English Edition
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Songs of Innocence and of Experience
English BooksWhale Edition by William Blake
Blake’s illuminated poems contrast childhood vision with social cruelty, repression, and prophetic imagination.
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Book introduction
Songs of Innocence and of Experience
Songs of Innocence and of Experience sets simple lyric forms against fierce moral insight. William Blake moves between childlike wonder and the darker knowledge of poverty, authority, religion, and desire, making innocence and experience speak to one another.
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This edition is based on a public domain text and has been prepared for digital reading by BooksWhale.
Public domain basis
Why this edition can be shared
William Blake died in 1827, and the combined Songs of Innocence and of Experience appeared in 1794. These dates support the public-domain basis for this English original edition.
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Songs of Innocence and of Experience
William Blake
Preview chapterSongs of InnocencePreview
Songs of Innocence
Preview chapterIntroductionPreview
Piping down the valleys wild,
Piping songs of pleasant glee,
On a cloud I saw a child,
And he laughing said to me:
‘Pipe a song about a Lamb!’
So I piped with merry cheer.
‘Piper, pipe that song again.’
So I piped: he wept to hear.
‘Drop thy pipe, thy happy pipe;
Sing thy songs of happy cheer!’
So I sung the same again,
While he wept with joy to hear.
‘Piper, sit thee down and write
In a book, that all may read.’
So he vanished from my sight;
And I plucked a hollow reed,
And I made a rural pen,
And I stained the water clear,
And I wrote my happy songs
Every child may joy to hear.
Table of contents
Inside this edition
- 01Full text
- 02Songs of Innocence
- 03Introduction
- 04The Shepherd
- 05The Echoing Green
- 06The Lamb
- 07The Little Black Boy
- 08The Blossom
- 09The Chimney-Sweeper
- 10The Little Boy Lost
- 11The Little Boy Found
- 12Laughing Song
- 13A Cradle Song
- 14The Divine Image
- 15Holy Thursday
- 16Night
- 17Spring
- 18Nurse’s Song
- 19Infant Joy
- 20A Dream
- 21On Another’s Sorrow
- 22Songs of Experience
- 23Introduction
- 24Earth’s Answer
- 25The Clod And the Pebble
- 26Holy Thursday
- 27The Little Girl Lost
- 28The Little Girl Found
- 29The Chimney-Sweeper
- 30Nurse’s Song
- 31The Sick Rose
- 32The Fly
- 33The Angel
- 34The Tiger
- 35My Pretty Rose-Tree
- 36Ah, Sunflower
- 37The Lily
- 38The Garden of Love
- 39The Little Vagabond
- 40London
- 41The Human Abstract
- 42Infant Sorrow
- 43A Poison Tree
- 44A Little Boy Lost
- 45A Little Girl Lost
- 46A Divine Image
- 47A Cradle Song
- 48To Tirzah
- 49The Schoolboy
- 50The Voice of the Ancient Bard
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