Songs of Experience
The Songs of Experience were first advertised in 1793,
before being rebound with the Songs of Innocence the
following year. As one might expect the poems of Experience are darker in tone and
outlook, affirming a bleaker (or more realistic) view of creation than their 'Innocent'
counterparts, more satirical, cynical and worldy-wise, and often more angry. In the Songs
of Experience 'Innocence has "progressed" towards 'Experience', but it is
important to remember that Blake's vision is essentially dialectical: 'Innocence' and
'Experience' are co-related states, and Blake is certainly not attempting to suggest that
'Experience' is "better" or "more realistic" than the idealistic
naivety of 'Innocence'. And behind the Songs of Experience also is the hope of
transformation, that "the cries of chimney sweepers, soldiers, harlots, menace
church, palace and established religion, calling not for removal to 'new worlds, as in
'Night' in Innocence, but for the transformation of this one." (Peter Butter).
Just as the figure of the Lamb dominates the Songs
of Innocence, so the Songs of Experience are presided over by the figure
of the 'Tyger', that mixture of the Beautiful, the Dangerous and the Energetic, with its
associations of "Christ the Tiger". It is worth remembering that Blake was
conscious of the dangers of a pallid and life-denying Evangelical Christianity which
castigated sexuality and sexual energy to the realms of the unspeakable demonic. From the
point of view of the Songs of Innocence this view of
sexuality, (and of tigers) is unthinkable, but these are not the Songs
of Innocence!
"The Chimney Sweeper" (Songs of Experience)
Songs Of Innocence and Experience