Of all the romantic poets of the eighteenth century, William Blake (1757-1827) is the most independent and the most original. In his earliest work, written when he was scarcely more than a child, he seems to go back to the Elizabethan song writers for his models; but for the greater part of his life he was the poet of inspiration alone, following no man’s lead, and obeying no voice but that which he heard in his own mystic soul. Though the most extraordinary literary genius of his age, he had practically no influence upon it. Indeed, we hardly yet understand this poet of pure fancy, this mystic this transcendental madman, who remained to the end of his busy life and incomprehensible child.
Blake’s poems can be summerised as ‘pouring in profusion ’ of ‘unpremeditated art’ in ‘full-throated ease’. Undisputed as it is, he is no founder of any particular school of thought like Wordsworth or Donne; yet his poems are outstanding, and matchless in its variety. He gave no ‘preface’ to his poems such as Wordsworth had given nor did he profess any theory of ‘simple diction’ or rural subject matter and ‘annals of the poor’. For Blake it was his visions that mattered more than anything else. Blake is a solitary figure, the greatest practitioner of symbolism in the entire horizon of English literature and the beauty of his works is par (গড়ে) excellent. He is second to none, not even to he celebrated French symbolists.
Blake’s originality kept him apart from the general public and from official recognition. Only a small section of aestheticians felt his ingenuity and greatness. Blake had less of alien influence; instead, most of his contributions depend on his own intuitive visions of spiritual presences. The very core of Blake’s philosophy is derived from these visions of his own mind. As James Thomson puts it Blake was always poor in worldly wealth, always rich in spiritual wealth. Blake was chiefly and