Monday, February 20, 2012
Racial Commentary in "The Little Black Boy"
"The Little Black Boy" stood out to me most prominently as it brings the slavery issue to the forefront once again unlike any of the other poems in this group. Here, Blake seems to be making a distinction between the innocence of black children and that of whites, namely that blacks are "bereav'd of light," an element associated with the divine since God lives in the sun according to the poem. Because black children lack this divine light, then, they must learn "the heat to bear" after which God will invite them to rejoice "round my golden tent,"steps which whites need not perform. Furthermore, Blake suggests that once both the black and white children have assembled "upon our fathers knee," the black child must shade the whites from the heat until he can also bear it. On one level, this poem is also a critique of Christianity and the established Church through the naiveté of the poem's young characters. More deeply, though, it is a harsh critique of the current slavery situation, which, as pervasive as it was into the social structure, changed the very meaning of youthful innocence according to color. Simply because God chose to make them darker than the rest, black children enjoy less innocence and must do more than whites to obtain the acceptance of God.
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I agree with your concept of "Black Boy" as a critique of slavery; did you think of the possibility that Blake is arguing that the black child may be more innocent and morally deserving than the white child, because he must work harder to gain God's approval, as well as fighting the injustices placed on him by the earthly burden of slavery?
ReplyDeleteI also thought that this was the most interesting poem in the 'songs of innocence" collection that we read because it is a lot less subtle in its attack on racism and religion than all the other poems. It also made me think of "The Negro's Complaint" that we read earlier in the semester, because it is also a poem written by a white man from the view of a slave that is criticizing slavery and racism.
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