William Blake: Saint of Writers and the Prolific/Creative Genius

[McCamy Taylor]

The Giants who formed this world into its sensual existence and now seem to live in it in chains are in truth the causes of its life and the sources of all activity, but the chains are the cunning of weak and tame minds, which have power to resist energy, according to the proverb, “The weak in courage is strong in cunning.”

Thus one portion of being is the[29] Prolific, the other the Devouring. To the devourer it seems as if the producer was in his chains; but it is not so, he only takes portions of existence, and fancies that the whole.

But the Prolific would cease to be prolific unless the Devourer as a sea received the excess of his delights.

Some will say, “Is not God alone the Prolific?” I answer: “God only acts and is in existing beings or men.”

These two classes of men are always upon earth and they should be enemies: whoever tries to reconcile them seeks to destroy existence.

Religion is an endeavour to reconcile the two.

William Blake from "The Marriage of Heaven and Hell"

Before you get all hissy, this is not a rant about religion. This is about politics and art. Capitalism and humanism.

Blake was a commercial failure in his own lifetime, but contemporary artists recognized his genius and kept him out of the gutter and working, because artists are funny that way—even if their own talent is minor, they can recognize greatness in someone else.

Since Blake’s death, his relevance to the profession has grown almost exponentially with the passage of time. Why? Because Blake did not write for the reader—not the reader as consumer who picks up a novel to pass the time while waiting for a plane in the airport or a coach at the inn. William Blake was the Saint of the Creative Genius especially the Creative Genius as Writer, the necessary counterpart to the consuming genius of the industrial era, the J.P. Morgans and the Rothschilds, those who make a shit ton of money through trickery and deceit, by selling arms and enslaving the third world, by forcing workers into factories where they perform mind numbing labor—and then getting them addicted to tobacco, drugs, liquor and gambling both to suck up their pitiful earnings and to keep them compliant.

The devouring genius that counts up the goods and services to make sure that there will always be enough and the creative genius that produces the love because it knows that food and a warm bed are not enough—these are the two paths of the Tree of Life, the yin and yang of Marriage of Heaven and Hell, the two active forces without which there can be no life, the two sides which must always be in opposition, the two forces which State Sponsored Religion( not spirituality, big difference) seek to merge into one great big all devouring blood sucking capitalist money producing machine with a King/Pope sitting on top of a pile of gold smiling down at the starving poor declaring “All is right in the world.”



What is the creative genius? It is Charles Dickens, who endured poverty as a child, such poverty that his family was consigned to a paupers prison and he was sent to work in the equivalent of a sweat shop for the literate. His Scrooge has a revelation, not that the solitary, devouring life and death will be meaningless. No, Scrooge realizes before it is too late that the fate of Tiny Tim is his own fate. He rediscovers the connection that he almost lost in childhood, when poverty and hunger and a world which said "If you want to survive you must give up caring for anyone else and take care of yourself" almost turned him from a creative empath to a creative autist---which would have been the end of his literary career, because, trust me, no one wants to read anything written by someone who does not give a damn about anyone else.

There is probably some primitive part of the human language center that is tied to the social harmony center. Bard is probably one of the basic caveman jobs, like Hunter and Gatherer and Mother. Blake, like all the other great Creative Geniuses recognized that he was not doing anything new----no, he was part of a tradition as old as human history. AS long as there have been people living with people, passing down their stories and their strategies for dealing with what nature throws our way---death, disease, drought, ice ages, floods, bugs, beasts and famine---there will always be a need for the lore teller. And, once we develop a way to carve the words in stone—or, Blake’s case, copper plates---the words will inevitably be recorded again and again because when we say the words, tell the story, we are fashioning a world where death, disease, drought, ice ages, floods, bugs, beasts and famine do not just kill the soul by encouraging us to create enormous stockpiles of goods and services for the coming winter—the way the creative devourer, the capitalist, the JP Morgans, the Rothschilds, the Kochs do. When we hear the call of the Saint of Writers, when we listen to our own Creative Genius, the empathic voice that lives within us all, we must sit down at our desk or computer or stone tablet and chisel out words…

“I was in a printing-house in Hell, and saw the method in which knowledge is transmitted from generation to generation.
In the first chamber was a dragon-man, clearing away the rubbish from a cave’s mouth; within, a number of dragons were hollowing the cave.
In the second chamber was a viper folding round the rock and the cave, and others adorning it with gold, silver, and precious stones.
In the third chamber was an eagle with wings and feathers of air; he caused the inside of the cave to be infinite; around were numbers of eagle-like men, who built palaces in the immense cliffs.
In the fourth chamber were lions[28] of flaming fire raging around and melting the metals into living fluids.
In the fifth chamber were unnamed forms, which cast the metals into the expanse.
There they were received by men who occupied the sixth chamber, and took the forms of books, and were arranged in libraries."

William Blake from "The Marriage of Heaven and Hell"

Now that would be a library worth visiting. Go read "Marriage of Heaven and Hell" again or for the first time, if you haven't read it.

http://www.gutenberg.org/files/45315/45315-h/45315-h.htm


And Peter Ackryod's bio of Blake (not available online free for so visit a non-infernal library or get it on Amazon) is turning out to be better than I thought it would be, worth a read.

[byronius]

1. The Ultra Artist. I spent several years absorbing this amazing man.

Thank you for this post.

[Blue_true]

2. Some of the greatest thinkers in history had a spiritual side.

It helped make their philosophy and thoughts relevant. There are many types on DU, some Christians, I assume other religions whose followers don't say much about on DU, some naturalist types that see a hand of a higher power in the workings of nature, some that think any mention of spirituality is fanciful foolishness.

To me, some of the great thinkers came up with observations on the world around them that are timeless in their relevance.

[Aristus]

3. My favorite Blake poem: The Grey Monk:

William Blake, "The Grey Monk"


I die I die the Mother said
My Children die for lack of Bread
What more has the merciless Tyrant said
The Monk sat down on the Stony Bed

The blood red ran from the Grey Monks side
His hands & feet were wounded wide
His Body bent his arms & knees
Like to the roots of ancient trees

His eye was dry no tear could flow
A hollow groan first spoke his woe
He trembled & shudderd upon the Bed
At length with a feeble cry he said

When God commanded this hand to write
In the studious hours of deep midnight
He told me the writing I wrote should prove
The Bane of all that on Earth I lovd

My Brother starvd between two Walls
His Childrens Cry my Soul appalls
I mockd at the wrack & griding chain
My bent body mocks their torturing pain

Thy Father drew his sword in the North
With his thousands strong he marched forth
Thy Brother has armd himself in Steel
To avenge the wrongs thy Children feel

But vain the Sword & vain the Bow
They never can work Wars overthrow
The Hermits Prayer & the Widows tear
Alone can free the World from fear

For a Tear is an Intellectual Thing
And a Sigh is the Sword of an Angel King
And the bitter groan of the Martyrs woe
Is an Arrow from the Almighties Bow

The hand of Vengeance found the Bed
To which the Purple Tyrant fled
The iron hand crushd the Tyrants head
And became a Tyrant in his stead

[ananda]

6. Reminds me of that Nietzsche quote ..

Beware of slaying monsters lest ye become one.

[jeffreyi]

4. Cosmic Consciousness

Remember that?
Another giant of our species who does not need to abide our question.

[Docreed2003]

5. Brilliant...thank you for sharing...nt

[bobbieinok]

7. Songs of Innocence and Experience' superb poem cycle eg 'Tyger, tyger burning bright...'

Wrote college freshman (1957) English term paper on Blake and these poems. Think we we had to pick from a list of suggestions. Had never heard of him before the paper, but he became a favorite.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

8. Blake was unique - nobody else was painting like that during that time.

This is one of my favorites:



It's so unusual to paint a main figure in a painting from the back. This depicts the Resurrection, but the angel, not Jesus, seems to be the most important image.