William Blake on Self and Soul

by Laura Quinney

Overview

It has been clear from the beginning that William Blake was both a political radical and a radical psychologist. In William Blake on Self and Soul, Laura Quinney uses her sensitive, surprising readings of the poet to reveal his innovative ideas about the experience of subjectivity.Blake’s central topic, Quinney shows us, is a contemporary one: the discomfiture of being a self or subject. The greater the insecurity of the “I” Blake believed, the more it tries to swell into a false but mighty “Selfhood.” And the larger the Selfhood bulks, the lonelier it grows. But why is that so? How is the illusion of “Selfhood” created? What damage does it do? How can one break its hold? These questions lead Blake to some of his most original thinking.Quinney contends that Blake’s hostility toward empiricism and Enlightenment philosophy is based on a penetrating psychological critique: Blake demonstrates that the demystifying science of empiricism deepens the self’s incoherence to itself. Though Blake formulates a therapy for the bewilderment of the self, as he goes on he perceives greater and greater obstacles to the remaking of subjectivity. By showing us this progression, Quinney shows us a Blake for our time.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780674054462
Publisher:	Harvard University Press
Publication date:	05/15/2010
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	216
File size:	279 KB

About the Author

Laura Quinney is Professor of English, Brandeis University.

Table of Contents

Contents Preface Acknowledgments A Note on Citation Introduction: The Impossible Self 1. Empiricism and Despair 2. Wordsworth, Plato, and Blake 3. The Four Zoas: Transcendental Remorse 4. Milton: The Guarded Gates 5. Jerusalem: The Will to Solitude Notes Bibliography Index

What People are Saying About This

Harold Bloom

Much of William Blake's most extraordinary work depends on his concept of 'Selfhood.' Laura Quinney has gone beyond all previous attempts to deal with Blake's treatment of what it means to be a solitary consciousness. Quinney illuminates Blake's very original relationship to the Gnostic heresy and his astonishing vision of what might redeem our humanity without falling into received doctrines.

Much of William Blake's most extraordinary work depends on his concept of 'Selfhood.' Laura Quinney has gone beyond all previous attempts to deal with Blake's treatment of what it means to be a solitary consciousness. Quinney illuminates Blake's very original relationship to the Gnostic heresy and his astonishing vision of what might redeem our humanity without falling into received doctrines.

Paul Fry

Quinney powerfully rereads both Blake's early work and his later visionary poems as an unfolding record of the embattled psyche. This extremely important contribution to our understanding of Blake should appeal not just to Blakeans but to all who think about the psychology of transcendence.
— Paul Fry, Yale University

Editorial Reviews

Quinney's readings of Blake's works, from Thel to Jerusalem, offer much insight, particularly when she engages with the debates of Blake's time.

Times Literary Supplement - Shirley Dent

Much of William Blake's most extraordinary work depends on his concept of 'Selfhood.' Laura Quinney has gone beyond all previous attempts to deal with Blake's treatment of what it means to be a solitary consciousness. Quinney illuminates Blake's very original relationship to the Gnostic heresy and his astonishing vision of what might redeem our humanity without falling into received doctrines.

Harold Bloom

Quinney powerfully rereads both Blake's early work and his later visionary poems as an unfolding record of the embattled psyche. This extremely important contribution to our understanding of Blake should appeal not just to Blakeans but to all who think about the psychology of transcendence.

Paul Fry

Quinney's readings of Blake's works, from Thel to Jerusalem, offer much insight, particularly when she engages with the debates of Blake's time.
— Shirley Dent

Times Literary Supplement