Figurative Language In William Blake's 'The Tiger'

One of William Blake great poems, The Tyger” is well known as one or perhaps

Unlike the lamb this poems meaning is something different I believe. In my opinion this poem can be interpreted as a response to the industrialization that Britain was going through during the time of Blake. I think we first see this in the title “The Tyger” or tiger misspelled. When you think of a tiger you think of ruthlessness, ferocity, fast acting, just as the industrialization of Britain. This theme is very common through out Blake’s pieces as we see it in almost every poem. It is present in “The Chimney Sweeper” and “London”. Blake paints an image of what the tiger represents through out this poem and its harsh nonetheless, which further makes me believe that he is talking about the revolution. I believe that the description of the tyger that Blake gives us an insight to think that it is unpleasant and hurtful, not necessarily the tyger itself but the revolution that is tied in with it. We see the word “dread” repeatedly used in describing the tyger and we can draw a conclusion to say that it puts an emphasis on the pain and suffering that was

The poem, The Tyger, contrasts innocence and experience, and good and evil. The description of the tiger in the poem is as a destructive, horrid creature. The original drawing on the poem shows a smiling, cuddly tiger which is quite the contrast to the tiger described in the poem. This picture might suggest a misunderstanding of the tiger and perhaps the fears that arouse from the poem are unjustified. This poem contrasts the tiger with a lamb which often symbolizes innocence, Jesus, and good. The tiger is perceived as evil or demonic. Blake suggest that the lamb and the tiger have the same creator and in a way states that the tiger might also have the ability to have the benign characteristics of the lamb. The tiger initially appears as a beautiful image but as the poem progresses, it explores a perfectively beautiful yet destructive symbol that represents the presence of evil in the world. In the poem, Blake writes: " What immortal hand or eye, / Could frame thy fearful symmetry (4-5)." It is hard to determine if the tiger is solely evil or good.

According to Blake this creature has a special "inner" source of energy which distinguishes its existence from the cold and dark world of inanimate things (Blake 3). There is also an essence of the devil in the tiger. William Blake points this out by using words like furnace and just by him picking a tiger. There are many other violent predators out in the jungle but he chose the tiger because of its bright orange and black. When it runs it looks like a fireball. In line twenty of "The Tyger," William Blake says, "Did He who make the lamb make thee?" (Blake 539). What he is wondering is if he made such an innocent creature like the lamb how could he make a beast like the tiger?

William Blake’s 1793 poem “The Tyger” has many interpretations, but its main purpose is to question God as a creator. Its poetic techniques generate a vivid picture that encourages the reader to see the Tyger as a horrifying and terrible being. The speaker addresses the question of whether or not the same God who made the lamb, a gentle creature, could have also formed the Tyger and all its darkness. This issue is addressed through many poetic devices including rhyme, repetition, allusion, and symbolism, all of which show up throughout the poem and are combined to create a strong image of the Tyger and a less than thorough interpretation of its maker.

The first line in the poem says, “Tyger Tyger, burning bright.” By Blake repeating the word Tyger twice, it feels to the reader as if we are speaking directly to the tiger. The

A popular characteristic in many of Blake’s poems is the inclusion of biblical allusions to convey meaning. In his poem “A Poison Tree”, Blake uses anaphora, diction, and symbol to allow biblical allusions that depicts the evil that man is capable to come into being. Anaphora is the usage of the same word or phrase at the beginning of every consecutive line. In stanza one, the word ‘I’ begins every line, and later on the word ‘and’ is used seven times to signify the start of some of the lines. The poem is organized in a way that immediately starts off using anaphora and since anaphora is mainly

William Blake’s poetry is considered through the Romantics era and they access through the sublime. The Romantics poetry through the sublime is beyond comprehension and spiritual fullness. A major common theme is a nature (agnostic religion). In William Blake’s poem “The Tyger” he describes the tiger as a creature that was created by a higher power some time before. In Blake’s poem he questions, “What immortal hand or eye/ Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?” (Blake 22-23). He describes the tiger as a form of symmetry that can be seen as evil, yet have intriguing features such as those that make the tiger a beautiful creation. Blake also questions if that the higher being who created the tiger also created all else around the world such as a human being. Blake shifts his first stanzas from the tiger to the creator. Not only is he questioning who created the tiger, but he is also describing the beauty and evil of the world. The beauty that the Romantics believe in is nature and one evil seen through the world is materialism that distract humans from the beauty of nature 's gifts. He believes that people lose touch with spirituality when haven’t given to nature. Blake also illustrated his own works through

'The Tyger' asks who could have made the tyger. More exactly, it is asking who could have made such an evil being as the tyger. It begins with the question the poem is based on What immortal hand or eye could frame thy fearful symmetry?, and throughout the poem, the question is asked in different forms . And what shoulder, and what art, could twist the sinews of thy heart?.

Blake uses traditional symbols of angels and devils, animal imagery, and especially images of fire and flame to: 1) set up a dual world, a confrontation of opposites or "contraries" which illustrate how the rules of Reason and Religion repress and pervert the basic creative energy of humanity, 2) argues for apocalyptic transformation of the self "through the radical regeneration of each person's own power to imagine" (Johnson/Grant, xxiv), and 3) reconstructs Man in a new image, a fully realized Man who is both rational and imaginative, partaking of his divinity through creativity. The form of the poem consists of "The Argument," expositions on his concepts of the "contraries" and of "expanded perception" which are both interspersed with "Memorable Fancies" that explicate and enlarge on his expositions, and concludes with "A Song of Liberty," a prophecy of a future heaven on earth.

The archetype of this poem focuses on how aggressive and vicious the tiger is. It also can be seen as a more physical comparison such as, “Tyger Tyger, burning bright,” (line 1, page 749). Blake says the tiger is burning bright, but does not mean this literally, for he is comparing the color of the tiger to the color of fire. Blake does insult God for creating the creature because all it does is kill and destroy. The tiger also has more power. In which, the Songs of Experience poems are related to those that are leaders, fighters, and that are more outspoken; therefore, The Tyger fits more perfectly with that collection of

William Blake’s The Tyger, in my opinion, is an intriguing poem that looks at the idea of how God is a mystery and how humanity is at a loss to fully understand his creations by contemplating the forging of a beautiful yet ferocious tiger. Blake begins the poem by beginning a conversation with the tiger and almost immediately begins his questions of who could make such a fierce creature. He wonders if God could really create such a creature or maybe it is a creature produced from a darker source. Blake also refers to the tiger as a form of art, almost as if the creator made the tiger perfectly. The image of a blacksmith is also given through the poem as Blake refers to a blacksmith’s common tools and

The poem opens up with the words, “Tyger Tyger, burning bright,” which in this case makes the words Tyger appear to the reader as if the author is speaking directly to the Tyger and sets up the theme of night along with which come darkness and evil. The words “burning bright” are used as a comparison to the Tyger. Blake chooses fire to be compared to the Tyger because both are known to be harmful, strong, wild, forceful, and destructive. In a way, they also resemble each other in looks, as a Tyger in the dark, looks like a fire because of its orange stripes. The third and fourth lines aske the first unanswered question: What creator has the ability to make something with such “fearful symmetry” (4)? The second stanza asks the same question but in a completely different way, wondering where the Tyger came from. In lines 10 and 20, Blake’s asks two questions. These questions are different from the rest, he asks, “Did he smile his work to see? /Did he who made the lamb make thee?’’ (19, 20) These lines are asking if the creator was happy with his work of such destructive soul, it also asks if the creator of the lamb was also the creator of the Tyger. You can look at this as if Blake was trying to connect the evil Tyger with the Lamb of God, Jesus Christ. The last lines ask the same question as the first, who could and who would create the Tyger.

William Blake depicted the tyger as the malevolent beast, to make the reader apprehend the beauty of God’s creation. “And what shoulder, and what art, could twist the sinews of thy heart?”(Blake 9-10).The tiger is mighty and innovative to fight off negative energy, such as ignorance. The heart being twisted represents how people are corrupted in their own

is a representation of the relationship between creator and creature. This poem may be one of his more popular poems from The Songs of Experience. In the poem, Blake writes about how the Tyger was created by the same immortal being who created the sheep. In this case, Blake is referring to God creating both good and evil in the world. Blake depicts this by this excerpt from the poem, ?the contrast between fire and night ? [which] corresponds to the contrast of yellow and black stripes ringing the Tyger itself [sic].?8 John E. Grant comments that William Blake?s poem is ? ? horrifying, as well as awesome, to think of an animate thing being hammered into shape in the smith.?9 Through this statement, Grant is referring to the creation of Tyger and the rest of humanity by God. The hammer merely being an instrument of creation.10 It is strange how much Blake speaks of God and creation as a whole, as he was not religious or a believer in one God, creator of the