Publications and Research

Document Type

Review (of Book, Film, Etc.)

Publication Date

2001

Abstract

Although William Blake is the quintessential multidisciplinary artist – his achievements in literature and the visual arts are for the most part uncontested – as far as we know, he was never particularly interested in music. Indeed, neither his poetry nor his pictures describe or depict music directly. Yet, in the last 200 years or so, his work has made an astounding mark on composers and music. One sees Blake's influence primarily in the numberless musical settings of his poems, but also in more general, indefinite, and ineffable way – a very Blake-ian one, I am tempted to say. I went to see "William Blake" at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York with the intention of learning why and how.

Comments

This review was originally published in Music in Art, available at https://www.jstor.org/stable/41818666

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