Blake on Language, Power, and Self-Annihilation

JOHN J. JONES Associate Professor of English at Jacksonville State University, USA.

"This lucidly written book is a welcome contribution to the dialogue about Blake and language. Jones insightful close readings are doubly enriched by eighteenth-century discourses and by a Bakhtinian vision of the effects of language on consciousness and relationships. Blake on Language, Power, and Self-Annihilation moves through Blake s oeuvre to explore the interrelated themes of monologism, dialogism, selfhood, and imposition, and culminates in a particularly fine reading of Jerusalem. Bringing Blake s representations of inspiration, authorship, and the role of the reader into relation with his concept of self-annihilation, this study advances our understanding of the potencies and potentialities of language in Blake s work." - Angela Esterhammer, University of Zurich "Thiscrucialbook sheds new light on Blake'scomplex conceptsof authorship, inspiration, and what the poet repeatedlyrefers to as Self-Annihilation. It also stands out asone of the fewstudies toapply recenttheoriesconcerning Blake's artistic andproduction methods.The result is a series of superb readings thatilluminate the evolution ofBlake's oeuvre, from the Songs to Jerusalem." - Michael Macovski, Georgetown University

• Introduction: 'Otherness as Origin' Blakean Inspiration and 'Self-Annihilation' The Discourse of 'Selfhood' Self-Annihilation and Dialogic 'Inspiration' Songs of Innocence and of Experience: Contrary States, Conflicting Voices The Marriage of Heaven and Hell: Dialogue and 'Imposition' The [First] Book of Urizen: The Problem of Authorial Selfhood Milton: The Annihilation of Authorial Selfhood Jerusalem: The Reader and Self-Annihilation The Annihilation of Authorial Selfhood in Jerusalem Conclusion: The Irony of Self-Annihilation