Following on from our class discussion today, here are the opening pages to Peter Ackroyd's biography of William Blake, which I mentioned. It answers the question asked today about his social background; modest middle class. His father was a hosier (un bonnetier), and they lived in a London house Ackroyd describes as "solid if not exactly prosperous". I will leave you to savour the writing of this remarkable biographer and novelist; how he can make us relive moments in the past with vivid detail. Note the reference to 'the piping infant' recalling our study of Songs of Innocence and Experience. His account is never purely factual, but imbued with a sense of the times, and the meaning held in the smallest details of life. I also strongly recommend his biography of Charles Dickens.
Click on the link below to access the excerpt:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/18U1BI4GtrmVFbkgSqsrcvnoMt9_u3INJ/view?usp=sharing
No comments:
Post a Comment