Who is a visionary poet

Although he ranks as one of the most important and influential of all romantic poets, he had very little if any contact with romantic poetry or philosophy. Throughout most of his life, his brilliant poetry and illustrations gained little, if any, public recognition, and he lived in loneliness and abject poverty. He follows in the shadow of his precursor, John Milton and Paradise Lost, the one great British Christian epic poem that you will have to suffer through some day if you are an English major.

Blake, however, suffuses the Christian narrative with his own wild, visionary, allegorical and, quite often, bizarre poetry. In fact, the illustrations and prints that he created for all of his volumes of poetry are as influential on romanticism if not more so than his poetry itself. He created wild, swirling illustrations of angels, devils, scenes from the Bible and brilliantly colorful prints showing scenes form his own poems. These are truly incredible pieces of art.

Thankfully, your anthology includes a few of the illustrations along with the poems. The short poems you have read are from his two collections of poems, The Songs of Innocence and The Songs of Experience.

Both books are companion pieces. Blake writes the poems in the former from the point of view of childlike innocense, and generally represent both a perspective that has not gained knowledge and experience concerning evil, i. Blake writes poems in the latter from the point of view of adult experience in the world, or, more aptly, adulterated experience, the perspective from human experience with sin, i.

About Us. B2B Publishing. Business Visionaries. Hot Property. Times Events. Times Store. Facebook Twitter Show more sharing options Share Close extra sharing options. Wechseln zu: Navigation , Suche. Meine Werkzeuge Anmelden. Even in a period when personal experience and grand themes were increasingly highly valued, Blake was considered particularly eccentric and unworldly.

The Canterbury Pilgrims At the time of the exhibition, Blake was living in dire poverty, supported only by Thomas Butts, and was also working on two final prophetic books, Milton and Jerusalem. Ugolino and His Sons in Prison.

In Blake's last decade he began to be recognised by a new generation of young Romantic artists. The landscape painters John Linnell , Samuel Palmer and Edward Calvert were particularly supportive, despite Blake's unorthodox Christianity and his distrust of the natural world.

But by then his earlier revolutionary and visionary fervour seems to have largely died down and in he even accepted a gratuity from the Royal Academy. He died in New stories, newly added artworks and shop offers delivered straight to your inbox every week.

Created with Sketch. About Discover Learn Support us. Main menu Close. Sign in Register. Email address. Remember me uncheck on a public computer.

First name. Sign up to the Art UK newsletter. The art of the Bard: seven paintings inspired by Shakespeare.