From: blake-d-request@albion.com Sent: Tuesday, November 26, 1996 2:22 PM To: blake-d@albion.com Subject: blake-d Digest V1996 #137 ------------------------------ Content-Type: text/plain blake-d Digest Volume 1996 : Issue 137 Today's Topics: Blake's Characters: Ahania et al -Reply Re: Blake's Characters -Reply Re: Urizen Question -Reply feminist bores and antivisionary elections -Reply Re: Jerusalem 25 -Reply birthday thoughts -Reply For Blake's Birthday Re: Jerusalem 25 -Reply Re: birthday thoughts Re: Blake Archive and e-texts -Reply B's female nudes & precursors in art Re: birthday thoughts -Reply Re: B's female nudes & precursors in art Re: Blake Archive and e-texts -Reply Re: anti-patriarch For Blake's Birthday -Reply Re: Blake Archive and e-texts -Reply -Reply J25: Spectre and Los Blake exhibit Re: Jerusalem 25 -Reply -Reply Re: birthday thoughts -Reply Re: Blake Archive and e-texts -Reply -Reply Re: Blake Archive and e-texts -Reply Re: Blake's Characters -Reply ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 25 Nov 1996 11:46:38 +0200 From: P Van Schaik To: blake@albion.com, izak@igs.net Subject: Blake's Characters: Ahania et al -Reply Message-Id: You invite response re Ahania as she was before the Fall ... I think this is evoked in "The Book of Ahania" in which Blake intimates some of the principles on which Innocence is founded - one of these being that all `female' spirits freely give their love to all `males' who find what they have to offer, spiriutually, intellectually and in appearance (since physcially is not an apt term here) attractive. The longer poems also make it clear that, in Innocence, all the female sprits make manifest, in the variable light of Beulah, that which the males with whom they become one in spirit, conceive of in their wondrous imaginations. Pam van Schaik. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 25 Nov 1996 12:19:21 +0200 From: P Van Schaik To: blake@albion.com, saleonar@cc.ysu.edu Subject: Re: Blake's Characters -Reply Message-Id: Scott, I think that Blake does also intimate that all of us on earth insatiably hunger for the lost joys of ETernity where each of us can find complete satisfaction since each can enter wholly the universes created by the imagination of others and disport there. So, hunger for completion in which all the fluxile spiritual senses are sated (as intimated in "The Book of Ahania"), is very well represented in Blake. The state in which our individual souls become united with those of all others, at will, is one in which lack and boredom can never figure. .... only variety, delight, infinite joy (and sorrow only because we envy the greater beauty of the paradises created by others). Surely, Blake evokes the possibility of each of us becoming gods capable of choosing and creating our own paradises of intellect and beauty, music, poetry, architecture, etc - all of which seems confirmed by the visions of those who have nearly died and seen something of the 0ther-side. Our poet , far from being semi-mad, found wisdom beyond what we have yet achieved in this century. Pam van Schaik ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 25 Nov 1996 12:28:40 +0200 From: P Van Schaik To: blake@albion.com Subject: Re: Urizen Question -Reply Message-Id: I fully agree with the views expressed by Jennifer about primary reading and response to the texts themselves. Pam ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 25 Nov 1996 12:53:30 +0200 From: P Van Schaik To: blake@albion.com, suzaraa@blue.weeg.uiowa.edu Subject: feminist bores and antivisionary elections -Reply Message-Id: Suzanne, Thank you very much for the clear insight into the way in which Blake is being maltreated by some of the lionised Feminist critics. Perhaps it is no use countering them by trying to point out the ways in which male'females are seen as complementary, and equal, aspects of the godhead, symbolically ... but it is the only way which comes naturally to me. I try to avoid academic and issue-based jargon, but , of course, one is always in a box of some kind, even while trying to escape the boxes made by others. Blake was aware of this, too, I suppose, in insisting on creating a `System' of his own. I particularly like his saying that those who create a tight `Circle'(a version of an ill-fitting box) , should go into it themselves and see how they like its restraints. (Can't remember the exact quotation here.) His own sublime visions are desgined, I feel, to release him from the Cricles and Boxes of his age and the past, and to help us escape too. Pam V Schaik ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 25 Nov 1996 12:57:26 +0200 From: P Van Schaik To: blake@albion.com, saleonar@cc.ysu.edu Subject: Re: Jerusalem 25 -Reply Message-Id: Surely, if Los accepts the dubious help of his Spectre, he is not on the way to recovering threefold vision, but to falling into single-fold vision? Los usually heroically resists the blandishments of his Spectre, only succumbing to these when , working to encompass Urizen's power, he becomes what (like that which) he beholds - as in FBU. Pam van Schaik ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 25 Nov 1996 13:32:55 +0200 From: P Van Schaik To: blake@albion.com, rdumain@igc.apc.org Subject: birthday thoughts -Reply Message-Id: Ralph Dumain, I object to your reduction of all the work I have done over the years on Blake as a `reduction to religious propaganda'. I myself belong to no Church though was raised at boarding school in both Methodist and Anglican traditions, and so find your understanding of where I come from totally inappropriate. I hate mental, emotional and spiritual boxes of any shape or size, (religious, marxist, feminist, scholastic) but have found that the kabbalists, in their attempts to understand how a good God could create a fallen world, come closest to Blake. There is an unfortunate tendency among people here (and everywhere, it would seem) who, when any spiritual matter is discussed, seem to think that this is polyanna-ish or un-Blakean. My reading of Blake is based closely on his own text and is an attempt to do justice to a great man and to pull off the rotten clothing I feel others often clothe him in. Your scoffing brings to mind the poem by Yeats in which he asks what those shuffling scholars would do if Catullus, whom they profess to teach, would appear to them as he was in life. I personally believe there is a life before this one and after this one, but arrived at this view only rather late in life, and independent of any other person's opinion, when I had mystical visions and became psychic in the bargain and also after reading all available writings on past-life regressions, mysticism, near-death experiences, Jung, etc in order to understand better what was happening to me. Luckily, my studies of Blake coincided with my own spiritual adventure into the unknown. Personally, I don't care if others prefer to `go to hell in a basket' or not, and like Blake's view of Eternity because it is the least boring I have ever come across.... fit for people with an insatiable appetite for the beautiful and creative. It distresses me that critics do not seem to understand his vision of heaven. If you do not like the spiritual, why quote so movingly a spritual poem as a tribute to Blake? Anyway, kindly refrain from insulting others who are genuinely trying to do the poet they love some service . Surely you see this as your mission too? Otherwise, what good reason do you have for being rude? Pam van Schaik ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 25 Nov 1996 08:37:06 -0500 (EST) From: bouwer To: blake@albion.com Subject: For Blake's Birthday Message-Id: <199611251337.IAA10706@host.ott.igs.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Ralph Dumain. You are back! What joy! What more can I say. But for Blake's birthday may I suggest that you, and others, stop picking on Pam van Schaik. She has found an invaluable and time-tested tool in the Kabbalah to handle the rapids, the white waters and the backwaters of the Spirit. Some of us are struggling with more imperfect tools. All maps of the Spirit should be respected. All spiritual tools should be taken seriously. I for one always try to understand what Pam has to say. My only regret is that I do not have an intimate knowledge of the Kabbalah. Gloudina Bouwer ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 25 Nov 1996 09:22:14 -0500 (EST) From: Scott A Leonard To: P Van Schaik Cc: blake@albion.com Subject: Re: Jerusalem 25 -Reply Message-Id: Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Pam: I'd agree that the Spectre is usually completely unreliable. Yet, this is moment of embrace seems to be the hinge upon which the (admittedly not fully realized) FZ's apocalypse turns. This is a moment of forgiveness, understanding (at least partially so), and willingness to let go of jealousy, despair, and rage. I'm not sure that the Spectre's brutish and insatiate hunger isn't exactly what (when commingled with Los' qualities) drives him to pick up the hammer and be again to build Golgonooza. Perhaps and allegorical sublimation and harnessing of unfocussed desire in the service of art? Scott On Mon, 25 Nov 1996, P Van Schaik wrote: > Surely, if Los accepts the dubious help of his Spectre, he is not on the > way to recovering threefold vision, but to falling into single-fold vision? > Los usually heroically resists the blandishments of his Spectre, only > succumbing to these when , working to encompass Urizen's power, he > becomes what (like that which) he beholds - as in FBU. Pam van Schaik > ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 25 Nov 1996 08:51:17 -0600 From: jmichael@seraph1.sewanee.edu (J. Michael) To: blake@albion.com Subject: Re: birthday thoughts Message-Id: Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Ralph, thanks for bringing "The Birds" to our attention. Somehow it had hitherto escaped my notice. I'm very sorry for your bereavement, but in my opinion there's no better place to turn than Blake at such a time. I especially like his letter to Hayley of May 6 1800 (new E, 705) on the death of Hayley's son. Jennifer Michael ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 25 Nov 1996 13:30:04 -0600 From: jmichael@seraph1.sewanee.edu (J. Michael) To: blake@albion.com Subject: Re: Blake Archive and e-texts -Reply Message-Id: Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Pam wrote: >Sandy, I hope your idea of collective work on a new text gets support. I >myself could not help re comparing Blake's originals and texts, but have >felt the inadequacies of both the Keynes and Erdman editions in so far as >neither (rightly so, being scholarly rather than simply editorial) reflects >modern editorial policy re punctuation. As a reader, this never really >bothered me, but one could do a version which would make Blake's >meaning more clear than versions which closely adhere to the original, The obvious problem is that where Blake's punctuation is ambiguous, absent, or "incorrect" by modern standards, it may not be so easy to ascertain his meaning in the first place. Just to give one example: Mark Lussier gave a paper at NASSR in which he pointed out that the lack of punctuation in the proverb "Where man is not nature is barren" makes it ambiguous: we usually interpret it as "Where man is not, nature is barren," but it also suggests "Where man is not nature . . .is barren." The editorial addition of a comma to help students see the first meaning closes off the possibility of the second. The Longman edition of Blake, edited by W. H. Stevenson (2nd ed), does use modern punctuation, with the additional benefit of explanatory notes at the bottom of each page. It's not the edition I turn to first, but I often refer to the notes, and I wouldn't hesitate to recommend it to someone seeking a readable edition. I'm not sure, though, if it's available in the US; I bought mine in England six years ago. Jennifer Michael ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 25 Nov 96 16:07 CST From: MLGrant@president-po.president.uiowa.edu To: blake@albion.com, "D.W. DOERRBECKER" Subject: B's female nudes & precursors in art Message-Id: <199611252220.QAA21237@ns-mx.uiowa.edu> Detlef Doerrbecker's learned 16-K discussion of Blake's art training and knowledge of prints after the Old Masters, in relation to his female nudes, has prompted a response from my (technophobic and non-typing) husband, John E. Grant (Jack), which he has asked me to transmit. In doing so, however, I'll omit -- on plea of press of time -- what Jack has to say about Job 12 and Blake's autograph in Upcott's album, since these designs feature male nudes. Before I begin quoting JEG, I want to clarify that I (MLJ) didn't mean to imply that there was any such thing as a nude Madonna (other than the pop diva); I had slid into commenting on the delicacy and grace of Raphael's treatment of the female form in general, as opposed to the power of Michelangelo's. As for female nudes by Raphael, I can think off the top of my head only of Eve in the Vatican loggia frescoes -- but let me hasten to convey Jack's main message to Detlef and to others who may be interested: Dear Detlef, You have some interesting things to say about Blake's nudes and where he got his ideas of the human form divine. As for seeking out figures by the masters he most revered, a good place to look would be all those prints assembled in Grazia Bernini Pezzini, et al, *Raphael Invenit*: Stampe da Raffaello nella Collezioni dell' Instituto Nationale per la Grafica (Roma: Quasar, 1984). The odds are good that, if Blake saw any Raphael subject (in addition to those on Biblical subjects for which he made commercial prints), he saw it in one or more of these prints after Raphael, albeit in the larger original formats which have so much more impact. But these prints often differ much from one another and it would certainly have made a difference which served as the take-off image for vision or memory. Simply as presentations of female forms would it be instructive to compare the (originally sculptured) *Three Graces* as rendered by any of the four (Pezzini, p. 845) with Blake's engraving after Stedman, *Europe supported by Africa and America* of 1793? Or is Blake to be figured only when he was free to produce his own forms? It does make a difference: if you see Borgianni's *Eve spinning, with the infants and Adam* (Pezzini, p. 403) you'd never think there was anything Blake could have connected with. But Lanfranco's treatment of the same subject (reverse: Pezzini, p. 387) does have a proto-Blakean air. Eve calls to mind the spinning mother in *NT*6, the title page for Night the First of *Night Thoughts.* I don't find this derivation would, however, help to explain the strange change of mind that occurred between the first state of Blake's engraving, which follows the woman's head as rendered in the watercolor, and the published state, which gives her quite a different face. . . . I hope all Blakeists have already been alerted to the exhibition of the Mellon Blakes at the Yale Center for British Art that is opening in April. Rumor has it that they aren't going to let the *Night Thoughts* fly, but there will be plenty else to reward you wherever you're coming from. Jack Grant Transmitted by Mary Lynn Johnson (a.k.a. Grant) ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 25 Nov 1996 15:22:01 +0000 From: David Rollison To: blake@albion.com Subject: Re: birthday thoughts -Reply Message-Id: <3299B999.7267@marin.cc.ca.us> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Pam writes: "Kindly refrain from insulting others who are trying to do the poet they love some service." Let us all keep this as a motto in our exchanges with one another. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 25 Nov 1996 17:35:27 -0800 From: reillys@ix.netcom.com (susan p. reilly) To: blake@albion.com Subject: Re: B's female nudes & precursors in art Message-Id: <199611260135.RAA27630@dfw-ix11.ix.netcom.com> Dear Jack and Mary, Please forward more information on Blake at Yale in April. Some of us (and I'm one of those lucky ones) are situated within easy driving distance of Yale. Susan Reilly ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 26 Nov 1996 00:42:35 -0500 From: TomD3456@aol.com To: blake@albion.com Subject: Re: Blake Archive and e-texts -Reply Message-Id: <961126004234_1850491530@emout01.mail.aol.com> The Longmans edition was available in the US when I bought mine some years ago-- and I also recommend it for Stevenson's generally fine notes, although I agree with Jennifer about the downside of "regularizing" Blake's punctuation. -Tom Devine ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 26 Nov 1996 00:42:43 -0500 From: TomD3456@aol.com To: blake@albion.com Subject: Re: anti-patriarch Message-Id: <961126004243_772333451@emout06.mail.aol.com> Lance- You wrote "Kristeva articulates a poetic discourse which subverts the symbolic and ruptures it, at the same time realizing (if only briefly) the maternal (semiotic) in its subversion." Could you please translate this into something comprehensible by mortals? I must say (not to be a poopy-breeches), this kind of jargon really annoys me and lends itself to parodies (which I will leave to those better equipped to do it justice-- WaHu, are you listening?) --Tom Devine ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 26 Nov 1996 08:54:49 +0200 From: P Van Schaik To: blake@albion.com, izak@igs.net Subject: For Blake's Birthday -Reply Message-Id: Thanks Gloudina ...I like your imagery of maps. We're , no doubt, all on a spiritual quest, looking at one another from different parts of the geography of the mind. I have written a whole book on BLake and the Kabbalah, but as yet have no publisher, and am often torn between expatiating briefly here, or simply trying to say the same thing without reference to the kabbalah and solely to Blake's text.... but as all the parts refer to the whole, this is rather like a dog chasing its tail. Pam ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 26 Nov 1996 09:15:03 +0200 From: P Van Schaik To: blake@albion.com, jmichael@seraph1.sewanee.edu Subject: Re: Blake Archive and e-texts -Reply -Reply Message-Id: Jennifer ..thanks for the explanation re editorial problems and the already available Stevenson edition. I find it extremely difficult to make any syntactical sense of the second possiblilty you offer as an example :`Where man is nature ... is barren'. What here is supposed to be the subject of `is barren' ? Nature? Some unspecified everything? Pam ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 26 Nov 1996 10:14:30 +0200 From: P Van Schaik To: saleonar@cc.ysu.edu Cc: blake@albion.com Subject: J25: Spectre and Los Message-Id: Scott, you are right about the particular passage in which the SPectre is momentarily inspired and speaks truth. I gshould not have generalised in my reponse. Now, I'm looking through my battered Keynes here at work, trying to find the exact passage you refer to and have come across the Spectre of Los recalling the lost joys of Eternity which he once shared with Enitharmon when they lived` in undivided essence' - she, as his `garden of delight' and he, as the `spirit in the garden'. (Vala VII, K272) Here, the `Spectre' of Los very much arouses our sympathy (as you rightly suggest) as he is less sinister than in some passages in which he threatens Los's humanity and Los is forced, in response, to comat his Spectre vigorously. Here he is more like a pitiful Shadow of his former self, lamenting the cosmic catastrophe of `Love Darken'd & Lost'(l.293) and Enitharmon , hearing his story, ceases to flee from his embraces in fear of Urizen's mistaken moral disapprobation. However, the progeny she brings forth after attempting to reunite with Los's `Shade' is not lovely - as would have been the case after the blissful unions of Eternity - but is a `Cloud' filled with really ugly Spectres -`male forms without female counterparts' (l .329) ... the imagery here being meant, no doubt, to form a horrific contrast with how Los and Enitharmon once lived, `Mutual in one another's joy', producing from their loving unions all the divine human forms peopling the landscape of their visionary paradises. The `seed' they now sow can only produce the monstrous and deformed, no longer the beautiful. It would seem then that Los's Shade rightly perceives that, only by annihilating the `terrors planted round the Gates of Eternal Life' .. that is, by destroying what they have been the progenitors of, in the fallen world ... can they regain their former bliss. (LL 300 ff, Keynes 327) However, because he himself has been reduced to an insatiable lust when wrenched from unity with the other Zoas in the Fall, he acknowledges that all his being craves for Enitharmon, thus frustrating his best intentions. When, however, Los in pity, embraces his Spectre, then the Spectre is able to regain something of his former humanity, and shed something of his `Domineering Lust' (l. 341) From this point on it becomes possible for Los, Enitharmon and the Spectre to work together to restore Albion's divine humanity. Through mutual co-operation and willingness to accept annihilation of the deformed Self, they can together `open' in heart and loins and brain a `Threefold' world as beautiful as before in Eternity. However, not to co-operate with one another would be to perpetuate the fall into Eternal Death where one body after another , each darker and more hideous than the ones before assumed, will be `Created Continually' - so that these can be cast off as dross by the Mercy and Love of God (l. 360) so setting a `Limit' to the Fall. I suppose one can appropriate the imagery of the Fall and use it to describe the processes of artistic creation, but surely one first has to acknowledge that Blake's primary meaning relates to his narrative of the Fall and Redemption? (Please debate this one with me as I think it has a bearing on how we read literature in general) This does not mean that the symbolism in Blake's visions has no relevance to real life .. just that it would seem that his focus is not directed specifically at the process of artistic creation ( or to any of our other modern concerns necessarily) here, but to deeper, even more relevant and profound issues. Namely, "What is the road back to our delight and bliss?" Is is via clinging to our mortal egos which are lustful and more like the Tiger than the Lamb?(Is this me, taking a religious propagandist view, or Blake, Ralph? I cling as fearfully to my mortal id and body as anyone else .. but Blake would seem to be insistently beckoning us to wind the `golden string' out of earthly attachments and lusts ... not , however, with the usual corollary of being asbstinent and afraid fully to explore the holy moments as they fly by using all our senses ...but senses illumined by wisdom , truth, and complete faith in divine mercy and our own divinity.) Well, this is the Blake I love because his vision is wholesome for here where we are all clearly very `lost' and weakened by the imperfections we encounter in others and ourselves. It also assures us that this imperfect, incomplete here is not all there is. I'd like to dedicate this as my birthday tribute to Blake. Pam ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 26 Nov 1996 09:25:47 -0600 From: jmichael@seraph1.sewanee.edu (J. Michael) To: blake@albion.com Subject: Blake exhibit Message-Id: Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" > I hope all Blakeists have already been alerted to the exhibition of > the Mellon Blakes at the Yale Center for British Art that is opening > in April. Rumor has it that they aren't going to let the *Night > Thoughts* fly, but there will be plenty else to reward you wherever > you're coming from. I've heard rumors of this exhibit, but no specifics. Could someone please post a full announcement to the list? Jennifer Michael ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 26 Nov 1996 09:35:34 -0600 From: Mark Trevor Smith To: blake@albion.com Subject: Re: Jerusalem 25 -Reply -Reply Message-Id: In response to Pam Van Schaik quoted below: If Los accepts the help of his Spectre, he is on the way to successful reintegration of the wholeness of his humanity. One of the difficult lessons of _Jerusalem_ is the need to embrace the dark forces that discourage and sabotage us and harness them in our service. Instead of rejecting or destroying his Spectre, Los needs to put him to work. Instead of self-righteously proclaiming himself right and his Spectre wrong, Los needs to assimilate his Spectre. Just as Jesus becomes, takes on, and thereby puts off Satan, so must Los with his Spectre, and so must we all. "Each man is in his Spectres power / Until the arrival of that hour / When his humanity awake / And cast his Spectre into the Lake." Yes, Blake does use the language of exclusion frequently, but I would define that casting off as requiring an assimilation in order to work. You never genuinely defeat your enemy as long as it is "outside" you. -- Mark >>> P Van Schaik 11/25/96 04:57am >>> Surely, if Los accepts the dubious help of his Spectre, he is not on the way to recovering threefold vision, but to falling into single-fold vision? Los usually heroically resists the blandishments of his Spectre, only succumbing to these when , working to encompass Urizen's power, he becomes what (like that which) he beholds - as in FBU. Pam van Schaik ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 26 Nov 1996 09:39:00 -0600 From: Mark Trevor Smith To: blake@albion.com Subject: Re: birthday thoughts -Reply Message-Id: >>> J. Michael 11/25/96 08:51am >>> > I especially like his letter to >Hayley of May 6 1800 (new E, 705) on the death of Hayley's son. A copy of that letter hangs on my office door. I purchased a facsimile from the Houghton Library in 1991, after twice (in that year and about six years previous) touching that sacred relic. -- Mark ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 26 Nov 1996 09:45:12 -0600 From: jmichael@seraph1.sewanee.edu (J. Michael) To: P Van Schaik Cc: blake@albion.com Subject: Re: Blake Archive and e-texts -Reply -Reply Message-Id: Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" > Jennifer ..thanks for the explanation re editorial problems and the >already available Stevenson edition. I find it extremely difficult to make >any syntactical sense of the second possiblilty you offer as an example >:`Where man is nature ... is barren'. What here is supposed to be the >subject of `is barren' ? Nature? Some unspecified everything? Pam Well, it was Mark Lussier's example, but I suppose "Where man is not nature" could, with a stretch, be a noun clause and thus the subject. The point is that with no punctuation, the reader is likely to rush past "not" to "nature," and the more logical reading only becomes apparent after one reaches the end of the sentence. Blake would surely be aware of this problem: we're not talking about a scribbled manuscript, but an engraved plate. While I readily acknowledge that there are outright mistakes (such as Blake's persistent tendency to misspell "receive"), I can't help thinking some of his ambiguities must have been intentional--especially in a work such as _MHH_, which is concerned with exploiting and inverting dualities before it "marries" them. Perhaps a better example (my own) is "Little Lamb who made thee," and its parallel line in the second stanze, "Little Lamb I'll tell thee," where the lack of a comma, to me, emphasizes the threefold identity of lamb, child, and creator that is so essential to the poem. It is the "Lamb who made thee" and the lamb/child who instinctively knows its maker. Here, of course, it's not duality but identity that emerges from what seems at first to be ambiguity in the line. In the example from the Proverbs, it seems we have to make a choice between the two readings, but in "The Lamb," it doesn't matter because lamb, child, and creator are all one. Jennifer Michael ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 26 Nov 1996 11:02:53 -0500 (EST) From: Scott A Leonard To: blake@albion.com Cc: blake@albion.com, agourlay@risd.edu Subject: Re: Blake Archive and e-texts -Reply Message-Id: Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Pam: You don't really want a version of Blake that can be more easily understood do you? What about "that which can be understood by the idiot isn't worth my time?" Blake's abstruseness seems so obviously a stylistic choice designed to alter the consciousness of his readers--fix the punctuation and the lines so he's EASIER? May it never be! Scott ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 26 Nov 1996 11:06:04 -0500 (EST) From: Scott A Leonard To: blake@albion.com Subject: Re: Blake's Characters -Reply Message-Id: Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Pam: you said that so very well. Precisely where my students are in their exploration of the nature of the spectre and its role in the reawakening of Albion. This post will be required reading. Scott -------------------------------- End of blake-d Digest V1996 Issue #137 **************************************