Songs of Innocence and Experience: Shewing the Two Contrary States of the Human Soul, 1789-1794 (Oxford Paperbacks)

There are larger, more luxurious graphical editions of Blake's two most popular works but the Oxford SONGS OF INNOCENCE AND OF EXPERIENCE is perhaps the most affordable and convenient.
After a short introductory piece which makes the reader expect a pastoral mood, SONGS OF INNOCENCE opens with "The Shepherd", and the reader is immediately acquainted with Blake's style: deceptively simple, but filled with metaphor and allusion. Many of the poems speak of the solace of Christianity, but Blake shows a more universal and tolerant tranquility found through appreciation of simple human virtues. In "The Divine Image", he writes: "And all must love the human form, / in heathen, turk, or jew. / Where Mercy, Love, and Pity dwell, / there God is dwelling too."
Even within SONGS OF EXPERIENCE, the most pessimistic and cynical half, Blake maintains a his childlike style in order to bring the truth of human experience to anyone at all, young and old. In "A Poison Tree" he writes: "I was angry with my friend: / I told my wrath, my wrath did end. / I was angry with my foe: / I told it not, my wrath did grow", concisely summarising the effects of pride and ill-will on one's soul.
Blake was by profession an engraver, and his engravings for SONGS OF INNOCENCE AND EXPERIENCE are so closely bound to the text of the poems that a photocopy edition is really the only way to enjoy the poems as they were meant. In this paperback edition, the original engraving can be seen along side a typeset text, presented in a size large enough that the words can be relatively easily made out and, perhaps more importantly, the reader can see Blake's mythological characters. These personages, such as Urizen and Lothos, are key to understanding Blake's larger metaphysical work, for which the Songs present a good introduction.
This edition is especially valuable as it contains a photocopy of the engraving of "A Divine Image", a poem intended for SONGS OF EXPERIENCE which Blake subsequently left out because of its savage pessimism. The poem survives on an uncolored plate which is not found within many collections of the poet's work.
If you are intrigued by poets who transcend mere beautiful words to present a complete worldview, Blake is certainly worth reading. The Oxford Paperbacks edition is, in my opinion, the best place to get started with this deep and tricky, but fulfilling and fascinating poet.

It may seem an immediate departure to discuss Blake's biography, but it must be considered. Leaving formal school at ten, Blake first entered a drawing school, very early evincing great artistic talent. An eight year apprenticeship with engraver James Basire was a milestone of Blake's rather low key life. Blake's talents in the art of engraving were immeasurably important to both the full expression of his poetry and visual art.
As a poet, Blake opted for an almost facile, rhythmic, lyrical approach. His metre was superbly tight, his vocabulary surprisingly controlled for an 18th century writer. Of the two parts, Songs of Experience is the better of the two; not only did five years give Blake's poetry just one more dash of prowess, but his topics are dealt with in a more effective and interesting manner. His subject matter also becomes more bleak, more wearily phrased. A perfect example: Here is a stanza from ...Innocence's The Divine Image
For mercy has a human heart
Pity, a human dress
And love, the human form divine
And peace the human dress
Compare this with the poem of the same name in experience:
Cruelty has a human heart,
And jealousy a human face
Terror, the human form divine
And secrecy, the human dress
Whyfore this turnabout, from an almost sanguine mentality to one so dour and unmitigatedly bleak that Blake excluded this poem and attendant engraving in most editions of his Songs...
First, the death of Robert, Blake's beloved younger brother and apprentice. It is said that Blake stayed up a fortnight nursing his ill brother; a four day sopor followed. Later, Blake was to report that he was visited by Robert's spirit, laden with ideas as to the format of the Songs. ...Such poems as the Chimney Sweeper and the Little Boy Lost are frightful, cynical visions of the fractured side of London life. Take this stanza from Little Boy Lost, a story of a child martyed for speaking his mind:
The weeping child could not be heard
The weeping parents wept in vain
They strip'd him to his little shirt
And bound him with an iron chain
And burned him in a holy place
Where many had been burned before
The weeping parents wept in vain
Are such things done on Albions shore?
This darker judgement of life does not preclude the two motifs most sacred to Blake: Religion and love. Poems such as the Clod and the Pebble, The Pretty Rose Tree, both Holy Thursdays, the Laughing Song, and the Lamb all explore some aspect of divine justice or the perverse or beautiful aspects of love.
Something fascinating: In that very racist, colony-crazy, native torching time, Blake iconoclastically treats the subject of race in the Little Black Boy, which describes a black child of such spiritual perception that he is able to guide his paler brethren on the path to God. This intimation of an oppressed race's closeness to an arcane but majestic God is a keynote in the study of the fiercely individualistic Blake. Buy this book when you see it.

Inexpensive classic with illustrations

William Blake is known for some very mystical hard-to-understand poetry, but his "Songs of Innocence" and "Songs of Experience" is very different from that other work. Here in beautiful, almost child-like simplicity, he describes happy things like childhood and purity, as well as the darker realities of corruption and disillusionment. These poems are always spiritual and lyrical, full of heart and soul. The style is simple, yes, but the words and metaphors are profound and so is the wisdom, like in "The Human Abstract":
Pity would be no more
If we did not make somebody poor;
And mercy no more could be
If all were as happy as we.
David Rehak
author of "Poems From My Bleeding Heart"

poems, not novel

Good book with insites of who William Blake really was.

yes. thank you. in time to use at school

Gorgeous poetry and illustrations by Blake. A must have for your library and a treasure to share with your children.