The Book of Urizen

William Blake · 1794 CE · Poem · English · Romantic

A shadow separates itself from the Eternals, withdraws into a void, and comes back holding a book of brass with one law in it for all — after which the eternal world has to be measured, divided and shut inside a body. Los watches the self-closing and beats it into shape across seven ages, and what is born of the watching is a child of fire. Blake set the plates in double columns with numbered chapters and verses, so the page itself argues with Genesis.

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Lineage

• responds to ↑ Genesis
  Anonymous · c. 550 BCE · Scripture
• responds to ↑ Paradise Lost
  John Milton · 1667 CE · Poem

Attributes

Closest analogues

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