INTRODUCTION (1789)
William Blake
Piping down the
valleys wild
Piping songs of pleasant glee
On a cloud I saw a child.
And he laughing said to me.
Pipe a song about a
Lamb;
So I piped with merry chear,
Piper pipe that song again —
So I piped, he wept to hear.
Drop thy pipe thy
happy pipe
Sing thy songs of happy chear,
So I sung the same again
While he wept with joy to hear
Piper sit thee down
and write
In a book that all may read —
So he vanish'd from my sight.
And I pluck'd a hollow reed.
And I made a rural
pen,
And I stain'd the water clear,
And I wrote my happy songs
Every child may joy to hear
From ‘Songs of Innocence’
BIBLIOGRAPHY:
Index of/fores/poesia ‘William Blake’
Copyright 1995-2004 by Dr. Vicente Forés
http://www.uv.es/~fores/poesia/01blake.html (18-10-06)
POETIC COMMENTARY
“To begin with, we have to say that ‘Introduction’ is a poem included in ‘Songs of Innocence’. It was written in London (1789) by William Blake, one of the earliest and greatest figures of Romanticism. He wrote poetic compositions, theatre plays, aphorisms, etc. Some of this poems are: ‘Poetical Sketches’, ‘The book of Thel’, ‘America’, ‘Songs of Innocence and Experience’, ‘Europe’, ‘The Everlasting Gospel’…”(Index of/fores/poesia)
‘Introduction’ seems on the surface to be about a man who remembered with yearning and happiness the innocence of his childhood.
The main ideas are:
- Firs verse: The poet writes about a person who is in the middle of the nature playing songs. When he plays, all sounds are paralysed to him. Then, he recognize a pleasant boy (maybe himself when he was a child) who is like his conscience. The boy is like an angel, an unattainable entity to this person.
- Second verse: The boy wanted that “the person” to play “a song about a Lamb”. A Lamb refers to a child because it represents the innocence, the childhood. It is a metaphor. The boy cried when he remembered that song.
- Third verse: This song makes a feeling of yearning but, at the same time, it is a wonderful feeling.
- Fourth verse: The boy said to “the person” that he hadn’t to forget the music of his childhood. The communication between the boy and “the person” finishes here because the boy “vanished”
- Fifth verse: “The piper” grown up but he wants to continue with his “happy songs” and he thinks that every child should enjoy being a child, although the poet stills being a young boy.
About the title, as its name indicates, is an introduction to life. The childhood is the beginning of our life and it’s a stage characterized by innocence of the human beings. It’s a wonderful poem and it is easy to understand. It is concentrated on the past and the poet describes and imaginary situation.
What I can see about the structure and the form of the poem is that it is composed of five stanzas of four lines each one. The rhyme is consonant and the lines are of seven syllables.
There are some words which belong to the ancient English like: “thy” (it means “yours”) and “chear” that doesn’t appear in the dictionary. The poet plays with two people: the main character of the poem and a child. It is not clear if the main character is the poet himself. When he refers to himself he uses the personal pronoun “I” and when he is talking about the child, he uses “he”.
From my point of view, it is a nice poem. I like its theme, the rhyme and the word play that the poet makes with the word “piper”. Moreover, I love its harmony and, in my opinion, the poet has known how to transmit it to the reader.
BIBLIOGRAPHY:
Index of/fores/poesia ‘William Blake’
Copyright 1995-2004 by Dr. Vicente Forés
http://www.uv.es/~fores/poesia/01blake.html (18-10-06)