Compare/contrast the Tyger Vs. the Lamb
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William Blake composes two beautiful pieces of work that exemplify his ideas on the nature of creation. The two pieces, The Lamb and The Tyger, are completely opposite views, which give questionable doubt about most people’s outlook of creation. These two poems are meant to be interpreted in a comparison and contrast form showing the “two contrary states of a human soul.” With the poems written six years apart, they separately come together to establish this third meaning. Obviously Blake believes that good and evil are in God and that depending on the situation its good to be a tyger or may be good to be a lamb.
The Lamb which gives a childlike atmosphere to it is written in very simple language, but with a deeper meaning. The Lamb is suppose to represent a sense of innocence and naivety, somewhat in comparison to children. Blake not only believes that God has created us, but also that He has blessed us. With his use of infantile and somewhat reverent verbiage, Blake displays a side of creation that is ingenuous and pure. With phrases such as, “Little lamb, God bless thee” and “He is meek, and he is mild” give off that idea. Even the arrangement of the poem is one of a didactic method, somewhat of a call and response sort of concept. The repetition of lines back to back adds to the whole childlike manner of the work. As for the Tyger the central idea stays the same, but the whole perception is changed around.
The Tyger is the darker side of the idea of creation where there are less joys involved. Blake only displays the horrors of the world in this poem to separate it almost completely from the Lamb. The purity and simplicity that was displayed in the Lamb is not shown in the Tyger. With Blake’s use of vivid imagery such as, “fire”, “hammer”, “furnace”, “chain”, “anvil”, and “spears” and the use of austere action words such as, “burnt”, “seize”, “twist”, “beat”, “grasp”, “clasp”, and “threw” creates specific relentless connotations. Blake creates visions of a bold creature with “eyes of fire and dreaded hands and feet.”