BIBLICAL TRADITION IN BLAKE'S EARLY PROPHECIES: the great code of art PDF
Preview BIBLICAL TRADITION IN BLAKE'S EARLY PROPHECIES: the great code of art
Biblical Tradition in Blake's Early Prophecies LESLIE TANNENBAUM Biblical Tradition in Blake's Early Prophecies: The Great Code of Art PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS PRINCETON, NEW JERSEY Copyright © 1982 by Princeton University Press Published by Princeton University Press, 41 William St., Princeton, New Jersey In the United Kingdom: Princeton University Press, Guildford, Surrey ALL RIGHTS RESERVED Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data will be found on the last printed page of this book This book has been composed in Linotype Baskerville Clothbound editions of Princeton University Press books are printed on acid-free paper, and binding materials are chosen for strength and durability Printed in the United States of America by Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey To Paula Contents PREFACE ix TEXTUAL NOTE xiii INTRODUCTION 3 I. Blake and Biblical Tradition 8 II. Prophetic Form: The "Still Better Order" 25 III. The Figurative Language of Scripture and Blake's Composite Art 55 IV. Sublime Allegory: Blake's Use of Typology 86 v. America: "The Doors of Marriage Are Open" 124 VI. Europe: The Bride and the Harlot 152 VII. The Song of Los: Enslavement to the Elements 185 VIII. The Book of Urizen: Blake's Inverted Genesis 201 IX. The Book of Ahania: Moses Fell and Asia Arose 225 x. The Book of Los: Los Agonistes 251 283 NOTES BIBLIOGRAPHY 337 363 INDEX Vll The Old & New Testaments are the Great Code of Art. —William Blake Preface While this book was in its initial stages, a distinguished colleague asked me how I had the temerity to write about so vast a subject as Blake and the Bible. I responded with a quotation from William Godwin's The Enquirer: "When a man writes a book of methodical investigation, he does not write because he understands the subject, but he un derstands the subject because he has written." I have writ ten because I wanted to understand what Blake meant when he said that the Bible is the Great Code of Art. My investigation of this subject began with three earlier stud ies: one on the relationship of The Book of Urizen to Genesis, and the two others on the biblical context of The Ghost of Abel. In these studies I found that Blake was not merely concerned with the Bible itself but was also engaged with critical and exegetical premises and conclusions that had accrued from the past and that were being actively tested and revised in his own time. Indeed, given the enor mous exegetical overlay that had been imposed upon the Bible since the time of the church fathers, it would be difficult for someone in Blake's time to be reading, in New Critical fashion, simply "the text itself." Therefore, I dis covered, the proper study of Blake's use of the Bible must include a consideration of how Blake's contemporaries and predecessors read the Scriptures, and how this is reflected in Blake's theory and practice. I learned, in short, that we cannot talk meaningfully about Blake and the Bible with out talking about Blake and biblical tradition. Over the past few years, therefore, I have been concerned with exam ining this tradition and its relevance to Blake's ideas about —and exploitation of—prophetic form, biblical pictorial-
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