The Tyger
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"The Tyger" is a poem by the English poet William Blake. The poem was published as part of his collection Songs of Experience and was written sometime around 1794. It is one of Blake's best known poems. It is also one of the most analysed of his poems.
Gnostic Themes
In both form and subject the poem closely follows his earlier work "The Lamb" that was part of his Songs of Innocence collection. He references this work in the fifth stanza with the question "Did He who made the lamb make thee?". While "The Lamb" lauded a noble and gentle God, "The Tyger" looks at the God who created death and misery in the world. The poem is an exploration of Gnostic thought, which very much interested Blake. This is heavily inspired by the works of John Milton, of whom Blake sometimes considered himself a successor. The lines "On what wings dare he aspire?/What the hand dare seize the fire?" can be seen as a reference to the story of Prometheus or that of Paradise Lost and begins the speculation that Lucifer may also have played a role in creating the universe. The lines from the fifth stanza "When the stars threw down their spears/ And watered heaven with their tears," are also often considered to be a reference to Paradise Lost. Critical attention has often been drawn to "the arrival of a Great Fiery meteor"³ over London in the summer of 1783, undoubtedly interpreted by Blake as a Gnostic symbol of divine presence and fertility.Industrialization
Blake was one of the most noted romantic poets and like them he saw the pastoral country side as idyllic and viewed industrialization as a blight. "The Tyger" uses many images of the industrial world: fire, hammers, anvils, and furnaces all convey an image of the "satanic mills" of the nineteenth century.Experience
"The Tyger" was published as a part of Songs of Experience and the poem can also be seen as dealing with the growing knowledge of the world as one ages. While "The Lamb" is grounded in the pastoral settings of Blake's youth "The Tyger" is set in the industrialized modernity. "The Tyger" reflects a knowledge that evil exists in the world and that benevolence is not omnipresent.
Similarly, the Tyger poses an exceptional theological question. The tiger is very beautiful, but it is also very dangerous, a creature capable of great destruction. If God created the tiger, then, what does this say about God?
Allusions to the poem
The third story in The Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling (1894) is titled "Tiger! Tiger!" However, Kipling's Tiger, Shere Khan, has a withered leg and therefore lacks the "fearful symmetry" of Blake's Tyger.
The title of Northrop Frye's first groundbreaking work on Blake Fearful Symmetry is a quote from the poem.
Henry Cowell declared that his fearsome solo piano composition Tiger (ca. 1928) "was suggested originally by William Blake's poem on 'Tyger, tyger, burning bright.'"
There is also a reference to the poem in the song "Every New Day" by Five Iron Frenzy, which quotes the first two lines of one of the stanzas, "When the stars threw down their spears, watered heaven with their tears..."
The song "William Blake" by Daniel Amos makes several references to the poem. In fact, Blake's inspiration surfaces quite frequently in the work of D.A. frontman Terry Scott Taylor, including an album named after a line in this poem, Fearful Symmetry.
In an episode of The Suburban Jungle, the poem is used as the "soundtrack" for a flashback sequence [link]
Tangerine Dream's song Tyger, on their album of the same name, is the poem set to music.
Alfred Bester's novel The Stars My Destination was originally published as Tiger! Tiger!.
Alan Moore's and Dave Gibbons' Watchmen features an entire chapter which revolves around a bit of text from this poem.
The novel and movie, The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys references this poem several times.
In a strip of Bill Watterson's comic Calvin and Hobbes, Calvin makes reference to Blake's poem while watching his stuffed tiger sleep.
In the TV show there is an episode entitled "Tyger, Tyger". The episode is an interpretation of the poem, with Catwoman as the guest villainess.
Episode 18 of the second season of The X-Files was titled Fearful Symmetry. The story involved bizarre occurrences at a zoo.
A character labeled "Mr. Big" (Martha Plimpton), who appears in episodes 12 and 13 of the TV show Surface quotes lines from the poem.
Part 3 of "Farenheit 451" by Ray Bradbury is called 'Burning Bright', which is in the first line of this poem, and the section of the book also deals with similar themes as this poem.
Katie Melua's song 'Tiger in the Night' is also based on the poem, featuring the lines You are the tiger burning bright, deep in the forest of my night
In the fifth issue of the comicbook miniseries "Origin" the poem is read by the character Rose while panels depict Wolverine hunting with a pack of wolves.
The one-shot "The Tyger" in The Punisher series has the poem's subject as an analogy to the nature of vigilantism and, ultimately, Frank Castle himself.
Topics on the spelling of tyger
Rumour has it that Blake specifically chose the Old English spelling of "tyger" (over the standard English of "tiger") because that particular version of the word evoked a more terrifying imagery and deeper visceral reaction from the reader1.
A similar idea is also said to have motivated A. A. Milne, author of the Winnie the Pooh illustrated children's books, in the naming of his Tigger character.
Since the word "tiger" invoked a more menacing image, A. A. Milne supposedly chose to soften the name, by adding the extra "g" to "tiger", so that the Tigger character would appear less threatening to his readership2.
From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.See also
TrocheeExternal links
Lipoti's Banquet address] and [Tigers in literature and popular culture]
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