, Robert, died from tuberculosis at age 24. At the moment of Robert's death, Blake allegedly saw his spirit ascend through the ceiling, joyously; the moment, which entered into Blake's psyche, greatly influenced his later poetry. The following year, Robert appeared to Blake in a vision and presented him with a new method of printing his works, which Blake called "illuminated printing." Once incorporated, this method allowed Blake to control every aspect of the production of his art.

While Blake was an established engraver, soon he began receiving commissions to paint watercolors, and he painted scenes from the works of Milton, Dante , Shakespeare and the Bible.

The Move to Felpham and Charges of Sedition

In 1800, Blake accepted an invitation from poet William Hayley to move to the little seaside village of Felpham and work as his protégé. While the relationship between Hayley and Blake began to sour, Blake ran into trouble of a different stripe: In August 1803, Blake found a soldier, John Schofield, on the property and demanded that he leave. After Schofield refused and an argument ensued, Blake removed him by force. Schofield accused Blake of assault and, worse, of sedition, claiming that he had damned the king.

The punishments for sedition in England at the time (during the Napoleonic Wars) were severe. Blake anguished, uncertain of his fate. Hayley hired a lawyer on Blake's behalf, and he was acquitted in January 1804, by which time Blake and Catherine had moved back to London.

Later Years

In 1804, Blake began to write and illustrate Jerusalem (1804-20), his most ambitious work to date. He also began showing more work at exhibitions (including Chaucer's Canterbury Pilgrims and Satan Calling Up His Legions ), but these works were met with silence, and the one published review was absurdly negative; the reviewer called the exhibit a display of "nonsense, unintelligibleness and egregious vanity," and referred to Blake as "an unfortunate lunatic."

Blake was devastated by the review and lack of attention to his works, and, subsequently, he withdrew more and more from any attempt at success. From 1809 to 1818, he engraved few plates (there is no record of Blake producing any commercial engravings from 1806 to 1813). He also sank deeper into poverty, obscurity and paranoia.

In 1819, however, Blake began sketching a series of "visionary heads," claiming that the historical and imaginary figures that he depicted actually appeared and sat for him. By 1825, Blake had sketched more than 100 of them, including those of Solomon and Merlin the magician and those included in "The Man Who Built the Pyramids" and "Harold Killed at the Battle of Hastings"; along with the most famous visionary head, that included in Blake's "The Ghost of a Flea."

Remaining artistically busy, between 1823 and 1825, Blake engraved 21 designs for an illustrated Book of Job (from the Bible) and Dante's Inferno . In 1824, he began a series of 102 watercolor illustrations of Dante — a project that would be cut short by Blake's death in 1827.

Death and Legacy

In the final years of his life, Blake suffered from recurring bouts of an undiagnosed disease that he called "that sickness to which there is no name." He died on August 12, 1827, leaving unfinished watercolor illustrations to Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress and an illuminated manuscript of the Bible's Book of Genesis. In death, as in life, Blake received short shrift from observers, and obituaries tended to underscore his personal idiosyncrasies at the expense of his artistic accomplishments. The Literary Chronicle , for example, described him as "one of those ingenious persons ... whose eccentricities were still more remarkable than their professional abilities."

Unappreciated in life, Blake has since become a giant in literary and artistic circles, and his visionary approach to art and writing has not only spawned countless, spellbound speculations about Blake, they have inspired a vast array of artists and writers.

QUICK FACTS

• Name: William Blake
• Birth Year: 1757
• Birth date: November 28, 1757
• Birth City: London, England
• Birth Country: United Kingdom
• Gender: Male
• Best Known For: William Blake was a 19th-century writer and artist who is regarded as a seminal figure of the Romantic Age. His writings have influenced countless writers and artists through the ages.
• Fiction and Poetry
• Christianity
• Astrological Sign: Sagittarius
• Royal Academy of Art's Schools of Design
• Death Year: 1827
• Death date: August 12, 1827
• Death City: London, England
• Death Country: United Kingdom

We strive for accuracy and fairness.If you see something that doesn't look right, contact us !

CITATION INFORMATION

• Article Title: William Blake Biography
• Author: Biography.com Editors
• Website Name: The Biography.com website
• Url: https://www.biography.com/authors-writers/william-blake
• Access Date:
• Publisher: A&E; Television Networks
• Last Updated: May 27, 2021
• Original Published Date: April 2, 2014
• I am under the direction of messengers from Heaven daily and nightly.
• The vision of Christ that thou dost see is my vision's greatest enemy. Both read the Bible day and night, but thou readst black where I read white.

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Biography Online

Biography William Blake

“Tyger, Tyger, burning bright In the forests of the night, What immortal hand or eye Could frame thy fearful symmetry?”

– William Blake – The Tyger (from Songs of Experience )

Short Bio of William Blake

William Blake was born in London 28 November 1757, where he spent most of his life. His father was a successful London hosier and attracted by the Religious teachings of  Emmanuel Swedenborg. Blake was first educated at home, chiefly by his mother.  Blake remained very close to his mother and wrote a lot of poetry about her.  Poems such as Cradle Song illustrate Blake’s fond memories for his upbringing by his mother:

Sweet dreams, form a shade O’er my lovely infant’s head; Sweet dreams of pleasant streams By happy, silent, moony beams. Sweet sleep, with soft down Weave thy brows an infant crown. Sweep sleep, Angel mild, Hover o’er my happy child.

– William Blake

His parents were broadly sympathetic with his artistic temperament and they encouraged him to collect Italian prints. He found work as an engraver, joining the trade at an early age. He found the early apprenticeship rather boring, but the skills he learnt proved useful throughout his artistic life. He became very skilled as an engraver and after completing his apprenticeship in 1779, he set up as an independent artist. He received many commissions and became well known as a skilled artist. Throughout his life, Blake was innovative and his willingness to depict the spirit world in physical form was criticised by elements of the press.

In 1791, Blake fell in love with Catherine Boucher, an illiterate and poor woman from Battersea across the Thames. The marriage proved a real meeting of mind and spirit. Blake taught his wife to read and write, and freely shared his inner and outer experiences. Catherine became a devoted wife and an uncompromising supporter of Blake’s artistic genius.

“Love seeketh not itself to please, Nor for itself hath any care, But for another gives its ease, And builds a heaven in hell’s despair.”

– Songs of Experience, The Clod and the Pebble, st. 1

Mystical experiences and poetry

‘Pity’ by William Blake

As a young boy, Blake recalls having a most revealing vision of seeing angels in the trees. These mystical visions returned throughout his life, leaving a profound mark on his poetry and outlook.

“I am not ashamed, afraid, or averse to tell you what Ought to be Told: That I am under the direction of Messengers from Heaven, Daily & Nightly; but the nature of such things is not, as some suppose, without trouble or care.” – Letters of William Blake

William Blake was also particularly sensitive to cruelty. His heart wept at the sight of man’s inhumanity to other men and children. In many ways he was also of radical temperament, rebelling against the prevailing orthodoxy of the day. His anger and frustration at the world can be seen in his collection of poems “ Songs of Experience ”

“How can the bird that is born for joy Sit in a cage and sing? How can a child, when fears annoy, But droop his tender wing, And forget his youthful spring!”

– William Blake: The Schoolboy

As well as writing poetry that revealed and exposed the harsh realities of life, William Blake never lost touch with his heavenly visions. Like a true seer, he could see beyond the ordinary world and glimpse another possibility.

“To see a world in a grain of sand And heaven in a wild flower Hold infinity in the palm of your hand And eternity in an hour.”

This poem from Auguries of Innocence is one of the most loved poems in the English language. Within four short lines, he gives an impression of the infinite in the finite, and the eternal in the transient.

One of Blake’s greatest poems – popularly referred to as ‘Jerusalem’ – was the preface to his epic work “Milton: A poem in two books”. This hymn was inspired by the story that Jesus travelled to Glastonbury, England – in the years before his documented life in the Gospels. To Blake, Jerusalem was a metaphor for creating Heaven on earth and transforming all that is ugly about modern life ‘dark satanic mills’ into ‘England’s green and pleasant land.” Jerusalem, set to music by Hubert Parry in 1916, is often seen as England’s unofficial national anthem.

On one occasion he got into trouble with the authorities for forcing a soldier to leave his back garden. It was in the period of the Napoleonic Wars where the government were cracking down on any perceived lack of patriotism. In this climate, he was arrested for sedition and faced the possibility of jail. Blake defended himself and despite the prejudices of those who disliked Blake’s anti-military attitude, he was able to gain an acquittal.

Religion of Blake

Outwardly Blake was a member of the Church of England, where he was christened, married and buried. However, his faith and spiritual experience was much deeper and more unconventional than orthodox religion. He considered himself a sincere Christian but was frequently critical of organised religion.

“And now let me finish with assuring you that, Tho I have been very unhappy, I am so no longer. I am again. Emerged into the light of day; I still & shall to Eternity Embrace Christianity and Adore him who is the Express image of God” – Letters of Blake

For the last few decades of his life, he never attended formal worship but saw religion as an inner experience to be held in private. Throughout his life, he experienced mystical experiences and visions of heavenly angels. These experiences informed his poetry, art and outlook on life. It made Blake see beyond conventional piety and value human goodness and kindness. He was a strong opponent of slavery and supported the idea of equality of man.

“If the doors of perception were cleansed, everything would appear to man as it is: infinite.” – Blake, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1790–1793)

Blake read the Bible and admired the New Testament, he was less enamoured of the judgements and restrictions found in the Old Testament. He was also influenced by the teaching of Emanuel Swedenborg, a charismatic preacher who saw the Bible as the literal word of God. Although Blake was, at times, enthusiastic about Swedenborg, he never became a member of his church, preferring to retain his intellectual and spiritual independence.

Blake died on August 12 1827. Eyewitnesses report that his death was a ‘glorious affair’. After falling ill, Blake sang hymns and prepared himself to depart. He was buried in an unmarked grave in a public cemetery and Bunhill Fields. After his death, his influence steadily grew through the Pre-Raphaelites and later noted poets such as T. S. Eliot and W. B. Yeats.

The esteemed poet, William Wordsworth , said on the death of Blake:

 “There was no doubt that this poor man was mad, but there is something in the madness of this man which interests me more than the sanity of Lord Byron and Walter Scott.”

The Art of William Blake

Newton by Blake

Citation: Pettinger, Tejvan . “ Biography of William Blake” , Oxford, UK www.biographyonline.net , 1st June. 2006. Page updated 23rd Jan 2020.

The Complete Poetry & Prose of William Blake

• The Complete Poetry & Prose of William Blake at Amazon.com
• The Complete Poetry & Prose of William Blake at Amazon.co.uk

To See a World in a Grain of Sand

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• Quotes of William Blake
• William Blake Biography
• William Blake Poetry

William Blake: Biography offers glimpse into artist and poet's visionary mind

• Published 26 June 2021

Few took William Blake seriously as an artist and poet in his lifetime

One day in 1801, when William Blake was living on the Sussex coast, he went on a long country walk when he got into an argument with a thistle.

The artist, poet and musician, who experienced beatific visions throughout his 69 years on Earth, wasn't wandering lonely as a cloud, like some of his Romantic peers.

On this occasion, the prickly plant he encountered also took the form of a hectoring old man. For all Blake could see, the two were inseparable.

The London shopkeeper's son (who didn't go to school) would also regularly see God, angels and demons, and often spoke with the spirit of his dead brother Robert. His wife Catherine once commented: "I see very little of my husband, he's always in paradise."

These divine and mind-bending experiences informed Blake's world view and inspired his deeply philosophical illustrated texts like Jerusalem and Milton.

As a result, though, he was deemed mad by much of 18th and 19th Century England, and died penniless and largely unheralded.

Nowadays, he is widely considered one of UK's most influential and respected artists and poets. And in a new biography, William Blake vs the World, author John Higgs argues we are now far better placed to understand what was going on inside his head.

'Mythological system'

"Blakeans have been touchy about the subject historically," Higgs tells the BBC. "There was the one exhibition he gave in his lifetime and it sold no paintings, and it got one review which referred to him as 'an unfortunate lunatic'. And so this accusation of madness followed him around in his day.

"Van Gogh scholars are quite happy to admit he had mental health issues, and that adds to their understanding of him. [But] Blake scholars have been traditionally keen to insist that he was not mad, that there is reason and logic and worth in this system that he created - this mythological system."

A portrait of Urizen, the embodiment of restricted thought, reason and law, from William Blake's The Book of Urizen

He adds: "I think now we're in a position where we can say, yeah absolutely he was [sane]. But there was a period where he had poor mental health. In his letters there were references to melancholy, as a disease, and depression, and also later incidents that show signs of paranoia."

Those mental health issues arose around the year 1800. "It was just a period in his life and you can see at the end of his life how he had come through it, with the help of his wife, and was just in a very blissful state," Higgs continues.

Blake's high regard for contrary states, as evidenced in his Songs of Innocence and Experience and The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, suggests he knew that what goes up must come down.

Slip inside the eye of your mind

The key to achieving timeless bliss, he believed, was to re-balance the imagination (or The Four Zoas) so the left-brain - the part that deals with logic, reason and language - was less dominant, unlocking the potential of the right side, which deals with creativity, emotions and physical pleasure.

The polymath underlined the importance of viewing things through one's mind's eye, rather than merely through the organs on either side of your nose. In his book, Higgs cites the work of neuroscientist Dr Adam Zeman, who has studied the imagination for decades. He first described in 2015 the condition of aphantasia, where some people were found to be unable to visualise mental images. In other words, they had no mind's eye.

At the opposite end of the spectrum, those with extremely vivid imaginations were said to have hyperphantasia.

Dr Zeman, who released his latest research findings , external last month - with the help of his colleagues at the University of Exeter and around 70 volunteers willing to have their brain activity scanned - agrees with Higgs that rather than meaning he was unhinged, Blake's visions strongly suggest hyperphantasia.

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"When I think about my fiancee, there's no image" Niel Kenmuir on living with aphantasia

"[Blake] seems to live in the world of his own imagination to a great degree," Dr Zeman says. "Some people [with hyperphantasia] say that it is hard for them to be sure whether they've imagined something, or it actually happened because their imagining is very vivid."

Neither extremes, which are believed to affect millions of people around the world, are viewed as disorders, he notes. They are more like interesting variations of perspective, each with their own pluses and minuses.

Hyperphantasics tend to be more open and have abundant mental imagery, research shows, but can be more vulnerable to emotions that images fuel - like regret, disgust or longing.

Aphantasics tend to be more introverted, have thin autobiographical memoires - relying more on facts - and often miss being unable to picture loved ones they have lost. However, many highly imaginative people, including Pixar animations co-founder Ed Catmull, Mozilla Firefox co-creator Blake Ross and leading scientists Oliver Sacks and Craig Venter have all lacked imagery.

Urizen measures out the material world in The Ancient of Days, taken from Europe a Prophecy by William Blake

There is some evidence to suggest that very vivid imagery can put people at the risk of psychosis, Dr Zeman says, if they lose sense of the boundary between what's real and what's imaginary - which Blake's contemporaries clearly thought he had done.

But he thinks Blake, who died almost 200 years ago, may have been an early adopter of the increasingly accepted idea in psychology and cognitive neuroscience today that "all our experience, in a sense, is imaginative".

"Although we aren't aware of it, a huge amount is happening in our brains all the time to enable us to see, hear or make sense of anything," Dr Zeman says. "An experience itself is a creative act, let alone the echo of experience that you get in the mind's eye.

"I think Blake had a sense that all of all our whole mental lives - not just the mind wandering, daydreaming, creativity and the artistic sense, but simply having an experience - is a creative and imaginative act."

Or as Blake himself put it: "The imagination is not a state: it is the human existence itself."

Albion contemplating Jesus crucified in William Blake's engraved poem Jerusalem

The limited, rational or logical part of our brains, which Blake characterised as Urizen, is actually only a model of how we understand the world, Higgs explains.

"We think it's real, we think it's true," he says. "When it feels under threat, it lashes out and tries to defend itself.

"You can see on social media, people have a desperate need to be thought of as right. For Blake, it's all about being able to step outside that and just see the rational brain for what it is, as a sort of quite limited small part of a much larger mental experience."

Albert Einstein once remarked on "the stubbornly persistent illusion of the passing of time", which was also depicted by Blake in the form of Los.

The artist's conviction that concepts like time, God, heaven and hell were all internal creations, Higgs feels, also salvages theological debates for today's more secular UK society.

"If you know someone who has been living through hell, the idea that Blake was in paradise becomes a little bit more plausible," he says.

The doors of perception

William Blake is by no means the only historical figure to have reported on such ineffable experiences. And his apparent capacity to access parts of the imagination that were beyond the realm of the average person, and the importance he placed on free love, sex and bashing the establishment, were of great appeal in the swinging late 60s.

Jim Morrison's band The Doors even named themselves after a famous line from a Blake poem: " If the doors of perception were cleansed then everything would appear to man as it is, Infinite."

The Doors attempted to break on through to the other side

The likes of Timothy Leary and Aldous Huxley championed the use of psychedelic drugs to help achieve Blake-like states of consciousness.

For people with aphantasia, Dr Zeman notes, hallucinogens sometimes help them to generate imagery, but it doesn't seem to outlast the drug effect. Higgs compares the practice, as well as that of transcendental meditation, to "micro-dosing in Blake's eternity".

It's not impossible that Blake may have dabbled in magic mushrooms, the author concedes, but recreational use was not believed to have been common at the time, and he had been chronicling his visions from childhood until old age.

William Blake's Albion Rose, circa 1793

Blake believed we could all work on our imaginations, just like our abs or biceps, and aspire to joining him in "eternity".

Dr Zeman's studies suggest that while it may be possible to strengthen the mind's eye, ear or fingertip with magnetic pulses, there is a biological and possibly genetic limit to how far along the imagination spectrum each individual can travel. But we should celebrate that difference, he says, and not medicalise it.

He is hopeful that one day we will be able to know it better, and ultimately solve the age-old Cartesian conundrum of how consciousness can be generated from that grey, jelly-like lump of tissue in our heads.

To give Blake the final word on the matter: " What is now proved was once only imagined."

William Blake versus the World, by John Higgs, is out now

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An Overview of William Blake as a Romantic Poet and His Songs of Innocence and Experience

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A Poison Tree by: William Blake

Jul 28, 2014

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A Poison Tree by: William Blake. Author Biography. William Blake was born in 1757 in London and from a young age, spoke of having visions. At age 10 his parents sent him to drawing school; At age 12 he began writing poetry; and at age 14 he became the apprentice to an engraver.

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A Poison Treeby: William Blake

Author Biography • William Blake was born in 1757 in London and from a young age, spoke of having visions. • At age 10 his parents sent him to drawing school; At age 12 he began writing poetry; and at age 14 he became the apprentice to an engraver. • In 1782, he married Catherine Boucher and taught her how to read, write and draw. • He worked as an engraver and illustrator but was not very successful. • He started to teach his younger brother Robert the arts but he shortly fell ill and died in 1787. William claimed to have seen his brothers spirit leave his body. • Blake's first printed works protested against war and tyranny. • He preferring imagination over reason. • In 1800 he experienced many spiritual insights that prepared him for his more mature work which showed the human spirit triumphant over reason. • While some people praised Blake's artistry, others thought him insane. Blake's poetry was not well known by the general public.

A Poison Tree I was angry with my friend:I told my wrath, my wrath did end.I was angry with my foe:I told it not, my wrath did grow.And I watered it in fears,Night and morning with my tears;And I sunned it with smiles,And with soft deceitful wiles.And it grew both day and night,Till it bore an apple bright.And my foe beheld it shine.And he knew that it was mine,And into my garden stoleWhen the night had veiled the pole;In the morning glad I seeMy foe outstretched beneath the tree.

Summary • This poem is about the dangers that come from holding grudges. It talks about a speaker who gets mad at a friend, but is able to forgive him/her. However, later on he becomes angry with a “foe”, and his anger grows into a tree and the speaker’s enemy ends up dyeing because he eats of the fruit of his wrath. The speaker is then pleased to see his enemy dead beneath the tree.

Form • The poem is made up of four quatrains (each with two rhyming couplets). • The Rhyme scheme is AABB CCDD EEFF GGHH

Definitions A A B B C C D D E EFFGGHH I was angry with my friend:I told my wrath, my wrath did end.I was angry with my foe:I told it not, my wrath did grow.And I watered it in fears,Night and morning with my tears;And I sunned it with smiles,And with soft deceitful wiles.And it grew both day and night,Till it bore an apple bright.And my foe beheld it shine.And he knew that it was mine,And into my garden stoleWhen the night had veiled the pole;In the morning glad I seeMy foe outstretched beneath the tree. to be exposed to the sun deceitfulcunning or trickery; to beguile, entice, or lure to sneak the night is so dark that the North star (Polaris) cannot be seen

Poetic Devices • Metaphor • The tree and its fruit (the apple) symbolize the speaker’s hatred and anger toward this person. As the tree grows so does his anger, and eventually it produces a fruit that kills the enemy, so too can our anger cause harm to others. • Meter • The poem’s language has a “bounciness” within it that is a product of its meter. • Lines 2, 4, 14, and 16 are iambic tetrameters. (tetra meaning four and iamb meaning a pair of syllables in which the first is unstressed and the second is stressed.) I told my wrath, my wrath did end. • The rest of the lines are trochees, which are similar to iambs but the stress is switched.  I was angry with my friend.

Personal Response • I like this poem because it shows that when we are angry at someone who we care about, we fell like we can confront them and our anger ceases because we know that they only want the best for us. However, when we are angry with someone who we do not want to confront, our angry does not go away and it can grow and fester, and cause bad things to happen to both of the people involved. • I also liked the simplicity in the language, which makes it easy to understand, but is still really powerful.

Picture Sources • http://www.blakearchive.org/blake/about-blake.html • http://shobey1kanoby.deviantart.com/art/The-Poison-Tree-II-116287985 • http://sarsparillavalentine.wordpress.com/2009/10/18/rsa-week-4/bal7040/ • http://stunnedbanana.blogspot.com/2012_11_01_archive.html • http://www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/116 • http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/steal?s=t • http://www.shmoop.com/poison-tree/rhyme-form-meter.html

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