SONGS OF INNOCENCE AND OF EXPERIENCE : SHREWING THE TWO CONTRARY STATES OF THE HUMAN SOUL, 1789 - 1794 / by William Blake, Introduction and Commentary by Sir Geoffrey Keynes

William Blake was an English poet, painter, and printmaker. Largely unrecognised during his lifetime, Blake is now considered a seminal figure in the history of both the poetry and visual arts of the Romantic Age. His prophetic poetry has been said to form "what is in proportion to its merits the least read body of poetry in the English language".His visual artistry has led one British art journalist to proclaim him "far and away the greatest artist Britain has ever produced".Although he only once journeyed farther than a day's walk outside London during his lifetime,he produced a diverse and symbolically rich corpus, which embraced the imagination as "the body of God",or "Human existence itself".