Talk:London (William Blake poem)

This page is, umm, problematic. Originally a high-school "response to poetry" assignment, I have tried to work it into a more readable format. Not really successful. I'd have been better off just replacing the article with the poem. Any ideas?

Notice
This is an individual poem, which is covered by WikiProject Poetry. For articles of this type, our guidelines suggest that the following sections be added:


 * The text of the poem - if it's short. Otherwise, a link to the poem, preferably from WikiSource.
 * The publication history of the poem.
 * The critical response to the poem, and any critical analysis that is not original research.
 * The circumstances in which the poem was written.
 * The structure and style.
 * The poetic effects of the poem.
 * The references made in the poem.

This is only a guideline in order to help you edit this article. Feel free to add other information as you see fit.

Dev920 16:55, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Chartered
The comment on the word 'chartered' is in error. The word has nothing to do with mapping. That's "charted" not "chartered". Also, in this period one of the most common meanings of 'chartered' was 'freighted' - that is laden. It appears in this meaning in Wordsworth's Old Cumberland Beggar (1800), "And let the chartered wind that sweeps the heath/Beat his grey locks against his withered face", where chartered seems to mean "heavy" (though ity may mean "free", as in licensed). This differs from the meaning "controlled by a charter granting exclusive rights". Paul B (talk) 16:43, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Dissent, Ranting, Muggletonianism
I have moved the dissenting tradition comment under the interpretations heading. Thompson does say this, but his is only one critical viewpoint Lithoderm (talk) 16:38, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

Spelling / Grammatical Errors... And Also License to copy Poem Here???
"As with most of Blake's was a dancer and a poetd" - wtf is all this? This is crap writing. "interpretations of wales." - Why is wales not capitalized (and also italicized? What is the meaning of the word, wales?

"In jones view" - Should be Jones' view... horrible writing level. Should I correct this or delete this? I have no idea who Jones even is. The person is not previously referred to... again, horrible writing. This whole article should basically be re-written. WHO IS JONES???

According to Wikipedia's license, can we reproduce the poem on the page???


 * end of rant*

BriEnBest (talk) 22:44, 2 September 2009 (UTC)

London or "London"?
In the sentence, "Blake alludes to the revolution in London, arguably suggesting that the experience of living there could encourage a revolution on the streets of the capital", shouldn't the city name be in quotes? That is, is Blake taking about "London" the poem or London the city? I presume the former, but didn't want to make the change in case I misunderstand the writer's intent. Also, if the poem is meant, it would be inelegant to refer to people "living there" (i.e., living in the poem). Finally, shouldn't the first instance of "revolution" (in the sentence quoted) be capitalized--assuming it refers to the French Revolution? Urgos (talk) 22:39, 11 November 2012 (UTC)

Removed unlikely statement that was without citation since 2008
The phrase "city of london" now refers to the financial district of London, like Wall Street in New York. It is only about a square mile in area. See City of London article. I am not sure if this phrase had the same meaning in Blake's day, but even then London was far bigger than just "the city". 92.28.246.202 (talk) 10:00, 23 December 2013 (UTC)

Not aware
The article says "Within the poem that bears the city's name, Blake describes 18th century London as a conurbation filled with people who understood, with depressing wisdom, both the hopelessness and misery of their situation." But it seems to me that this is not true, that actually they were not aware. If they were aware, then the mind forged-manacles would fall away. 92.28.246.202 (talk) 10:22, 23 December 2013 (UTC)

Tried to improve article and tagged it
The article still seemed very much like a personal essay so I rearranged the content and deleted some stuff that didn't need to be in the article (extraneous stuff on William Blake, etc) and added in the poem itself. I also tagged the article as poetry-stub, as something that needs more references, and as an article that still needs more help with its tone, as it still sounds a bit like an essay. --Nerd1a4i (talk) 20:23, 25 March 2018 (UTC)

Still in Need of Work
This article is still inadequate as a resource--too much of it is vague, unsourced, or just lifted from the one repeated e-kalvi.com citation. That cited webpage, by the way, is so grammatically a mess that I have to question its authority as a source for commentary on poetry. This includes the entirely out-of-Wikipedia-character citation of "(Zhan,2013)" in the middle--the cited webpage does it like that.

I'd recommend cutting out everything that was lifted from that webpage (e.g. the bullet-point list of three themes) as well as all the material that is irredeemably vague, e.g. "Laws began to be imposed which restricted the freedom of individuals" (which laws? which freedoms? citation??). 179.50.145.164 (talk) 03:12, 6 June 2023 (UTC)


 * Agree. The rhetorical question at the end of the ‘Analysis’ section seems particularly out of place here. Djewesbury (talk) 18:34, 25 April 2024 (UTC)

Incorrect century in ‘analysis’
The analysis says that this is a critique of early 19th century London, but the article states that it was published in 1794. Djewesbury (talk) 18:33, 25 April 2024 (UTC)