Blake, Nation And Empire

Blake, Nation and Empire challenges the orthodoxy of the politics of William Blake as exclusively radical, defined by his participation in the revolutionary ferment of the 1790s. It examines his work in the context of emergent discourses of nation and empire, and of the construction of a public sphere, and restores the longevity to his artistic career by placing particular emphasis on his output in the 1820s. Relevant contexts include technology, sentimentalism, Ireland and Catholic Emancipation, missionary prospectuses and body politics. Blake's work is shown not only to be complexly embedded in the culture of his time but also to prefigure and contest the imperial century of pax Britannica.

David Worrall is Senior Lecturer, St Mary's College of Higher Education, Strawberry Hill, Twickenham.

Steve Clark is with Nara Women's University.

Introduction--David Worrall & Steve Clark * PART I: BLAKE IN THE 1790s * Blake's Mistake--Morris Eaves * Alternative Europes: Blake and London's print cultures--David Worrall * Blake, Taste and the State of the Nation--Jon Mee * Blake and Romantic Imperialism--Saree Makdisi * Blake's Gendering of the Nation--Susan Matthews * Blake and the Syntax of Sentiment--James Chandler * PART II: BLAKE AFTER WATERLOO * 'What is Liberty without Universal Toleration': Blake Homosexuality and the Cooperative Commonwealth--Christopher Z. Hobson * Restoring the Nation to Christianity: Blake and the Aftermyth of Revolution--Andrew Lincoln * Blake and the Ancient Britons--Jason Whittaker * Jerusalem as Imperial Revelation--Steve Clark * Nation and Empire in Blake's Jerusalem--Robert N. Essick * Yah and His Two Sons: Two Sons Satan and Adam--Morton Paley * Blake After Blake: A Nation Discovers Genius--Joseph Viscomi * Index