Blake's The Chimney Sweeper (Innocence)

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  • The Chimney Sweeper (I)
    • Rich in powerful imagery illustrating terrible conditions
      • 'cry', 'scarcely', 'weep', 'bare', 'soot', 'coffins'
    • The Speaker and Tom Dacre
      • 'Dacre' may derive from 'Dark' - sooty countenance
      • Dacre's present state is only made bearable by the two edged hope of a happy afterlife following a quick death
      • The speaker has the ability to find the silver lining in every cloud, highlighting the tragedy of the poem; he remains innocent in an awful environment
    • Form
      • 6 quatrains
      • AABB rhyme scheme
      • 2 rhyming couplets per quatrain
      • Master of rhetoric
    • Positive verbs - 'rise', 'sport'
  • Dacre's present state is only made bearable by the two edged hope of a happy afterlife following a quick death
  • The children may have been deluded by a false sense of duty misread by their own innocence
    • The Speaker and Tom Dacre
      • 'Dacre' may derive from 'Dark' - sooty countenance
      • The speaker has the ability to find the silver lining in every cloud, highlighting the tragedy of the poem; he remains innocent in an awful environment
  • Rhythm and rhyme is incongruous with the subject matter and images described
    • Form
      • 6 quatrains
      • AABB rhyme scheme
      • 2 rhyming couplets per quatrain
      • Master of rhetoric
  • Stanza 4/5 depicts paradise only achievable following death
    • The Chimney Sweeper (I)
      • Rich in powerful imagery illustrating terrible conditions
        • 'cry', 'scarcely', 'weep', 'bare', 'soot', 'coffins'
      • Positive verbs - 'rise', 'sport'
  • 'Were all of them lock'd up in coffins of black' - represents the narrow chimneys children sometimes suffocated in

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