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Yawar Ali Mrs. Wilson English IV B 13 May 2013 Woes of a Chimney Sweeper The life of a child laborer carries many aches and pains. The laborer himself is unaware of what the world has to offer him: having lived his entire life as a worker subjected to brutal conditions without freedom in sight. In The Chimney Sweeper (Songs of Innocence and Experience) by William Blake, Blake attempts to criticize a culture which perpetuates the existence of child chimney sweepers in inhumane conditions by exploring its hardships using detailed imagery, extended metaphors and a despairing tone. Through utilizing these methods, Blake seeks to bring awareness to society in pursuit of freeing these children from the atrocious conditions they work in. Blake makes it very evident in the very beginning that he means to expose an aspect of society previously unknown or uncared for by the general public. He sets up the stage with his narrator, a poor old boy forced to live out his early years as a chimney sweeper, When my mother died I was very young / And my father sold me while yet my tongue / Could scarcely cry weep! weep! weep! weep! (Blake 1-3). The narrator is forced to work as a chimney sweeper after his mother passes away and hes abandoned by his father - essentially hes a slave to his new owners. Swift then uses imagery to describe the conditions faced by a new chimney sweeper, little Tom Dacre who cried when his head was shaved to avoid the soot [that now] cannot spoil [his] white hair (Blake 5,8). By illustrating the scene, William Blake wants to delve

Ali 2 deeper into the lives of just a few chimney sweepers in order to make his audience more involved and establishing a personal connection with his poem. The boys are forced to shave their head in order to prevent lice and vermin from getting into them while they work tirelessly in the chimneys. These are just a few of the sacrifices they must make. The period of Romanticism emphasizes the role of human achievement and intrinsic goals, all of which Blake sets up perfectly when he transitions the poem from complete hopelessness to one of motivation or light at the end of the road. He writes about a dream that Tom has where the sweepers are down [in] a green plain, leaping, laughing, they run, / And wash in a river and shine in the Sun. (Blake 15-16). Essentially in the dream-like world of Toms imagination, the boys are freed by the Angel - free to live by their own rules and pursue their own imagination. Yet these scenes of bliss and happiness that Blake depicts are quickly erased as Tom awakes to the cold, harsh reality gets [his] bags & [his] brushes to work. (Blake 22). Tom realizes hes back to his daily routine with the other chimney sweepers and if they continue on mindlessly doing their duty, they need not fear harm. (Blake 24). Unlike the Song of Innocence, the Song of Experience contains elements of a narrator who realizes that his life is in a state of disarray and is more realistic of lifes expectations. The narrator and Tom in the Song of Innocence are still praying for a glimpse of a prosperous future and freedom, whereas Song of Experience accepts the reality and the loneliness that comes with abandonment by his parents and the church (which does not accept the chimney sweepers). Blake in the first poem speaks of the thousands of sweepers . . . locked up in coffins of black. (Blake 11-12) where coffins of black refers to the dismal surrounding in a chimney, but the sweepers are soon freed by an Angel who had a bright key (Blake 13). The bright key most likely referring to the key to the future or happiness, the escape from the lives as chimney

Ali 3 sweepers. These metaphors help contrast the bleak state of the children in their present condition to what they believe will greet them after they struggle through their lives as sweepers. This represents characteristics of the Romantic Era because Blake emphasizes the individual and his achievements. In the second poem, Blake talks about the boys and how theyre clothed in clothes of death (Blake 7). The clothes of death most likely refers to the uniforms the boys wear as they clean the chimneys, uniforms that they will die in as they breathe in the soot and suffer in the coffins of death that are the chimneys. Lastly, Blake utilizes a despairing or hopeless tone throughout the poems. Although at points in the Song of Innocence, the boys are met with hope and prosperity (like the dream), these dreams are quickly erased by the brutal realities of their daily routine which further reinforces the despairing nature of their struggle. In both poems, the chimney sweepers cry out and weep! weep! which establishes their current mind set towards the conditions theyre faced with. They long for their parents, calling out [w]here are thy father and mother? Say! (Blake 3). These lines aid in formulating the tone of the poems, it is indeed despairing and hopeless. What makes it more hopeless, according to Blake, is the lack of societys involvement in trying to cure these ills facing these child workers who see no help in sight as they live out their lives in brutal conditions that take many of their lives in the process. Using detailed imagery, extended metaphors and a despairing tone, William Blake in The Chimney Sweeper attempts to make society aware of the difficulties and conditions faced by chimney sweepers. He attempts to garner the attention of the public towards these problems in order to fix them. Yet, his main goal is to criticize society for turning a blind eye to these problems that plague the nation and by exploring the life of a chimney sweeper; he makes them guilty of their ignorance.

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Work Cited
Dover, Richard. "Songs of Innocence." By William Blake. N.p., n.d. Web. 15 May 2013. Reiser, K. L. "An Analysis of Blake's "The Chimney Sweeper" Poems." Yahoo! Yahoo! Contributor Network, n.d. Web. 15 May 2013. Shmoop. "The Chimney Sweeper (Songs of Experience)." Shmoop. Shmoop University Inc., n.d. Web. 15 May 2013.