Fearful Symmetry: A Study of William BlakeThis brilliant outline of Blake's thought and commentary on his poetry comes on the crest of the current interest in Blake, and carries us further towards an understanding of his work than any previous study. Here is a dear and complete solution to the riddles of the longer poems, the so-called "Prophecies," and a demonstration of Blake's insight that will amaze the modern reader. The first section of the book shows how Blake arrived at a theory of knowledge that was also, for him, a theory of religion, of human life and of art, and how this rigorously defined system of ideas found expression in the complicated but consistent symbolism of his poetry. The second and third parts, after indicating the relation of Blake to English literature and the intellectual atmosphere of his own time, explain the meaning of Blake's poems and the significance of their characters. |
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... imagination” is the regular term used by Blake to denote man as an acting and perceiving being. That is, a man's imagination is his life. “Mental” and “intellectual,” however, are exact synonyms of “imaginative” everywhere in Blake's ...
... imagination behind his perception than to the man who cautiously tries to prune away different characteristics from that imagination and isolate one. The more unified the perception, the more real the existence. Blake says: “\What,” it ...
... imagination is derived. “My legs feel like a walk” is recognized to be a half-humorous figure of speech; but “my heart beats” is accepted as literal. It is not altogether so: the imagination beats the heart; but still the automatic ...
... imaginative life is most clearly seen in the work of art, which is a unified mental vision of experience. For the work of art is produced by the entire imagination. The dull mind is always thinking in terms of general antitheses, and it ...
... imagination. Hence an antithesis of energy and order, desire and reason, is as fallacious as all the other antitheses with which timid mediocrity attempts to split the world. Imagination is 26 THE .ARGUMEJV'T.