The Frontispiece of Milton: A Poem

I wanted to take the opportunity to dwell a little further on the art of the frontispiece and speak about it in relation to self-annihilation. The most striking detail of this frontispiece is the split in the title that seems to display a broken name. Milton is deliberately pushing into the work causing a disturbance. The cover anticipates the theme of self-annihilation in the work that Milton desires to ultimately seek. Blake’s choice to split the title echoes the line in the work: “I will go down to the sepulcher to see if morning breaks!/ I will go down to self annihilation and eternal death.” The splitting of his name in the frontispiece demonstrates his attempt to rip apart his identity–to annihilate himself. It appears that the name has been broken into two equal halves and I am assuming that in the second book, Milton after his cleansing annihilation in the “Eternal Death” will be reunited in “one wonderful body.”

I find it peculiar that Blake deems it necessary for Milton to sacrifice himself as Christ did. I cannot wait to see the result of the supreme self-sacrifice in the end of this poem. Until then, however, I wonder why the self-sacrifice is necessary–does Blake see it as the only way to break free from Urizen? Why must Milton be the figure to bring forth the New Jerusalem? I guess Blake must identify with Milton as an artist (pretty bold move) and sees his representation of Satan in Paradise Lost as containing an absurd amount of energy–embodying revolution and passion. Blake must see this rendition as sufficient as to choose Milton as he requires him to harness the energy from his creation and “claim the Hells, [his] Furnaces, [as he goes] to Eternal Death.” Thoughts on the subject?

 

Milton, Selfhood, and Communication with the Divine

Milton’s proclamation that he must “go down to self annihilation and eternal death” is accompanied by the threat “Lest the Last Judgment come & find me unannihilate / And I be siez’d & giv’n into the hands of my own Selfhood” (Plate 15, lines 23-24). Self annihilation in this sense refers not to physical destruction but to the mental, emotional, and spiritual crucifixion of the self: the destruction of the old, entrenched ways of living in favor of the new. The overarching message of “Milton: A Poem” is Blake’s version of Jesus’s admonition in Matthew 16:25: “For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it.”

“Losing one’s life” in the context of this verse and of “Milton” is to destroy the power of the self over the spiritual state in order to gain the power of God over one’s soul. Blake’s interpretation of the Fall posits that Man severed his relationship to God, in which the divine was in direct communication with the mortal, in favor of an entirely human-centered focus. Blake does not dismiss the power or importance of the human element of faith, but he does affirm his belief in the importance of looking to the divine as the focus of one’s life. Only opening one’s mind and spirit to the power and methods of the divine (this is, of course, encapsulated in Blake’s idea of the “poetic genius”) can free the soul from the bonds of human-constructed laws and systems that proscribe the inspiration and creation of the imagination. “Dying to self” is thus the tenet by which Blake would have every person live: he affirms a mortal life that is nonetheless centered on the divine and anticipates the ultimate communication with God throughout eternity.

The consequence of failing to “self-annihilate” is to be condemned to Hell at the Last Judgment, or the final coming of Christ. To Blake, Hell, or eternal suffering, is encapsulated in the idea of “Selfhood”: an almost independent entity that, when given full reign over a person’s consciousness, places him in a state of constant self-awareness. Given the dominance of moral law, specifically that of the all-powerful Church, over an individual’s conscience, self-awareness in this life leads to a constant examination and condemnation of one’s “sinful” motives. For Blake is focusing primarily on the differences between the moral state propounded by the Church and that which he believes is the one truly in line with Christ’s life on Earth and the power of the divine present in humanity. According to Blake, mortal systems for regulating the conduct of one’s life emphasize constant evaluation of the self and one’s actions in place of a God-centered faith in which the divine is expressed via human creation and art.

To Blake, a constant focus on one’s own self – one’s thoughts, actions, and motivations – allows self-centeredness to become the compass of an individual soul. Every thought and event is evaluated in relation to the self. Conversely, a God-centeredness opens the door for the type of artistic imagination and production of which Blake is a staunch proponent.

Freedom through Death and Rebirth

In response to kathcal and singerofinnocence,

I agree that there are strong connections between Milton and slave spirituals, and especially the link to Blake’s disapproval of the mental enslavement by Urizen’s reason. When re-reading this plate, I was reminded of part of a poem by the Muslim mystic poet, Rumi, in which the speaker invokes the voice of G-d:

I would love to kiss you.

The price of kissing is your life.

Now my loving is running toward my life shouting,

What a bargain, let’s buy it.

Both in Rumi’s poem and Blake’s work, the idea of abandoning life on earth in order to connect with G-d is the only way for a person to achieve the level of oneness they desire. Without death, and the self-annihilation of the current state of existence, mankind will be deprived of the of the greater significance and connection for which they yearn, forever trapped in their own “Selfhood.”

One aspect of the picture on page 167 that I also noticed was the shape of the muscles depicted on Milton’s back as he pushes against Urizen. There seems to be a small, angular opening in his lower back that reminded me of the vaginal imagery we discussed in earlier works that is a symbol for Christ’s wound, as well as a path through which one can experience the poetic genius. Because of this, Blake perpetuates the link between self-annihilation and rebirth that ultimately brings man closer to Christ through an exertion of poetic genius and uninhibited sexuality.

Slavery as a Component of Milton

In response to kathcal,

I think that your connection between Milton and slave spirituals is not tenuous at all but, rather, quite an adept recognition. In fact, I would further argue that Milton: Book the First explores another form of slavery to which Blake frequently alludes: mental enslavement. Just as Blake disapproves of the institution of slavery, as is evident in many of his works, he also disapproves of the binding moral and logic-based laws of Urizen; such disapproval led him to put forward the idea of self-annihilation as a way of creating distance from the rational, systematized part of oneself. I’m curious about your claim that self-annihilation involves the abandonment, or sacrifice as you referred to it, of autonomy. Quite contrarily, I would argue that the act of self-annihilation enables one to become autonomous, The act of self-annihilation in and of itself is destructive but it doesn’t degrade the part of oneself that is intrinsically your own. Self-annihilation is a way of freeing oneself from Urizen’s ties and, on a more conceptual level, it is not the separating of the self into two parts, it is the final freeing of the self from a counterpart to which it was unceremoniously attached–Urizenic law.

Considering Milton in the context of slavery commentary, the engraving on Pg. 126 (shown below) takes on a double entendre of sorts. Milton’s personage, a sinewy character lunging forward and attacking Urizen dually suggests a break from his previous state of self and, more generally, from a state of subjugation and powerlessness. Certainly, the image of Milton is one of a man who has toiled laboriously, with brawny and defined muscles. One may even be as bold as to say that some of the markings on the back of Milton could be interpreted as scars from lashings by a whip. Thus, Milton gains a powerful, implicit jab at the slavery movement of the time while he furthers his contention imagistically that the self must be freed from Urizenic law to truly be capable of entering the “Kingdom of Heaven.”.

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See Where All Our Follies are Led

As with most cases, I find myself going back to Michelangelo and Renaissance Italy.  This is his Last Judgement Fresco from 1536-41, on the altar wall of the Sistine Chapel.  We have Jesus in the center, painted to appear like Apollo, the sun god (Los?).  At first glance there appears to be chaos with the Last Judgement, but if you look closer, you’ll see that the saved souls are being lifted from the earth on Jesus’ right hand side (the left side of the painting for us), and the damned are being dragged downward into Hell, or onto a boat that would take them to Hell.

Hm…so how is Milton/Satan? He says “I in my Selfhood am that Satan: I am that Evil One!” / He is my Spectre! in my obedience to loose him from my Hells/ To claim the Hells, my Furnaces, I go to Eternal Death.”  (ll. 30-32, p. 162).  In the illustration provided in the book, Satan is pushing Urizen down into the water (as these figures are being torn down from the sky into water before entering the fire), as we’ve seen with the post on O Brother Where Art Thou by kathcal.

Now I want to look at one of the most interesting details of the painting.

This is supposed to be St. Bartholomew, whose skin was flayed from his body, and Michelangelo used this figure as a self portrait.  He holds the skin that looks sickly and sallow, and what is left (albeit old), is a muscular figure–perhaps Bartholomew’s true emanation, and maybe even Michelangelo’s.

(Side note: all the figures in the Last Judgement were originally painted nude, then somebody came along and decided that the Pope’s chapel didn’t need such lasciviousness…question for all of you is whether you think that now the cloths should be removed to reveal the original painting the way Michelangelo intended it to be.  Keep in mind that this is fresco, and therefore removing may cause more damage.  This is an ongoing debate today over this painting).

Is the skin the “self-hood?”  It has been annihilated; in fact, torn from his body.  The self-hood drops down towards Hell, but Bartholomew/Michelangelo stays on the cloud close to Jesus/Los.  If the self is “unannihilated,” then Milton will be “siez’d & giv’n into the hands of my own Selfhood.” (ll. 23-24).

The self must be annihilated in order to escape being entrapped by it.  The presence of water indicates cleansing, maybe cleansing of the self before true judgement.

I’m going to go ahead and post the song “Down by the Water” by The Decemberists.  They start off the song with “See this ancient riverbed/ See where all our follies are led/Down by the water.”  Enjoy.

The Necessity of Milton’s “Going Down”

Plate 15 begins with the Bard’s boisterous proclamation of his own divine inspiration. He self-assuredly proclaims, “I am Inspired! I know it is Truth! for I Sing/ According to the inspiration of the Poetic Genius…” (51-2). The Heavens apparently don’t take too kindly to this, as the whole Earth trembles at his arrogance. Milton then rises, himself, and sheds “the robe of the promise, & ungirded himself from the oath of God.”
According to the footnote in the text, Milton rises up “Having recognized himself in the self-deceptive, self-righteous Satan of the Bard’s song.” He sees the failure in his mortal life of bringing his readers closer to God, as “The Nations still/ Follow after the detestable Gods of Priam…” (14-15). So Milton, determined to right his past wrongs, decides, “I will go down to self annihilation and eternal death,/ Lest the Last Judgment come & find me unannihilate/ And I be seiz’d & giv’n into the hands of my own Selfhood” (22-24). In stepping down from his “‘Elect’ status” as the book puts it, he hopes to be prepared (and help others prepare themselves) for the Last Judgment.
Take a look at plate 16, which is not included in the text.

 

Here, Milton is depicted as a Christ-figure (hence the halo), shedding the aforementioned “robe of the promise”, an allusion to the “garments of salvation” and “robe of righteousness” in Isaiah 61:10 according to the footnote in the text. Remember that Satan in “Milton a Poem” is Milton’s own Selfhood. He must annihilate that selfhood or remain among the Elect in Heaven, cognizant of the fact that he has led so many astray in the cult of personality surrounding him in contemporary England. In his descension, he mirrors the decision Jesus makes in Paradise Lost to sacrifice himself for mankind’s salvation. This is, perhaps, why he is depicted with the Halo.

The Necessity of Going Down.

After reading the paragraph of Milton’s proclamation on p.162, the repetition of the phrase “I will go down” in lines 20 and 21 reminded me of the classic Christian spiritual “Down to the River to Pray,” and I have included a version sung by Alison Krauss in the movie O Brother Where Art Thou.

Although the connection between Milton and slave spirituals may seem tenuous at the onset, these works both consider self-annihilation as a means to reaching the divine. When Milton states, “I will go down to the sepulcher to see if morning breaks!/ I will go down to self annihilation and eternal death,” he recognizes the need to sacrifice his current life in order to avoid remaining imbued with Satan, being “that Evil One!” (20-21, 30). The image of the sepulcher reinforces this idea that death (and all its physical pain and suffering) must precede oneness with God, a state that can only be achieved by the destruction of autonomic reasoning.

In the spiritual, the singer encourages others to accompany her to the river to pray, which is a reference to baptism, and this sacrament can be seen in the accompanying video. Though Christian doctrine believes Christ to have been the ultimate atonement for sin (a tenet with which Blake disagrees), the rite of baptism literally mimics the act of being reborn as a Christian, and one can not possibly be reborn if one has not already died. Even the most mainstream sects of Christianity preach one must sacrifice autonomy in order to be receive in the Kingdom of Heaven, so although this song lacks the intense corporeality of Blake’s images and prose in Milton, the underlying belief in the necessity of self-annihilation drives both.

Is Blake unconsciously patriarchal?

In Visions of the Daughters of Albion, we learned that Blake takes similar stand with feminist at his time. However, Blake still stayed within a restricted feminism. His feministic arguments are more inclined to free women from the traditional moral cage rather than treating men and women equally. In Milton, Milton was freed by his “Sixfold Emanation”, his three wives and three daughters (p. 149). These six women symbolize Milton’s suppressed feminine desire and his spiritual form of self.

On one hand, women are powerless victims and forced to reluctantly reproduce. Oothoon reproduces Leutha’s trap to the girls while being a victim herself (p.64). The shadowy female in Europe a Prophecy is powerless and can only complain about the vicious reproduction she has to take on doing (p.98-99). Enitharmon, the character that suppress Orc and Los, put men into her eighteen hundred years of female dream (p.101). On the other hand, women are symbols of sexual liberation and free desire. Oothoon calls for “free love” constantly in Visions of the Daughters of Albion. In Moravian tradition, Jesus is feminine. In the image of Milton strangling Urizen, we also see his Sixfold Emanation above him. His Sixfold Emanation is artistic and joyful. These are all images that Blake truly praises.

Nevertheless, women are never the revolutionary in Blake’s work. They don’t strangle Urizen. They don’t bring revolution like Orc and Los. One can definitely argue that Blake portrays the oppressed situation of female to call for changes. But can we also argue that Blake never put female as revolutionary characters in the center of his system is being unconsciously patriarchal? In the New Jerusalem, what will the gender system be?

Optional Question Prompts for 3/30

Optional question prompts for this week:

1. Why does Milton need to “go down to self-annihilation and eternal death”? (Plate 15, ln. 22; p. 162)
hint: take a peak at the accompanying illustration/text images in the Blake Archive.

2. How is Milton like (or unlike) Satan?

Feel free to build off each other’s comments. Please download the WordPress app on your smart phone, so we can follow the blog if we decide to meet outside of class this Friday.

Paradox of Sexual Reproduction

I’m interested in taking a closer look at lines 25-35 of plate 3.   Claudia and I worked on these lines in class last week, and hopefully I can push our reading a little further.   The first two lines say “the human race began to wither” because the “Healthy built / Secluded places, fearing the joys of Love,/ And the diseas’d only propagated”.   These lines dinstinguish between the physical and mental.    Even though more and more people are reproducing and having kids, the human race is withering.  When Blake talks about healthy people, he probably is referring to their mental rather than their physical health.  The diseased of mind, not body, are the ones who reproduce and have children.  Those who are healthy of mind are those who are aware of the “joy of love,” while those who are diseased of mind are the ones who cannot perceive the joys of love, but rather “propogate”.  Blake is distinguishing between the functional and purely pleasurable aspects of sex, and champions pleasure over functionality.  In the next few lines, Blake expands upon this pleasure-functionality contrary, and things get pretty confusing.  Antamon (the male seed) calls up Leutha (sin) from her “valleys of delight”.   Sotha (frustrated sex) gives Odin (Scandinavian war God), a Code of War.  Again, Blake highlights the pleasurable, enjoyable aspect of sex, and suggests that when sex is not appreciated for this pleasure, the consequence is war!  Frustrated sex is expressed through violence, and suppressed lust is transformed into war.  So why is it so important to appreciate sex for its sensual pleasures?  In the next few lines, Blake answers this question.  The lines read, “These were the Churches: Hospitals: Castles: Palaces./ Like nets and gins and traps to catch the joys of Eternity”.  The speaker equates churches and hospitals.  Hospitals breed sick people, and this line suggests churches do the same.  These sick people are the ones who do not understand sensual pleasure.  This idea, then, that sex is purely functional and not pleasurable, is perpetuated by the church.  And this is a problem, because this belief will eventually “catch the joys of Eternity”.