Blake, William. The William Blake Archive. 1996-2002. http://www.blakearchive.org
Print, Daughters of
Albion – Front Piece. 1789 & 1793.
Print, “The Progress of Poesy: A Pindaric Ode”, Thomas
Gray Poems. 1768.
http://www.engl.virginia.edu/~enec981/dictionary/blake6.html
Print, America, Plate 6. 1793.
Print, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, “Vanity”, Plate
21. 1790-1793.
Painting, Newton. 1795-1805.
Print, Jerusalem, Plate 100. 1804-1820.
Print, Jerusalem, Plate 53. 1804-1820.
Other:
Van Dyck. Self Portrait with
Sunflower. 1632.
Allen Ginsberg Kaddish Cover: Photographer: Unknown; Date: Unknown.
Elsa Dorfman, Photograph,. Allen Ginsberg, Polaroid, 1986.www.elsa.photo.net
http://elsa.photo.net/Ginsberg.html
Book Cover, Sanders, Edward. 1968
A History In Verse
Quoted Text:
The printer embodies the text on the page . William Blake, iconoclastic poet visionary and printer
published his poetry with elaborate illustrations, creating a
unique mythology for his prophetic vision. The engraved prints
were hand-colored. He illustrated the works of Chaucer, Milton,
Dante and contemporary, Thomas Gray in several emblem books.
Although Blake is associated with the Romantic Movement, his work
is distinctively individual. The engravers art etches text on
metal plates for printing. Blake engraved his hand- written text on to copper
plates by etching with the word with caustic materials. While the
enlightenment thinkers called for an empirical proof of ideas Blake's works
provide an empirical visceral proof of vision embodied. His crafted works
demonstrate the physicality of application. As a self-published author engaged
in every phase of production, from concept to finished product, Blake represents
bookmaking embodied in practice.
Dante Rossetti, who founded the Pre-Raphaelite movement, also produced
elaborately illustrated poetry books that paired image with text. He purchased
Blake's notebook. Other printer poets include Laura Ryding, (Anarchy is Not
Enough), Robert Graves (The White Goddess: A Historical Grammar of Poetic
Myth), and Mark Twain ( The Mysterious Stranger). In this design, two plates from Blake’s Marriage and
America depict the same figure and page composition. The
selected images, show how Blake portrayed the human in exalted
states of pure innocence and profaned descent. His ideas about the
body, found a renaissance in the twentieth century with poet,
Allen Ginsberg (1926-1997) who had a vision of Blake in a railroad
yard, where he wrote his "Sunflower Sutra" poem Blake.
Ginsberg created melodies for several Blake poems. He always
ended his performances with Blake’s “All the Hills Are Echoing”.
A native plant of the Americas, the sunflower first appeared in Europe during
the mid 1500s and quickly became a popular symbol for constancy based on
its heliotropic properties. It is also a potent symbol of the revolution in
thought known as the Enlightenment that was fostered by colonization, conquest
and trade with the new world. The two Sunflower poems of Blake and Ginsberg are quoted:
The two Sunflower poems of Blake and Ginsberg are quoted:
Blake’s poem, “To the Muse”,
is quoted on the page for printing. His poem summons the ancient muse of a prior age, while lamenting the
loss of purity and clarity of her fading voice. The post-modern poem below echoes
Blake's threnody with ironic overtures:
(Dean, “To the Muse”)
Note, The Notebook of William Blake. Erdman, N25
transcript 1787-1827.
Poem, “To the Muses”. (Erdman, Poetical Sketches; p
417: 13-17).
Line, “I will not Reason & Compare:” (Erdman, Los in
Jerusalem, 10.21; p 153). 1804-1820.
Who countest the steps of the Sun,
Seeking after that sweet golden clime
Where the traveller's journey is done:
(Blake “Ah Sun-flower”)Look at the sunflower he said,
there was a dead gray shadow against the sky,
big as a man sitting
dry on top of a pile of ancient sawdust—
I rushed up enchanted—it was my first sunflower,
memories of Blake
—my visions—Harlem and Hells
(Ginsberg, ”Sunflower Sutra”)
Oh Muse
Come and speak awhile
Your dance dies in our arms
Yet we strive once more
to revive your failing falling heart
Vision’s perfection eludes
gone in lost days no return
hard to be a dying breed
Forever I hear fire. Your
mystic song wails out
forgotten tattered tainted glory