User:Lithoderm/William Blake and Enlightenment Philosophy

I'll be using this page as a general Blake sandbox.

Blake and Enlightenment Philosophy

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Blake stood opposed to the predominant Enlightenment views of his day because what he saw as Newton's dead atomic machine of a universe was opposed to his visionary religious and artistic views. Blake believed that paintings which naturalistically depict the fall of light upon objects were products entirely of the "vegetative eye" and not the imagination. He railed against it in his marginalia to Joshua Reynolds he Blake saw Locke and Newton as "the true progenitors of Sir Joshua Reynolds' aesthetic"(285). The popular taste in the England of that time for such paintings was satisfied with mezzotints, prints produced by a process that created an image from thousands of tiny dots upon the page. Blake saw an analogy between this and Newton's particle theory of light, and significantly never used the technique.

Blake's marginalia on The Complete Works of Sir Joshua Reynolds, P 204. My notion of nature comprehends . . . also the . . . 

human mind and imagination. 

<Here is a Plain Confession that he Thinks Mind & 

Imagination not to be above the Mortal & Perishing Nature. Such 

is the End of Epicurean or Newtonian Philosophy it is Atheism>

I turn my eyes to the Schools & Universities of Europe 

And there behold the Loom of Locke whose Woof rages dire 

Washd by the Water-wheels of Newton. black the cloth 

In heavy wreathes folds over every Nation; cruel Works 

Of many Wheels I view, wheel without wheel, with cogs tyrannic 

Moving by compulsion each other: not as those in Eden: which 

Wheel within Wheel in freedom revolve in harmony & peace.

To Venetian Artists

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That God is Colouring Newton does shew
And the devil is a Black outline all of us know
Perhaps this little Fable may make us merry
A dog went over the water without a wherry A bone which he had stolen he had in his mouth 

He cared not whether the wind was north or south 

As he swam he saw the reflection of the bone 

This is quite Perfection, one Generalizing Tone 8 
 Outline Theres no outline Theres no such thing 

All is Chiaro Scuro Poco Piu its all Colouring 

Snap. Snap! he has lost shadow & substance too 

He had them both before now how do ye do 

A great deal better than I was before 

Those who taste colouring love it more & more 11


William Blake's Illustrations to The Divine Comedy

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William Blake's Illustrations to the Divine Comedy encompass more than 100 watercolours, drawings, and engravings he began work on in 1824 and left in varying stages of completion upon his death in 1827.

Blake's view of Dante

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Blake's annotations (c. 1800) of Henry Boyd's translation of the Inferno display a critical approach to the work. Blake also owned a copy of Henry Cary's 1814 translation of The Divine Comedy, and taught himself Italian to read the original.[1]

Development

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Blake's work began in 1824 with the commission of John Linell, who paid one pound a week for Blake's work beginning in December of the next year. By 1826, he had begun to engrave the designs in copper. Of the engravings only seven were completed before Blake died on 12 August 1827.[2]

Technique

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References

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The Book of Los

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The Book of Los (1795), is a prophetic book by William Blake. It is a retelling of The Book of Urizen from the point of view of Los. It exists only in one complete copy, which is in the collection of the British Museum. The book is unusual in that its copper plates were printed entirely by the intaglio process, rather than relief etching, which was used for the other prophetic books.

References

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An Island in the Moon

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Certainty for the position of a particular illustration in a particular point in the sequence can be measured on a scale from 1 to 4, with 1 being no certainty whatsoever, and 4 being the greatest certainty. Certainty for a particular illustration is the inverse of the number of different locations in which it is placed (or the number of different scholars that agree on it being in a single location), and certainty for a given location is the inverse of the number of different illustrations that have been proposed for that location (or the number of scholars that agree that a certain illustration should be placed there).

(This is getting awfully OCD)

  • The Descent of Peace = D
  • The Annunciation to the Shepherds = A
  • The Old Dragon = Ol
  • The Overthrow of Apollo and the Pagan Gods = Ov
  • The Flight of Moloch = F
  • The Night of Peace = N

Certainty v1

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Certainty per location. Notice that certainty is correlated to the location of the print in the sequence- the location of prints closer to the center is less certain.

  1. 4
  2. 3
  3. 1
  4. 2
  5. 2
  6. 3


Certainty v2

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Certainty per illustration.

D=4
A=3
Ol=2
Ov=1
F=2
N=3

Ranking for the previous
In order from most certain to least certain

  1. D (100 %)
  2. A & N (75 %)
  3. Ol & F (50 %)
  4. Ov (25 %)

Certainty v3

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Here the digit indicates the # of scholars who place the print in that location. Attempt at combining the previous two.

  1. D=4
  2. A=3, N=1
  3. F=1, A=1, Ol= 1, Ov=1
  4. F=2, Ol=1, Ov=1
  5. Ol=2, Ov=1, F=1
  6. N=3, Ov=1


This shows us that the most probable sequence, from the available data, is thus:

  1. D
  2. A
  3. Ov
  4. F
  5. Ol
  6. N

These results coincidentally correspond to the sequence adopted by Behrendt and Werner. Of course, this is based solely on existing numbers, without considering the persuasiveness of the argument advanced by each scholar or any original analysis of traits intrinsic to the artworks.

Displayed together with certainty percentage

  1. D (100 %)
  2. A (75 %)
  3. Ov (25 %)
  4. F (50 %)
  5. Ol (50%)
  6. N (75 %)

Sequence v1

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Summary of Proposed Sequences
"Original" Keynes Butlin
&
Dunbar
Behrendt
&
Werner
 
The Descent of Peace
 
The Descent of Peace
 
The Descent of Peace
 
The Descent of Peace
 
‘‘The Annunciation to the Shepherds’’
 
’‘The Night of Peace’’
 
‘‘The Annunciation to the Shepherds’’
 
‘‘The Annunciation to the Shepherds’’
 
‘‘The Flight of Moloch’’
 
‘‘The Annunciation to the Shepherds’’
 
’‘The Old Dragon’’
 
’‘The Overthrow of Apollo and the Pagan Gods’’
 
’‘The Old Dragon’’
 
‘‘The Flight of Moloch’’
 
’‘The Overthrow of Apollo and the Pagan Gods’’
 
‘‘The Flight of Moloch’’
 
’‘The Overthrow of Apollo and the Pagan Gods’’
 
’‘The Old Dragon’’
 
‘‘The Flight of Moloch’’
 
’‘The Old Dragon’’
 
’‘The Night of Peace’’
 
’‘The Overthrow of Apollo and the Pagan Gods’’
 
’‘The Night of Peace’’
 
’‘The Night of Peace’’

Sequence v2

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Summary of Proposed Sequences
Scholars 1 2 3 4 5 6
"Original"
 
The Descent of Peace
 
‘‘The Annunciation to the Shepherds’’
 
‘‘The Flight of Moloch’’
 
’‘The Old Dragon’’
 
’‘The Overthrow of Apollo and the Pagan Gods’’
 
’‘The Night of Peace’’
Keynes
 
The Descent of Peace
 
’‘The Night of Peace’’
 
‘‘The Annunciation to the Shepherds’’
 
‘‘The Flight of Moloch’’
 
’‘The Old Dragon’’
 
’‘The Overthrow of Apollo and the Pagan Gods’’
Butlin
&
Dunbar
 
The Descent of Peace
 
‘‘The Annunciation to the Shepherds’’
 
’‘The Old Dragon’’
 
’‘The Overthrow of Apollo and the Pagan Gods’’
 
‘‘The Flight of Moloch’’
 
’‘The Night of Peace’’
Behrendt
&
Werner
 
The Descent of Peace
 
‘‘The Annunciation to the Shepherds’’
 
’‘The Overthrow of Apollo and the Pagan Gods’’
 
‘‘The Flight of Moloch’’
 
’‘The Old Dragon’’
 
’‘The Night of Peace’’

Already existing articles

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Illustrations of the Book of Job

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needs...

  • better sectioning, expansion in most sections
  • an explanation of blake's philosophy of art and how it affected his technique...
  • a section on the New Zealand set (see Butlin)
  • all of the illustrations:
    • uploaded to commons
    • In a table in the article, ala the illustrations to OtMoCN

The Tyger

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Looks like the entire substance of the article has been removed, although it was generally correct. Needs major work, lest it be shmoopified, especially as this is perhaps Blake's best known work.

Shmoop

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Speaking of Shmoop, it looks like single purpose accounts are Shmooping all over various articles again. I would have a list of these accts, if I still cared. But supposing I did, it would run:


Other

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P. 39, William Blake: painter and poet: "The Ancient of Days setting a Compass to the Earth. From a water-colour drawing by W. Blake. British Museum"

The image to the right is very curious. I wonder if it was copied by one of the "Ancients" after Blake's original design, which was far more forceful.

Aha, according to the British Museum, it's not in Butlin, so it likely is not by Blake.