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London - Coggle Diagram
London
" I wander thro' each charter'd street, near where the charted themes flow. And mark in every face I meet, marks of weakness, marks of woe."
Blake creates the impression that he is wandering through London, observing life in this bustling, frightening city. It also suggests a person who may be aimless, but is taking time to think about what he sees. It prepares the reader for the significant — and harrowing — comments that will follow.
The Thames is a river, rivers are usually associated with being naturally flowing, however, "charter'd" insinuates the idea that the ones in power during Blake's period restricts it, and almost like they plan every step of their lives.
In this line 'mark' is used in the sense of seeing and also marked by experience, setting up the wordplay and repetition for the next line, where 'Marks' reappears as a noun, a device known as antanaclasis. The word 'every' in line three is repeated three times in the next stanza.
The two phrases within the line have the same syntactic construction, a device known as syntactic parallelism; the repetition giving emphasis. Note also that "weakness" and "woe" create a semantic field of suffering.
How the Chimney-sweeper's cry
Every blackning church appalls; And the hapless Soldier's sigh
Runs in blood down Palace walls
boys were forced by poverty into this dangerous and exploitative employment. This links to the next line where their cry metaphorically blackens the church, with its alleged care for the weak. Though the children have dirty, blackened faces, they are innocent. The church, however, is blackened or sullied by its complicity in the abuse and exploitation of the vulnerable. The hypocrisy appals Blake.
Note the alliterative repetition of 'a's and 'p's in 'appalls' and 'hapless', which give unity to the stanza. Also the plosive 'b's and 'p's in 'blackening' and 'blood', and 'Palace', 'appalls' and again 'hapless' express the anger and despair of the speaker. The sibilant 's's imitate the sound of sighing.
There is also irony in the returned Soldier who sheds blood to protect a system that keeps him in such terrible conditions, so he is indeed 'hapless'.
The acrostic that runs down the first letters of the lines in this stanza makes up the word 'HEAR'. This could be a call to all those in authority to listen to the complaints
The "blood down palace walls" may refer to the corrupt European governments of the Romantic era. Those who were oppressed under the monarchy and powerful financial interests shed blood. The "palace walls" form a barrier between the rich, privileged men in power and the poor soldiers.
Summary
In the poem London, Blake creates a surrealistic depiction of universal human suffering in order to criticise the impact of the Industrial Revolution on humans freedom
Themes
What most critisises the poem is the power of the language. The poets dense composition and choice of emotive words. The rhetoric, for example, vivid depictions of blood running down palace walls, and the child’s cry has a powerful impact. The pictures of suffering are difficult to forgett
Structure
- Iambic Tetrameter + quatrain:Blake uses ballard form to voice the people of the street→ giving the voice to the common people→ more colloquial/simplistic for memorization
- Very strict ABAB rhyme scheme in each of the 4 stanzas
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- could possibly reflect the rigid and restrictive system and policy that suppresses individual freedom and desire→ reflects Blake's view of seeing society as prisons of custom and habit= duty and obedience
- has a sense of mechanical movement→ reflects the progression of the Industrial Revolution→ Piston of Mechanisation
- reflects the pace of walking→ each stressed syllable reflects each footfall of the narrator→ slowly describing what he sees as he walks through the street.
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- compacted/tight-packed poem with confined imagery
- each of different elements in the poem is emblematic of something else and dislocated→ each is attempting to voice their experience, but there is no communication
Tones
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→ hold an observational view from the use of the word 'mark' =to notice which is used by the gentlefolks
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Harsh, aggressive, bitter, hateful not just from the speaker but other people in the city
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context
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a political system in which the state holds total authority over the society and seeks to control all aspects of public and private life wherever possible→ Blake's against this system
These short poems explore the harsh realities of late 18th and early 19th Century life during the time of King George III.
In every cry of every man,
In every Infant's cry of fear,
Powerful repetition of 'every' and 'cry' develops the sense that Blake's London is a tortuous and agonising place in which to live. The sense that everybody, regardless of age, is living in this dystopian city pervades. The lines are structured to constitute a list, building up a picture of an abundance of suffering. By having both 'every man' and 'every infant' crying, we can infer that pain and suffering are constant from birth to death.