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WILLIAM BLAKE’S: THE BOOK OF THEL. THE AESTHETIC VERSUS THE USEFUL?
Abstract
In The Book of Thel (The Book of ????, that is The Book of the Female), Blake’s main preoccupation, in my opinion focuses on the juxtaposition between the aesthetic and the useful, their antithesis and their synthesis to produce and explain the female identity. Knowing that Blake’s thought always moves in oppositional and synthetical structures, the useful versus the aesthetic is nothing more than the restless and perpetual fight of the dualisms of innocence and experience, energy and Urizen, imagination and reason. Taking into consideration that Blake’s dualisms are constructive rather than destructive, in The Book of Thel, he wonders and oscillates between the aesthetic and the useful. He attributes an indefinite, unclear kind of beauty to Thel, which is a progression of his thought since The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, where he associated the organs of reproduction with beauty, вЂthe genitals Beauty’, the sublime and the beautiful together, that is the head and the genitals, a confirmation that вЂMan has no Body distinct from his Soul …’. This progression of his thought relates to the formation of what is commonly called beauty (aesthetic value), an ethical feminine development in contradistinction to use value the necessity of survival: вЂвЂ¦ without a use this shining woman liv’d, / Or did she live. to be at death the food of worms.’ Nevertheless, the issue seems problematic. Thel, вЂthe daughter of beauty,’ finally is the вЂвЂ¦ beauty of the vales of Har.’ (Har in Greek mythology, that is ????? is the ferryman who carried the dead to the underworld and the etymology of the word Har (X??-??) is an euphemism of the verb ?????, meaning enjoy, take pleasure in), thus signifying quite the opposite; that is the death of the aesthetic possibly in favour of the useful. Thel lives in a world of uselessness, depression, and oblivion. Thus, Blake’s Har and the Greek Har introduce death as Thel’s ultimate refuge. The question is: is Thel after having rejected the (her) use value, a mere aesthetic value belonging to Har? Or her aesthetic value in the real world, the world of experience equals death?
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References34
David V. Erdman ed. The Complete Poetry & Prose of William Blake. Newly, Revised Edition. Commentary by Harold Bloom. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press; and Garden City, N.Y.: Anchor Books, Doubleday, 1988. 37.
Ibid. 34.
Ibid. 5.
Ibid. 3.
Blake’s Har, the вЂmountain’ in Tiriel, according to S. Foster Damon due to his weakness to cope with his lawless sons without having slain them with the power of the paternal curse lives in a vale, cut off from mankind unable to cope with the problems of humanity. In the genealogy of the Sons of Los, Har is no longer the father of all mankind, but only the sixteenth in the list. His immediate father is Satan, (self - love). His children are Ochim and Ijim, that is, вЂdoleful creatures’ and вЂsatyrs.’ … In The Book of Thel, Har’s domain is a place of primal innocence. The self - centered, nubile Thel is the mistress of вЂthe vales of Har’, the вЂbeauty of the vales of Har’, and when she is terrified at the voices issuing from her вЂgrave plot’, she flees back unhindered to the vales of Har, where she belongs. Damon, S. Foster. A Blake Dictionary: The Ideas and Symbols of William Blake. 1965. Rev. ed. Hanover: University Press of New England, 1988. p. 174. Har is the state of Self - love. p. 401. Nevertheless, the negativity of the concept is obvious.
The vales of Har, have been traditionally interpreted as a paradise-like world (Blake’s Beulah or pre-existence), and thus Thel is not subject to death. … Malgorzata LuczynskaHoldys. “Life exhal’d in milky fondness”- Becoming a Mother in William Blake’s The Book of Thel. Volume 46, Issue 4, Spring 2013. https://bq.blakearchive.org/46.4.luczynska. [accessed May 2022]. My opinion is that Har means death, thus Thel chooses death -with all the negative connotations that the word implies- instead of living in a urizenic world.
Sadly, it seems that there are no positive patterns in Blake’s later poetry to follow regarding female fulfillment either as an independent woman or in relation to others. The best that can happen to females such as Ololon and Jerusalem is their total absorption into their male counterpart, even if the outcome of this process is deemed glorious and ultimately positive. Malgorzata Luczynska-Holdys. “Life exhal’d in milky fondness”- Becoming a Mother in William Blake’s The Book of Thel. Volume 46, Issue 4, Spring 2013. https://bq.blakearchive.org/46.4.luczynska [accessed May 2022].
David V. Erdman ed. The Complete Poetry & Prose of William Blake. Newly Revised Edition. Commentary by Harold Bloom. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press; and Garden City, N.Y.: Anchor Books, Doubleday, 1988. 200.
Ibid. 6.
The Lilly, as her name suggests, signifies purity, virginity, and innocence, but it is interesting to remember that lilies have another primary symbolic association: death. This makes Blake’s symbolism extraordinarily consistent and links the Lilly to other elements in the text associated with death and mourning: the Clod of Clay, tombs, worms, withering of the body, and elegiac overtones. Would existence akin to that of the Lilly mean death for Thel? … https://bq.blakearchive.org/46.4.luczynska[accessed May 2022].
David V. Erdman ed. The Complete Poetry & Prose of William Blake. Newly Revised Edition. Commentary by Harold Bloom. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press; and Garden City, N.Y.: Anchor Books, Doubleday, 1988. 602.
Ibid. 492.
Ibid. 6.
Mellor, Kostelantz Anne. Blake’s Human Form Divine. Los Angeles. London. University of California Press, Berkeley, 1974, 34.
Bogen, Nancy ed. The Book of Thel. A Facsimile and Critical text. New York: Brown UP, 1971, 31.
David V. Erdman ed. The Complete Poetry & Prose of William Blake. Newly Revised Edition. Commentary by Harold Bloom. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press; and Garden City, N.Y.: Anchor Books, Doubleday, 1988. 62.
Ibid. 5.
Ibid. 369.
Ibid. 6.
Ibid. 4.
Ibid. 5.
Ibid. 3.
Ibid. 6.
Ibid. 4.
Ibid. 6.
Ibid.
Ibid. 5.
Ibid. 4.
Ibid. 3.
Ibid. 38.
Ibid. 604.
Ibid. 6.
Ibid. 34.
Ibid. 6
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