BLAKE’S CHIMNEY SWEEPER POEMS: I

BLAKE’S CHIMNEY SWEEPER POEMS: I

William Blake composed two main collections of poetry: The Songs of Innocence and The Songs of Experience. In the first, he presented a world of innocence and purity, a world to which suffering and misery is a stranger. The purity of the children presented in Innocence surpasses any kind of misfortune they are subject to. They are surrounded by evil but their purity triumph over it and aspire to reach heavenly or saintly status. Blake has intentionally used that atmosphere to call for the Romantic version of religion. The second collection shows almost the same situations but without innocence. The characters’ awareness of the ugliness in their world makes them more experienced and, thus, less pure.
“Chimney Sweeper I” is enhanced with such innocence and love. The child’s innocence is foregrounded through the ugliness of the surroundings (father sells son, work in soot, dressed in black, etc.). The child is not aware of all that and thinks positively of the incidents. Blake’s display of the boy’s innocence foregrounded emphasizes his eagerness to have his fellow English people empathize with it and, thus, accept the change.
The poem can be divided into four phases: background, the shaving incident, the dream, and the next morning. The background (stanza 1) serves as a start line for the events displaying the circumstances that led that specific child into such work. The shaving incident (stanza 2) reveals the inherent goodness of the child transferred to the other child, Tom Dacre. Interestingly, the child’s positivity (not only positiveness) fosters Tom’s innocence and leads to the dream phase.
The dream (stanzas 3-5) assures Tom’s purity through the series of bright things that can be inspired only by a God-given imagination. The dream transfers Tom from the blackness that surrounds him to the light of God through the “bright key” (which could be a reference to inherent innocence or nature). The messenger of God, the angel, is not described; however, he is the means through which the necessity for innocence is reassured. This shift changes the boy’s feelings and enhances him with confidence. He, therefore, is ready for the next phase: going back to reality.
The last phase (stanza 6) is the same boy (Tom) but reborn. It is as if Tom was given a new soul with his same body. He is more confident, happier, more lively, warmer, more ready to go through his day, etc. Tom wakes up early for his work and resumes living after visiting heaven and being certain he has a powerful, yet loving, Father.
The transferring is over and the difference explains why Blake wants his people to return to nature. Blake wants to restore that child-like innocence and purity.

MORE IMPORTANT POINTS TO DISCUSS:
1. colour imagery
2. religious imagery
3. natural imagery
4. choice of words
5. importance of repetition
6. symbolism of the dream
7. rhyme scheme and rhythm
8. comparison of the child with the lamb
9. contrast (black vs. white or bright; human father vs. heavenly Father, etc.)
10. moralization (the last line in the poem)