Our four presenters approach Blake from starkly different angles—from ecology and disability studies to politics, book history, and reception history. These papers variously pioneer innovative ways of seeing Blake’s work or offer fresh interventions into well-established fields of Blake studies. They have been curated to speak to each other, yet also reflect the diverse array of scholarly approaches Blake has and will continue to inspire.
Writing at the dawn of the Industrial Revolution, keenly aware of earth’s degradation, Blake decried “dark satanic mills” marring England’s “green and pleasant land.” Elizabeth Giardina’s paper, “William Blake’s Arks, Watercolors, and Hydro-aesthetics of Human Design,” joins the robust ecocritical conversation around Blake’s work, exploring one aspect of his ecological thinking yet to be addressed by scholarship—his approach to water. Giardina traces Blake’s representations of the Deluge, Noah’s ark, and planetary water-cycles, examining how water (and “saturation”) functions in his art theory and practice (e.g. the materiality of watercolors). Arguing that Blake’s water-cycles are sites of ecological intimacy where damage is mutually inflicted, Giardina challenges ecocritical Blake scholarship which often asserts he depicted nature at the whims of humankind.
Moving from ecocriticism to disability studies, Sarah Weston’s paper, “Blake’s Stomach,” tackles the omnipresence of pain in Blake’s oeuvre. Although Blake lived with a lifelong, often-debilitating chronic illness, scholars have never considered how his constant, gnawing stomach pain (likely Inflammatory Bowel Disease) shaped his representations of and preoccupation with bodily suffering. Examining bloody looms spinning intestines, splitting-selves, anguished globules of blood, and “Bowlahoola” (the flame-filled forge of Blake’s creator-figure), Weston locates (for the first time) descriptions of Blake’s symptoms (found in letters) embedded in his poetry and art, contending that pain and creativity were comorbidities, deeply shaping Blake’s mythology. Weston reevaluates Blake’s “composite art” from a new disability-theory-informed angle, arguing that Blake’s hybrid art combatted prevailing aesthetic theories about representing pain.
Blake re-printed his books multiple times, often making minute changes that disclose rare insights into his shifting sentiment. When spotted, these subtle editorial moments are richly generative—yielding clues that help untangle Blake’s complex, often-contradictory thought and intent. In “The Nameless Shadowy Male,” Denise Gigante excavates previously-undetected revisions made to an 1821 copy of Europe: A Prophecy (1794). Grafting the turbaned head of French revolutionary Jean-Paul Marat onto the body of his mythological figure, “The Nameless Shadowy Female,” Blake bizarrely blended the political and religious, male and female, and anonymous and individualized martyrdom. Exploring Blake’s disenchantment with the French Revolution through the lens of his book history, Gigante furthers scholarship on Blake’s “copy theory” while also revising our understanding of his stance on one of the most polarizing, pivotal events in the Romantic era.
Our final panelist pivots to Blake’s legacy. When considering Blake’s posthumous influence, scholars frequently consider white artists: the Shoreham Ancients, Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, or WWII-era “Neo-Romantics.” Jonathan Gross’s paper, “Blake’s Prophetic Visions and Orozco’s Theosophy,” casts a wider net, scrutinizing Blake’s influence on the twentieth-century Mexican muralist, José Orozco. Blake, himself, imagined scrawling “frescoes” across London buildings. Establishing Orozco’s debt to Blake’s symbolism, Gross studies how both artists depicted prophecy, lambasted mechanization, and navigated censorship from hostile art establishments. Tracing, too, Blake’s influence on contemporary Latin American artists whose aerosol art covers the New York City subway, Gross supplements our still-emerging understanding of Blake’s global legacy.
Our four panelists will each speak for 12-13 minutes. Afterwards, our presider will facilitate unstructured discussion amongst participants and audience members for at least 15 minutes. I have sought a diversity of voices, spanning all levels of rank—from established to emerging scholars (two full, one assistant professor; one recent and one current PhD candidate). The scholar discussing Blake’s illness has the same disability Blake had. Our panelists hail from different types of institutions (public and private research universities; a private Catholic university) and geographic locations. They consider English their home-department, but variously hold joint appointments and affiliations elsewhere (from Art History to Data Sciences).