I only have a copy of this book from the library. It is one of the most valuable things in my heart.
I like this man because he attacks perfection. He attacks technology and he attacks big egos.
I think everyone should read this book. Blake is a humorist; he is very esoteric and clever.
He knows human nature best because he shows he has been burned emotionally by friends.
Betrayal is the great realism or knowledge of the heart.
Blake includes nature and art. What a remarkable creation. Why are all the interesting people dead… well maybe not so? I feel like he is around when reading his work.
Get it and make some wrinkles in your clothes. Go out and misspell something. Be imperfect in grammar and voice.
But never-never be insincere, greedy, or inhuman.
Read. Intelligence of the heart is the game he plays… and you got to have one to play Blake’s game of intelligence…brain, heart and honesty and William Blake.
I find so much decadence, arrogance and lying in the world today…How comforting it is to have Blake in the world to read.
The image below needs to be looked at sideways! Symbolic meaning: We have the left and right side of our brain. We are good and evil. A point that we need to be aware of from Blake’s perspective…a balancing act that can bloom into a lovely sunflower.
William Blake
William Blake
I can only gaze at the images of Blake’s work in a book, or on the internet … (maybe at times in a museum) and that will have to do.
I have been pulled into William Blake again. This means trouble because he takes me to strange places of my imagination… like no one else can. The game is light and shadow play, and it is real life. I am reading The Marriage of Heaven and Hell edited with introduction and commentary by Michael Phillips. It is good to have his writing placed in the context of history. Analyzing the why, how and who is important in understanding Blake’s work, but for me the real place is always the inward place of the imagination. We all have this place and all we must do is to use it.
This, for me, is the best place to start with understanding Blake’s work. He does get unbelievably detailed though and sometimes it does take a lot of study time to reveal his meaning.
I like this book of Blake’s because there are only a few editions of this work in the world. He did all the work himself. He is an originator of free speech with a fanzine of his own. Including his opinions of current events, his spirituality and esoteric perspective. He mixes it all up in a wild whirlwind of images and does not exclude nature. Heartfelt satire, humor and word play also splash the pages with words that are even misspelled. Re-created words run through his work.
Maybe this was since his hand wrote out each letter of this book. Who knows?
I find it refreshing and I think back on my days as an editor and publisher of an underground fanzine. To print it and get it out was a fast movement in documenting a growing scene. To me the message was more important than the grammar or spelling and the parallelism I draw from Blake’s work; as he is my mentor and teacher, and what we achieved on each issue is similar. He helps me, in a sense; feel relieved from criticism that I have received. That either consciously or unconsciously he is making a statement; He shows cleverly his intentions as in the statement from the Book The Marriage of Heaven and Hell:
Improvent makes straight roads, but the crooked roads without Improvement, are roads of Genius.
~Proverbs of Hell Pg. 69
Yes, the words “Improvent” and “Improvement” are the same words with the same meaning. Smart, what do you think? Something to ponder. This is what Blake does best he gets us to ponder, think and imagine.
I can only gaze at the images of Blake’s work in a book, or on the internet now… and that will have to do.
This next quote I have chosen is very current and insightful for our times. He also uses something I call “Nature Politics” in his work.
As the caterpillar chooses the fairest leaves to lay her eggs on, so the priest lays his curse on the fairest joys.
~ Proverbs of Hell Pg. 68
A layperson’s notes on the study of William Blake ends here but will continue in the future.
“The soul should always stand ajar, ready to welcome the ecstatic experience.”
~ Emily Dickinson
Christine Blasey Ford
I am not a professional editor. I find that I do reread my postings and continually make corrections. When I first post my posts are based on the emotional inspiration that comes up. This is when I am likely losing all sight to imperfections and grammar and misspelling. Then I try to edit my writing as time goes on.
My goal is to be as perfect as I can be. I know the truth about having work published in books, magazines and profession web sites. In these cases all work gets edited many times by many editors. I respect their discipline.
Editing is not my forte but writing a good story is. I try to catch an image or archetype and then write it into being.
I know this may sound simplistic but I will write it just the same. Once while watching an episode of Little House on the Prairie, Pa tells Laura about writing,
“There are those educated at the best universities, these are the ones we learn to respect. There are those that learn by nature, these are the ones we learn to love.”
My writing is somewhere between the two. I am not too interested in being respected. Being loved is much more fulfilling to me. Yet, I am not too sure on how homogeneous the two go together in this world of ours.
I am always open to suggestions or editorial insights. Maybe I will not agree but I will think about it. I also know that Emily Dickinson gave her editor a hard time… aren’t you glad she did !!!
I opened the book to wherever the giant book of fairy tales would take me. I just happened to open the book to Ferdinand the Faithful. I sat underneath the white metal bunk bed on the red futon and began to read the story to my son.
Of course my head was racing with thoughts while reading the story to him. Tomorrow is going to be my son’s first day in middle school.
This was as strange to me as the fairy tale I was reading. Here there are talking fish and talking white horses with magic pens and keys to open up a castle standing on a heath. A heath what is that? Oh yes, a tract of open and uncultivated land.
That is what I was feeling, uncultivated land? My eleven year old is going to make a new start away from me on a new adventure, and unless I find an invisible cloak tonight to follow him, I must let him go on his journey … alone.
I am hopeful because Ferdinand made friends and they helped him along his adventure while riding his white horse. He even outsmarted the bully Ferdinand the Unfaithful.
Life is like a fairy tale. I have taught my son much of what he needs to know about life. The story helps too, it even eased the tension in me and helped my son go to sleep.
If he is honest, helpful and strong my son will have meat for the giants and bread for the birds. He will have a flute to call the fish for help.
“He, however always rode on his white horse, and once when he was seated on it, it told him that he was to go on to the heath which he knew and gallop three-times round it. And when he had done that, the white horse stood up on its hind legs, and was changed into a King’s son.”
~ Ferdinand the Faithful, Grimm’s Complete Fairy Tales. Fall River Press
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“[Diontsos]. Swoony type, long hair, bedroom eyes, cheeks like wine.” ― Euripides, The Bacchae
This is a book of wisdom and secrets. One of the best sources of information when seeking the underbelly of truth and knowledge mixed with initiation. It is a magic book as well as a fact filled book. I am amazed with the information contained in this book.
I use it as a source for all my research projects. A matriarchal support system that unites a global, archaic and historical understanding of women.
While reflecting upon Ray Bradbury’s death, after reading about it in the Los Angeles times article by Lynell George, I was touched by the childlike qualities of Bradbury’s character. A few quotes stood out for me. I would like to share them here and why they are important to me, and profoundly so!
Poobah
“Bradbury had very strong opinions about what the future had become. In the drive to make their lives smart and efficient, humans, he feared, had lost touch with their soul.”
Though I do enjoy the benefits of technology I can understand Bradbury’s statement. I would be lost on a typewriter. He was a genius when using this machine. I think we need to find places that tend to the soul. I am not thinking about church or religion, but to the qualities of life that sustain the soul, such as reading, friends, music and beer. To plan time away from others. As an introvert I find that time alone is one of the most precious ways in staying in touch with my soul. Also, to push my comfort zone now and then on some crazy adventure.
A quote from the article takes another direct quote from Bradbury,
“We’ve got to dumb America up again” he said.
Joe Strummer from the Clash also made a statement along the some lines as,
“You’ve gotta be slightly stupid.”
To me this is a pun on childlike learning, understanding innocence and applying this to each moment of life, and to new experiences. The world’s problems can be solved by fresh and creative minds.
Another quote I took from the article makes me think of William Blake, because like Blake, Bradbury had an enormous imagination.
“For Blake, paradise was the human imagination, and he spent most of his time there…His greatest achievement in his poetry and his designs is to carry us with him into such an imaginative world.” {The Stranger From Paradise by G.E. Bentley Jr, introduction XXV}.
Bradbury states his greatest achievement in a statement from Times Magazine on his 90th birthday,
“All I can do is to teach people to fall in love…my advice to them is, do what you love , and love what you do…if I can teach them that, I’ve done a great job.”
In conclusion I was amazed to read this from the article,
“Bradbury’s follow-up bestseller, 1953’s Fahrenheit 451 was based on two earlier short stories and written in the basement of the UCLA library, where he fed the typewriter 10 cents every half-hour…as Bradbury says “You’d type like hell” he often recalled “I spent $9.80 and in nine days I had “Fahrenheit 451.”
