The Little Black Boy by William Blake: An Intrinsic and Extrinsic Elements Analysis
Rabu, 06 Juni 2018 | 0 comments
The Little Black
Boy by William Blake:
An Intrinsic and
Extrinsic Elements Analysis
William Blake was
one of the most well-known poets throughout centuries. Not only as a poet, but
he was also one of the most influential visual arts as well as printmakers
around the world. His remarkable works belong to the characteristics of
Romantic Movement and as “Pre-Romantic” which was around 1798-1830. Even though
he was considered “mad” because of his idiosyncratic or “quirk” habit he had,
he is in a high reputation for his expressiveness and creativity, and for his
mystical and philosophical contained within his works. He was born on November
28, 1757 in London, and was a son of London retail shopkeeper. In the age of
fourteen, he had to work as an engraver which stimulated his imagination of
drawings. However, the Bible was an early profound
influence on Blake, and remained a source of inspiration throughout his life.
Songs of Innocence and of Experience is an
illustrated collection of poems by William Blake. It appeared in two phases. A
few first copies were printed and illuminated by William Blake himself in 1789;
five years later he bound these poems with a set of new poems in a volume
titled Songs of Innocence and of Experience Showing the Two Contrary States of
the Human Soul. "Innocence" and "Experience" are
definitions of consciousness that rethink Milton's existential-mythic states of
"Paradise" and "Fall". Blake's categorizes our modes of
perception that tend to coordinate with a chronology that would become standard
in Romanticism: childhood is a state of protected innocence rather than
original sin, but not immune to the fallen world and its institutions. This
world sometimes impinges on childhood itself, and in any event becomes known
through "experience", a state of being marked by the loss of
childhood vitality, by fear and inhibition, by social and political corruption,
and by the manifold oppression of Church, State, and the ruling classes. The
volume's "Contrary States" are sometimes signaled by patently
repeated or contrasted titles: in Innocence, Infant Joy, in Experience, Infant
Sorrow; in Innocence, The Lamb, in Experience, The Fly and The Tyger. The stark
simplicity of poems such as The Chimney Sweeper and The Little Black Boy
display Blake's acute sensibility to the realities of poverty and exploitation
that accompanied the "Dark Satanic Mills" of the Industrial
Revolution.
A Little Black Boy is one of his
collection poem included in Songs of Innocence and of Experience. It is telling
about the story of a black boy. The poem was written by William Blake in 1789.
It was published during a time when slavery was still legal and the campaign
for the abolition of slavery was still young. The poem is heroic quatrains,
which are stanzas of pentameter lines rhyming ABAB.
My mother bore me in the
southern wild,
And I am black, but O! my soul is white;
White as an angel is the English child:
But I am black as if bereav’d of light.
My mother taught me underneath a tree
And sitting down before the heat of day,
She took me on her lap and kissed me,
And pointing to the east began to say.
Look on the rising sun: there God does live
And gives his light, and gives his heat away.
And flowers and trees and beasts and men receive
Comfort in morning joy in the noon day.
And we are put on earth a little space,
That we may learn to bear the beams of love,
And these black bodies and this sun-burnt face
Is but a cloud, and like a shady grove.
And I am black, but O! my soul is white;
White as an angel is the English child:
But I am black as if bereav’d of light.
My mother taught me underneath a tree
And sitting down before the heat of day,
She took me on her lap and kissed me,
And pointing to the east began to say.
Look on the rising sun: there God does live
And gives his light, and gives his heat away.
And flowers and trees and beasts and men receive
Comfort in morning joy in the noon day.
And we are put on earth a little space,
That we may learn to bear the beams of love,
And these black bodies and this sun-burnt face
Is but a cloud, and like a shady grove.
For when our souls have
learn’d the heat to bear
The cloud will vanish we shall hear his voice.
Saying: come out from the grove my love & care,
And round my golden tent like lambs rejoice.
Thus did my mother say and kissed me,
And thus I say to little English boy;
When I from black and he from white cloud free,
And round the tent of God like lambs we joy:
I’ll shade him from the heat till he can bear,
To lean in joy upon our fathers knee.
And then I’ll stand and stroke his silver hair,
And be like him and he will then love me.
The cloud will vanish we shall hear his voice.
Saying: come out from the grove my love & care,
And round my golden tent like lambs rejoice.
Thus did my mother say and kissed me,
And thus I say to little English boy;
When I from black and he from white cloud free,
And round the tent of God like lambs we joy:
I’ll shade him from the heat till he can bear,
To lean in joy upon our fathers knee.
And then I’ll stand and stroke his silver hair,
And be like him and he will then love me.
In the first stanza, it is stated that the narrator is a
boy who was born in Southern wild, or we call it Africa:
My
mother bore me in the southern wild,
And I am black, but O! my soul is white;
White as an angel is the English child:
But I am black as if bereav’d of light.
And I am black, but O! my soul is white;
White as an angel is the English child:
But I am black as if bereav’d of light.
In
the second line, he said that he was born as a black boy, but he had a white
heart—pure or innocent, he narrator starts to bring the story to the racism
issue in this line. The third and fourth lines indicate the difference of white
and black child that white child (English child) is as an angel, and black
child is dull. This comparison between white and black also provides the idea
about God. This idea will be explained more in the next stanza, and that the
idea of racism and religious will meet. The next stanza narrates about the
boy’s mother who gives advice to the boy underneath a tree in the morning. It seemed
that his mother really loved his son by taking her son on her lap and then
kissed him (line 3).
My mother taught me
underneath a tree
And sitting down before the heat of day,
She took me on her lap and kissed me,
And pointing to the east began to say.
And sitting down before the heat of day,
She took me on her lap and kissed me,
And pointing to the east began to say.
The third stanza is more
vivid that actually the idea about God’s kindness is the vision of this poem
for it is stated that God does exist and is generous:
Look
on the rising sun: there God does live
And gives his light, and gives his heat away.
And flowers and trees and beasts and men receive
Comfort in morning joy in the noon day.
And gives his light, and gives his heat away.
And flowers and trees and beasts and men receive
Comfort in morning joy in the noon day.
His
creation like the rising sun represents His existence in the world. He gives
His creation the light and heat that can make them alive, this represents God’s
generosity as well. The fourth stanza provides the readers that the love of God
is spread throughout this earth:
And we are put on earth a
little space,
That we may learn to bear the beams of love,
And these black bodies and this sun-burnt face
Is but a cloud, and like a shady grove.
That we may learn to bear the beams of love,
And these black bodies and this sun-burnt face
Is but a cloud, and like a shady grove.
The
mother explained that their black bodies were because God gives them the light
and heat (or I can assume the light and heat as God’s love) so that it made
their skin burnt. She also said that human is put on earth to learn and accept
God’s love. The skin—whether it’s black or white—is just the same as cloud,
that it would receive the light and heat from God. The mother kept saying about
God’s love:
For
when our souls have learn’d the heat to bear
The cloud will vanish we shall hear his voice.
Saying: come out from the grove my love & care,
And round my golden tent like lambs rejoice.
The cloud will vanish we shall hear his voice.
Saying: come out from the grove my love & care,
And round my golden tent like lambs rejoice.
She
said that our body wouldn’t be vanished until we had already learned and
accepted the God’s love, that our soul would meet God in heaven. Then, God will
say to enjoy and get free in His tent (heaven). Those sayings makes the little
black boy said that he would say the truth about God’s love to the English
boys:
Thus
did my mother say and kissed me,
And thus I say to little English boy;
When I from black and he from white cloud free,
And round the tent of God like lambs we joy:
And thus I say to little English boy;
When I from black and he from white cloud free,
And round the tent of God like lambs we joy:
He
said that they were different from their skin, but they are the same in the eyes
of God that they could joy in heaven together. The last stanza, ultimately,
asserts the most important message again that the black boy wanted to say to
English boys about the truth:
I’ll shade him from the
heat till he can bear,
To lean in joy upon our fathers knee.
And then I’ll stand and stroke his silver hair,
And be like him and he will then love me.
To lean in joy upon our fathers knee.
And then I’ll stand and stroke his silver hair,
And be like him and he will then love me.
The little black boy
wanted to teach English boys to learn and accept God’s love so that they can
joy together in His heaven. The last line asserts about the equality for both
black and white boys as well.
Blake tells us through this poem
about racism happened in English. He rebels against racism. He spreads his
concept about Christianity to the white people. The black boy tries to spread
and gain love in the racism era, and tries to say that everyone—whether he is
black or white—is the same in front of God.
From the interpretation above, the theme that can be inferred is the idea
of body and soul as well as racism. The difference of our body doesn’t really
give impact to the way God see us, to heaven. The most important is our soul
which always remembers and loves the creator. Meanwhile in the first stanza, the
little black boy seemed to be underestimated by saying “But I am black as if
bereav’d of light” as
though he assumed that white boys are good, but black boys are bad which leads
him to jealousy. However then, his mother said that the colour of our body was
not matter.
As to Blake’s
diction, his diction is simple and his language is highly symbolic. I may
say that actually the little black boy’s mother stands for nature which gives
him direction, and answers of his jealousy. Furthermore, the binary opposition
“black and white” gives another assumption other than the real color. “Black
and white” may stand for “reality and appearance”. Black skin doesn’t mean black
heart, meaning that the outer appearance doesn’t necessarily reflect the inner
reality.
There are several figurative
language that is used in the poem. There is simile in “as an angel”. The poet likens
the black boy's soul to angel that represents the goodness and perfection of
the spiritual life. This image reflects the boy's emphasize on his innocence
and purity. It
also shows his self-defense. He defends himself against any undermining views. There is a
metaphor in "beams of love". The poet compares God's love to sun. There
is a metaphor in "cloud". The poet compares man's body to a cloud
which screens the light of heaven. It shuts out the light form the human soul.
This is an extended image. The cloud represents the body which is the earthly
form of the human soul. This shows how the earthly, materialistic life brings
man's soul away from heaven.
In
that time, slavery was still alive. Black people were pushed to work fully
overtime, and they were treated as a machine. William Black, as a visionary,
gave a new perspective about black and white through this poem. He did not
slavery exist any longer. This emotion brought him to write such poem. The Little
Black Boy is a poem that reflects the Romantic era. The standard characteristic
is that it devotes the emotion and the beauty of nature. With Blake’s
perspective of God, this poem totally is to remind of God, and that colour of
skin doesn’t really matter.
By: MK
Label: intrinsic aand extrinsic element of a poem, little black boy analysis, little black boy poem, poem, william blake
