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Visions of the Daughters of Albion

 

 
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Visions of the Daughters of Albion is a 1793 poem by William Blake
William Blake

William Blake was an English people English poetry, Painting, and printmaker. Largely unrecognized during his lifetime, Blake is now considered a seminal figure in the history of both poetry and the visual arts of the Romanticism....
, produced as a book with his own illustrations. It is a short and early example of his prophetic books, and a sequel of sorts to The Book of Thel
The Book of Thel

The Book of Thel is a poem by William Blake, dated 1789 and probably worked on in the period 1788 to 1790.It is illustrated by his own plates, and is relatively short and easy to understand, compared to his later William Blake's prophetic books....
.

The central narrative is of the female character Oothoon, called the "soft soul of America", and of her sexual experience.






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Visions of the Daughters of Albion is a 1793 poem by William Blake
William Blake

William Blake was an English people English poetry, Painting, and printmaker. Largely unrecognized during his lifetime, Blake is now considered a seminal figure in the history of both poetry and the visual arts of the Romanticism....
, produced as a book with his own illustrations. It is a short and early example of his prophetic books, and a sequel of sorts to The Book of Thel
The Book of Thel

The Book of Thel is a poem by William Blake, dated 1789 and probably worked on in the period 1788 to 1790.It is illustrated by his own plates, and is relatively short and easy to understand, compared to his later William Blake's prophetic books....
.

Blake Daughters of Albion 2
The central narrative is of the female character Oothoon, called the "soft soul of America", and of her sexual experience. S. Foster Damon
S. Foster Damon

S Foster Damon was an American academic, a specialist in William Blake, a critic and a poet. He was born in Newton, Massachusetts. He was one of the Harvard Aesthetes, and married Louise Wheelwright, sister of John Wheelwright who was another poet identified with that grouping....
 (A Blake Dictionary) suggested that Blake had been influenced by Mary Wollstonecraft
Mary Wollstonecraft

Mary Wollstonecraft was an eighteenth-century Kingdom of Great Britain writer, philosopher, and feminist. During her brief career, she wrote novels, treatises, a travel literature, a history of the French Revolution, a conduct book, and a children's book....
's A Vindication of the Rights of Women, published in 1792.

Oothoon is in love with Theotormon, who represents the chaste man, filled with a false sense of righteousness. Oothoon desires Theotormon but is suddenly, violently raped by Bromion. After Oothoon is raped neither Bromion nor Theotormon want anything to do with her. They are all chained by the expectations of society. If Theotormon had realized that sex is not illicit, he may have had a healthy relationship with Oothoon. Bromion is enslaved by his violent act.

As is usual in Blake, the names of the characters represent their symbolic roles. Theotormon's name is derived from the Greek "theos", which means god, and the Latin "tormentum", which means twist or torment. The name of his rival Bromion is Greek meaning "roarer". Oothoon's name is from the poem "Oithona" in James Macpherson
James Macpherson

James Macpherson was a Scottish poet, known as the "translator" of the Ossian cycle of poems....
's "The Poems of Ossian", in which the eponymous heroine is raped by a rejected suitor, Dunrommath, but avenged by her true lover.

Bromion represents the passionate man, filled with lustful fire. Oothoon is the representation of a woman in Blake's society, who had no charge over her own sexuality. Blake has the Daughters of Albion look to the west, to America, because he believed that there was a promise in America that would one day end all forms of discrimination. It was to be in America, that races would live in harmony, and women would be able to claim their own sexuality. At the same time, Blake recognizes that though America has freed itself from British rule, it continues to practice slavery.

Blake used Plato's Allegory of the cave
Allegory of the cave

The Allegory of the Cave, also commonly known as Myth of the Cave, Metaphor of the Cave or the Parable of the Cave, is an allegory used by the Ancient Greece philosopher Plato in his work The Republic to illustrate "our nature in its education and want of education"....
 in Visions of the Daughters of Albion as a theme for the three characters not being able to understand the true nature of reality, without being hindered by convention
Convention (norm)

A convention is a set of agreement, stipulated or generally accepted standards, norm , norm or criterion, often taking the form of a Custom ....
. It has been argued that Theotormon is a mythicised version of John Stedman, whose book about his experience of slavery and brutality in Surinam on the coast of South America was being illustrated by Blake at the time.

Trivia


  • Bromion
    Bromion

    Bromion is a character in the mythology of William Blake. According to S. Foster Damon he represents Reason, from the side of the poet's mind....
     is a title used for Dionysos; it means the "loud-roarer".
  • The edition was very small, and copies have been individually traced.


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