Songs of Innocence

By William Blake, Mary H. Robinson and Charles Robinson

William Blake's 1789 classic evokes an idyllic world, populated by pipers, shepherds, angels, and joyful children. Graced by Charles and Mary Robinson's ethereal Art Nouveau illustrations, this special edition comprises the complete Songs of Innocence, in addition to nine poems from Songs of Experience.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dover Publications
• Release date: Mar 5, 2013
• ISBN: 9780486122236

William Blake

William Blake (1757–1827) was an English poet and visual artist often linked to the Romantic movement. As a youth in London, he was primarily educated at home before becoming an engraver’s apprentice. Later, Blake would attend the Royal Academy and eventually find work in publishing. His debut, Poetical Sketches, was printed in 1783 followed by Songs of Innocence in 1789. The latter is arguably his most popular collection due to its vivid imagery and thought-provoking themes.

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Reviews for Songs of Innocence

[brandonachey · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

The Echoing Green is an excellent poem by William Blake. It is a great meditation on the playful nature of youth and the inevitability that, eventually, we all do grow older and age. It has good metaphorical imagery and demonstrates different elements of poetry extraordinarily well, such as rhyme scheme and slant rhyme. However, I am unsure if children in the 4th-5th grades will be able to really attach themselves to it. The language is very archaic and slightly verbose. If children had the opportunity, as an activity of some sort, to put this poem into their own words, I think it would prove to be very beneficial in the classroom.

[meditationesmartini · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Oh my God, you guys, did you know William Blake didn't have any children? The author of "Infant Joy" and "Laughing Song," of lines like "Pretty joy! / Sweet joy, but two days old. / Sweet joy I call thee: / Thou dost smile, / I sing the while, / Sweet joy befall thee!" That is the most heartbreaking thing I hope to hear today.Anyway, the lyric power of Blake's short, thumping lines makes for a lot of instantaneous tear-jerkers here, although these poems could also have done with a dash of his mystic philosophy: I'm all for the innocence of children, but the worldview on display here is sort of carpingly simplistic for the most part. Where it rises above is in the first previews of Songs of Experience, like "The Chimney-Sweeper"--which I refuse to read as anything other than proto-Marxist--where the towheaded children are lost in a deeper sense than their peers who are lucky enough to get found by lachrymose lions and angels, and there's no happy reunion with M and P. Where it sinks below is in poems like "The Little Black Boy," which though well-constructed and doing som enice play with the heat of the African sun and the heat of God's love still just fights racism by making the black boy's soul white and is thus a cut below "Am I not a man and a brother?" Anyway, this is good for people who aren't given to sentimentality to dip into in their sentimental moments.

[big_bang_gorilla · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Being a handsome reproduction which includes Blake's lettering and illustration. The texts in plain typeface are appended for a little easier reading. If one enjoys the poems and Blake's art, this is a good edition to own.

[wishanem · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

It was interesting to see the earlier work of a famous poet, especially reproduced with all the original art and settings. Unfortunately, there's a good reason that I encountered Blake's later in school and not his early stuff. Some of the entries were stronger than others, but none of them made me want to memorize them.