William Blake; The schoolboy Essay -- English Literature

William Blake The schoolboyWilliam Blake believed in freedom of speech, democracy and freelove, for these reasons he disagreed powerfully with semiformal educationand conventional teaching in both schools and churches. He believedthat this constrained people stopping them from having their ownthoughts. Blake believed that babyren who were not given a formaleducation would want to learn off their own accord making learningmore recreation and enjoyable for the child. Blake portrays these opinions inthe poem The schoolboy which he chose to bring through in the voice of theschoolboy himself, to stand up for children whos views on schoolingare rarely acknowledged. Blakes decision to use a definite obligate inthe title The schoolboy shows that the poem is a biographical pieceabout a specific schoolboy, and allows Blake to voice his own opinionsas if they were that of a school child provoking more sympathy fromthe reviewer than would simply expressing his own views, thereforemaking his opinions on formal education more persuasive.The poem uses strong themes of disposition throughout the low gear versedescribes a sense of harmony between the schoolboy and nature througha positive description of the sounds of the birds which the schoolboyawakes to hear. Pathetic fallacy is utilise relating the summer morn tothe schoolboys joy for being awoken in this way. The second versestarts with the conjunction but to link the two verses, yet show the differentiate in mood between them. This negative verse outlines thechilds dread of school and brings the reader back to reality afterthe dream-like feel to the first stanza. The line under a cruel eyeoutworn suggests that the children are exhausted by school,personif... ...is used throughout the poemreferring to the stages of a persons living as the seasons in the year,the last stanza uses this metaphor to insinuate that a personschildhood is the most important time because if they dont learn howto have fun in the spring of their life they will not know how toenjoy themselves in the summer of life. This makes the last line ofthe poem particularly effective when the blasts of wintertime appear aspeople rarely think about how the way they live their childhood willeffect their after lives, this rhetorical question makes the readercontemplate whether a formal education in an early life is worthfacing the regrets it will cause them to live with in later lifelooking back upon few happy memories. And maybe learning the joys oflife and how to live to the fullest is the most important lesson to belearned within childhood.