Nurse’s Song by William Blake Essay

Compare the two variations of “Nurse’s Song”, exhibiting how Blake illustrates the concepts of Innocence and Experience The Blakean concept of “Innocence” is focused in purity, vulnerability, trust and harmony – often illuminated through the use of kids.

For “Experience” the heart is in remorse, remorse and the basic loss of purity. In the two versions of “Nurse’s Song” children are used to bring out both the innocent and experienced aspect of the nurse. In the “Innocence” version from the poem, a repeated expression pattern is employed. It is similar to children’s melodies and baby room rhymes because of the buoyant, song-like rhythm. “Come, come keep off play”, “No, not any let us play”, “Well, well go and play”.

This emphasises the childlike, infantile tone with the poem bringing out the blameless, simplistic character. It also lights a child light around the nurse, which in turn to a audience in an knowledgeable state of mind, gives off a compelled, unrealistic purity. The use of sound in the “Innocence” version of “Nurse’s Song” is very apparent. It pertains to the noises made by the youngsters, heard by the nurse; “laughing is observed on the hillside, ” this paints a pleasant picture, a great unmistakeably cheerful image to get the reader. It puts other poem in an stunning, dreamlike framework, giving a somewhat surreal border to the compared to that follow.

A final line “And all the hillsides ecchoed”, could possibly be seen as a usage of pathetic argument in that your children are laughing and shouting, and the hills ‘echo’ them – anything in this idealistic world can be content and perfect, a moreover of chastity, trust and openness. “The little ones hopped & shouted & laugh’d”, this list is shown in a ingenuo fashion, further illustrating the concept of innocence in the nurse herself. By using “&” instead of a intervalle, it the actual reader feel as if the doctor has a childlike perspective for the scene, as her frequentation uses standard, one-dimensional lexis giving an unsophisticated and straightforward view worldwide.

The enlightening relationship between your children as well as the nurse makes her appear straightforward and pure, and in addition inexperienced in her trust in the children. If the children refuse her obtain to go home to foundation, she merely allows those to carry on within their own approach “Well, well, go & play until the light fades away” showing her faith inside the reliability from the children and simultaneously offering her a great air of naivety, and reinforcing her innocence because she is evidently open to getting the pleasures of life. It also shows just how unworldly the girl with, how she’s blissfully unacquainted with the dangers around and simply worried that the kids should be during sex when the working day turns to night.

Inside the “Experience” variation of “Nurse’s Song” the reader feels a distinctly nasty tone radiated by the registered nurse. An underlying message of a awful childhood, or a disturbing children is given away when states “The times of my junior rise clean in my mind, / My face turns green and pale”. To some this could imply a sensation of jealousy in the nurse, green being an signal of envy – demonstrating the nurse envying the children’s purity and pleasure. However , I do believe it is just a device to exhibit how their particular purity and the inexperience will be nauseating towards the nurse; how it will remind her of her child years, and how this lady has lost that youth and vulnerability and it is sickened simply by her current self.

In the second stanza of the “Experience” version, the first two lines are the same, although they seem somewhat more ominous due to context. “Then come home my own children, sunlight is gone down / Plus the dews of night come up; ” Also there are not any speech signifies around these types of phrases, unlike the “Innocence” version. It implies that it is certainly not direct conversation from the doctor to the children, but rather an insight into the thoughts of the registered nurse – hidden and dark – giving the reader having a nervous strength given off by eerie gestures of the health professional. A contrast between the two poems with the second line of the initial stanza.

In “Innocence” it says “and laughing can be heard on the hill, ” but in “Experience” it says “and whisp’rings are in the dale. ” The obvious big difference is between your “laughing” as well as the “whisp’rings”. Laughter is a audio of pleasure and gaiety, but whispering has an air of secrecy, deceit and isolation. This can be an obvious compare in the amounts of communication between your two states, the genuine and open up laughter in “Innocence” practically an opposite to the protected, furtive whispering. Another difference between the two is that in “Innocence” the laughter is taking place “on the hill” – an exposed place, safe and high over everything, quickly seen and obvious to all or any.

But in “Experience” the whispering is taking place “in the dale. ” This is a hidden place, dark and difficult to see for the nurse – secretive. This subtle difference changes the tone totally between the two poems. “Your spring & your day happen to be wasted in play, / And your wintertime and night in disguise. ” These final two lines in the poem, I believe, are the most bitter and disparaging of all. Some might say that the times of year of “spring” and “winter” are metaphorical, for the “winter of your life” – the deeper days, the older, more skillful times; the “spring” symbolizing youth, chastity and chasteness.

As though the nurse is saying that when you may have the capacity to embrace the gift of “innocence”, your naivety and inexperience keep you from truly realising what you have and it is after that “wasted in play”; frittered away inside the menial enjoyment of life. Nevertheless once that innocence is definitely lost, you enter the winter season of your life, “in disguise” – hiding from those that point out to you of your innocence, and others that can see your experience. However another meaning could be that literally in the daytime, through the spring and winter including night you are still wasting your time; and so no matter what you are doing time can be passing by simply and you are gradually moving coming from a state of innocence to experience.

That time can be squandered in useless, unhelpful ways. The nurse’s resentment is expressed in her realisation on this desecration of such a precious point. It seems premeditated and as although she has reminisced over her youthful occasions and recognized her errors; as if she has discovered how she’s capitulated to the beliefs of “experience” and is unable to return to her candid, childlike self.

That stuff seriously overall, the message provided by the “Experience” poem can be one of resentment, remorse and resentment. The darker develop of the composition gives it a deeper meaning – to embrace every single second or to become a figure like the registered nurse in this version: cheated in life and negative about other folks. However , the playful, childlike “Innocence” type is less evocative and conceives a simpler idea, to laugh and play “till the light ends away as well as the dew of night arise”.

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