The Tyger

A William Blake original of The Tyger, printed c. 1795

"The Tyger" is a poem by the English poet William Blake. It was published as part of his collection Songs of Experience in 1794 (see 1794 in poetry). It is one of Blake's best-known and most analyzed poems. The Cambridge Companion to William Blake (2003) calls it "the most anthologized poem in English."^[1]

Most modern anthologies have kept Blake's choice of the archaic spelling "tyger". It was a common spelling of the word at the time but was already "slightly archaic"^[2] when he wrote the poem; he spelled it as "tiger" elsewhere,^[1] and many of his poetic effects "depended on subtle differences of punctuation and of spelling."^[3] Thus, his choice of "tyger" has usually been interpreted as being for effect, perhaps to render an "exotic or alien quality of the beast",^[4] or because it's not really about a "tiger" at all, but a metaphor.^[1]

"The Tyger" is the sister poem to "The Lamb" (from "Songs of Innocence"), a reflection of similar ideas from a different perspective, but it focuses more on goodness than evil. The poem also presents a duality between aesthetic beauty and primal ferocity. The speaker wonders whether the hand that created "The Lamb" also created "The Tyger”.

The poem, together with other William Blake poetry, has been set to music by the group Tangerine Dream, and can be found on their album "Tyger" from 1987 (re-released 1992).

References

1. ^ ^{a b c} Morris Eaves. The Cambridge Companion to William Blake, 2003. ISBN 9780521786775 - pg. 207
2. ^ Duncan Wu, David Miall. Romanticism. 2000. ISBN 9780631222699 pg.77 - "Tyger: this spelling was already slightly archaic by Blake's time."
3. ^ Edward Jenks (editor). The Independent Review. pg. 217 - "many of his effects depended on subtle differences of punctuation and of spelling.."
4. ^ Poems by William Blake - study guide

External links

• The Tyger Bibliography at the Wayback Machine (archived May 9, 2008)
• "The Tyger" set to music From the 1990 concept album “Tyger and Other Tales”
• The Taoing of a Sound – Phonetic Drama in William Blake’s The Tyger Detailed stylistic analysis of the poem by linguist Haj Ross