Songs of Innocence and of Experience

Published in 1789 this collection of poems by William Blake (1757-1827) has the poets own etchings as illustrations. In the piece Blake explores the two contrary states of the human soul as he puts it in the subtitle. Even while the Songs have straightforward rhythms and rhyme schemes as well as pictures of kids animals and flowers they frequently include challenging contentious or sarcastic themes that represent Blakes firmly held political convictions and spiritual experience. Blakes perspective covers controversial issues such child work abuse repression by the state and church and childrens right to be regarded as persons with free will. Songs of Experience has a lot of poetry that answer to equivalents from Songs of Innocence.