Contrasting elements of 'Innocence' and
'Experience' in Blake's poetry 'The Lamb' and 'The Tyger'.
William
Blake followed his own maxim that “without
contraries is no progression” when in 1794 he published together his 'Songs of
Innocence' and 'Songs of Experience' the form and manner of a single book and also
described his 'Songs' in the title page as "Showing the Two Contrary
States of the Human Soul". ( 2). The two sets of 'Songs' are very different from each other in
character, and accordingly does the poet group his verses under two main
headings.
‘The
Lamb' ( from 'Songs of Innocence') and 'The Tyger’( from 'Songs of Experience')
are both representative poem of Blake. They celebrate two contrary states of
human soul – innocence and experience. The 'Songs of Innocence' professes an
imaginative vision of the state of innocence; the 'Songs of Experience' shows
how we challenges, corrupts and destroys this vision. Blake believes that
experience is the only way to reach ultimate wisdom, that innocence cannot gain
true vision; that innocence by its own nature is easily led to decay that true
vision cannot come if one acquiesce in the
distortions of experience. He believes that ultimate wisdom is possible only by
the knowledge of these distortions and transcending them eventually. (4).
In
‘The Lamb’ the little child says:
“Little
lamb, who made thee?
Dost thou know who made thee?" (
‘The Lamb', line 1-2)
‘The
Lamb' celebrates the divinity and innocence not merely of the child but also of
the least harmless of creatures on earth. On the other hand, 'The Tyger' shows how
experience destroys the state of childlike innocence and puts destructive force
in its place. So the plot, content and point of view is too much different.
In
‘The Lamb' little child, the little
lamb, the pastoral setting are all Black symbols to convey a special kind of
existence or state of soul. It is a state when ‘clothing’ is 'delight’ itself, ‘voice’ is tender, a state
of pristine joy. The little boy sings out loudly and delightfully.:
"He
is called by thy name,
…….He
became a little child:
I
a child, and thou a lamb,
We
are called by his name.” ( 'The Lamb' line 16-18)
Both
the lamb and the tiger are created by God. But the lamb represent the milder
and gentle aspects of human nature, and the tiger it’s hoarseness and fires
aspect. Both of these poems have an imagery and symbol, but they are showing contrast morality and ideology. The tiger is
God's wrath, as the lamb His love. The tiger is ruthless, natural predator. On
the other side, the lamb is an object of joy. It’s bleat fills all the valley.
This
is very much like the ‘Psalm of David' (‘Psalm’ 23) in which "The Lord is
my shepherd; I shall not be in want”. It is a state of affluence, and the
wealth is joy. It is a state in which every human being as the same measure of
security and assurance, love and peace as belongs to a lamb feeding on green
pastures under a wise shepherd. In the Blakean corpus this shepherd is God Himself;
and therefore it is He who is Himself a Lamb and becomes a little child. As his
‘Songs of Innocence' shows, Blake is essentially a humanist poet who believes
that God is the creative and spiritual power in man. Blake believes that in the
state of innocence life is governed by ‘Mercy’, ‘Pity', ‘Peace', and ‘Love’
(Blake's ‘The Divine Image'), and these forces five security and sense of
completeness. It is for this reason that Blake calls his ‘Songs of Innocence' the
'happy songs'
Even
the beginning of these poems are very different. In ‘The Lamb' Blake asks a
question innocently as a child :
“
Little Lamb, who made thee?
Dost thou know
who made thee?” ( 'The Lamb’, line 1-2)
But
in ‘The Tyger' he asks questions differently as he has experienced all about it.
He asks ,
“
….. What immortal hand or eye
Could
frame thy fearful symmetry?” ( 'The
Tyger’, line 3-4)
In
both the poems Blake makes use of symbols to convey his ideas. In ‘The Lamb' he
draws the symbol from the Bible, and makes use of such a familiar figure as the
lamb of God. In ' The Tyger’ the symbols, as in other poems of ‘Songs of
Experience', are of his own making. The tiger is Blake's symbol for the fires
forces in the soul which are needed to break the bones of experience.
Yet,
Blake never thought this state of joy as the highest state. Rather, he saw this
state of child-like happiness as something that cannot last, and "to reach
a higher state man must be tested by experience and suffering" (3) . This
is the notion that links the two sections of the anthology.
‘The
Lamb', a mere child, is only concerned with the benign aspects of life, and
experiences only peace and happiness out of his companionship with the little
lamb for whom he can desire nothing but God's blessings. The speaker of ‘The
Tyger, an adult and experienced person, is aware of the hard realities of life.
To him the tiger is not simply a creature of beauty (as the lamb is that of
peace and innocence) but one who is at the same time fearful ('fearful
symmetry') in nature. He is terribly frightened because of its "deadly terrors”.
‘The
Tyger' therefore, is Blake's symbol for the fierce forces in the human soul
which are essential to break the bonds of the destructive forces - cruelty;
hypocrisy, poverty, misuse of intellect; distrust of the imagination, political
and ecclesiastical institutions, frustration of desire. This helps one
interpret the “forests of the night" as referring to ignorance, repression
and superstition. The metallic images suggested by the use of the ‘hammer’,
the 'chain', the 'anvil'. The physical perceptions of the creator at work wresting
with his stupendous creation are suggested by this shoulder, hand and feet. The
spare from and physical movement of the beast have been caught in the 'fearful
symmetry' and the idea of physical immediacy is conveyed in the line, “What the
hand dare seize the fire?” For some the tiger stands for the pervasive evil in
the world; and for others it symbolises an awful beauty in creation of the
universe. The forest “of the night” in which the tiger lurks represents ignorance,
repression and superstition. The ‘fire’ is a symbol wrath or passion of anger.
The 'stars' too suggests the angels – the rebel angels. Thus both ‘The Lamb'
and 'The Tyger’ are symbolic poem, but the difference is that 'The Lamb’ is the
symbol of innocence and 'The Tyger’ is
the symbol of experience.(6)
William
Blake's 'The Tyger’ and 'The Blake' are both very short poems in which the
author poses rhetorical questions to
what, at a first glance, would appear to be a lamb and a tiger.
Since Blake believes in the existence of
God in man, and that apart from man God has no meaning at all, when he asks
"Did he who made the Lamb make thee?" (‘The Tyger’, line 20) He is not only invoking the philosophical
question regarding the inscrutable nature of God in whom all irreconcilable
find co-existence, but is indeed seeing the presence of good and evil in man
himself. So when the "Good" that "obeys reason" is
destroyed, he still sees the "Evil" which in “the active springing
from Energy" lurking in the "forests” of oppression to restore the
world.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
1) Black,
William, ‘The Lamb’ and ‘The Tyger’, https://www.poetryfoundation.com
2) Blake,
William; 'Songs of Innocence and Experience, showing the two contrary states of
human soul' ,Last updated- 23 Nov., 2020 , https://www.encyclopedia.com,
3) Bowra,
C.M.; ‘Songs of Innocence and Experience'. ‘The Romantic Imagination'. OUP,
London, 1949.
4) Bentley, G.E., 'The Stranger From Paradise: A
Biography of William Blake'; Last updated – 24 Nov, 2020, ‘https://www.britannica.com
5) Weissenberger,
C.; “Comparison of William Blake's 'The Lamb' and 'The Tyger'”, Nov. 10, 2014, https://www.academia.edu
6) Ibrahim,
Amal, “Symbolism in Blake’s animal poems 'The Lamb’ and 'The Tyger’ an
analytical and descriptive study”; Vol.5, Issue 1. 2017, http://www.rjelal.com
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