The thing that struck me most about reading William Blake, Selected Poems was the sheer pleasure of the experience. I have barely read a word of poetry since I left university. I guess this is quite a shaming thing to admit for somebody who considers herself fairly well-read and literary and yet I imagine it’s not uncommon – certainly I was treated to looks of unsolicited sympathy when it was revealed that my Penguin Classic to blog was Blake.

Concern was unnecessary – I was thrilled by the thought of getting back into his weird and wonderful imagination. The introduction was the perfect amuse gueule; a totally accessible essay by G. E. Bentley, which painted Blake as a real man in love with his wife, devastated by bereavement, poet, artist, believer and (don’t kick me now) possible madman.

I feel drawn to all sorts of culinary and sensual imagery when writing about the poems themselves - not sure if that says more about me than the book - but the words delicious, rich and savour all feel apt. Books of collected poetry such as this are not for reading from cover to cover but rather for dipping in and tasting. It’s ironic perhaps that a lot of the content, while abhorring earthly, and earthy, pleasures, appeals to the very pleasure-centre of me; sample, for example, this:

Cruelty has a Human Heart
And Jealousy a Human face,
Terror the Human Form Divine
And Secrecy the Human Dress.

The Human Dress is forged Iron,
The Human Form a fiery Forge,
The Human Face a Furnace seal’d,
The Human Heart its hungry Gorge

Isn’t that just thrillingly dramatic? Perhaps it’s my ego, or Catholic upbringing, but I secretly love the idea that my heart is a hungry gorge.

Part of the pleasure is the easy readability of the poems too. Lots of Blake is familiar in contemporary culture– Jerusalem for example, or The Tyger, but I frequently found the poems I had never come across before beautifully simple to read. The experience was indulgence, not work. This extract from The Crystal Cabinet is a great example:

The Maiden caught me in the Wild
Where I was dancing merrily;
She put me into her Cabinet
And Lockd me up with a golden Key.

This Cabinet is formd of Gold

Remember that by posting a comment you are agreeing to the website Terms of Use.
If you consider any content on this site to be inappropriate, please report it to Penguin Books by emailing BlogaPenguinClassicFeedback@penguin.co.uk

Feed

There are 3 comments on this review