THE CHIMNEY SWEEPER
WILLIAM BLAKE
Comprehension Questions
Answer the following questions
1) What is the theme of the poem?
Ans: The theme of "The Chimney
Sweeper" misery, hope and death.
2) What is the tone of the poem “The Chimney
Sweeper”?
Ans: The tone of "The Chimney
Sweeper" is one of gentle innocence and trust.
3) Why is Tom Dacre compared to a sheep?
Ans: Tom Dacre compared to a sheep's back represents two things. He had
thick hair in light of the fact that there was no one to deal with him. And,
similar to the sheep, the child was innocent.
4) Who is Tom Dacre?
Ans: Tom was a young chimney sweeper like
the narrator.
5) Why does Tom Dacre crying?
Ans: Tom Dacre cried because his head’s
hair was being shaved off.
6) Who is “I” in the first line of the poem
“The Chimney Sweeper”?
Ans: “I” in the first line of the poem "The
Chimney Sweeper” is “The speaker”, the boy who is a Chimney Sweeper.
7) Who sold the speaker in the poem “The
Chimney Sweeper”?
Ans: Speaker’s father sold the speaker in the poem "The Chimney Sweeper".
8) What does “my tongue could scarcely cry”
mean/signify?
Ans: “My tongue could scarcely cry”
signifies that childhood is not a time to cry.
9) What does Tom see in his dream?
Ans: Tom saw that huge number of sweepers
was locked up in the coffins of black and afterward an Angel who had a bright
key and he opened the coffins and set them all free. They were playing, running
and snickering and they were washing in a river and shinning in the sun.
10) Who has a bright key?
Ans: An angel has a bright key.
Answer the following questions
1) Critically analyse the poem “The Chimney
Sweeper”.
Ans: William Blake features the stunning conditions where
the young chimney sweeps exist, as boys scarcely mature enough to try and say
sweep rather than "weep," are taken into administration. The poem
shows up as a feature of Songs of Innocence and there is a particular
acknowledgment by the reader that the young men live amidst awful encounters.
The Innocence variant uncovers that the boys don't have a clue about any better
and acknowledge their circumstance; even little Tom Dacre is "happy and
warm." Tom's dream of the boys who are locked up in coffins of black is
meant to horrify reader. The angel releases those boys with the bright key. The
imagery appears to get away from the seven year old narrator however isn't lost
on the reader who sees, despite the fact that it isn't said, just suggested,
that these boys will proceed in these positions until they either pass on from
sediment in their lungs or get too huge to fit up the chimneys. The boy is
something to be supported at the same time, for these boys, there is no prize,
but to keep doing "their duty." Failures to do so will without a
doubt result in the harm, the boys need to stay away from as they will be
rebuffed on the off chance that they don't work effectively. Brutality to
children was an unregulated and stunning social issue of the time; one which
William Blake felt emphatically about.
Consequently, the
subsequent rendition shows up in Songs of Experience. Here, the tone is
taunting and critical. The little fellow is as yet the narrator, he actually
acknowledges his circumstance to the point that the individuals who drive him
to work, his folks. However, the boy is a lot shrewder and the incongruity of
the circumstance doesn't get away from him in this adaptation as he can
perceive that it is so opposing to, while boys endure as chimney sweeps. The
boys in the previous adaptation are met by a heavenly messenger and in the last
form; the narrator perceives just the misery. William Blake is able therefore
to express his dissatisfaction with the situation and reveal how acceptance of
a situation does not make it acceptable.
2) Explain the conditions of the Chimney
sweepers.
Ans: Children, from
the beginning of time, have been apprenticed to blacksmiths, craftsmen, and
other merchants whose substantial positions would now be considered totally
unsatisfactory for them. During the Industrial Revolution, nonetheless, child
labor became effective in a way that had never occurred, as towns detonated
with production lines needing modest work. As creation blast, so too requested;
also, as families moved from the field into the urban areas, the typical cost
for basic items expanded even as the conditions declined an example
unmistakable to us in enormous urban areas today. To have the option to bear
the cost of lodgings near their work environments, parents would give their
kids something to do regularly fourteen-hour days in coal mineshafts,
processing plants, and the sky is the limit from there. The chimney sweepers
portrayed in Blake's poem are an especially impactful outline of the issue, not
just on the grounds that these were the absolute youngest laborers, but since
the young chimney sweepers were blameless boys who didn't have an appropriate
adolescence. They were sold by their parents when they were young. They needed
to work in dark sooty chimneys and they would be covered in soot. Also, since
their hair would get covered with soot, their heads would be shaved.
3) Critically examine the exploitation of the
chimney sweepers.
Ans: William Blake was
searing of what he saw as the harming outcomes of the advanced industrial
economy. A long way from considering it to be a engine room of progress and
flourishing, he viewed it as carrying broad torment and hopelessness to the
least fortunate and generally helpless in the public eye. In the two poems by
the name "The Chimney Sweeper," Blake centers around the exploitation
of child labor and the harming impacts it has on the kids compelled to attempt
to save themselves and their families from complete desperation. In the Songs
of Innocence poem, we are acquainted with a helpless youthful starving stray
sold into the chimney sweep exchange by his dad before he could scarcely talk.
He educates us regarding the huge number of youthful chimney sweeps currently
locked up in coffins of dark, an undeniable reference to how perilous it is for
little youngsters to work around here.
It's terrible enough that he's the victim of exploitation, yet it's far
worse. Blake's boy tune is here wealthy in significant considered social
injustice and imbalance, human exploitation, and human misery. Elder seems
appears to peep and voice itself through the much injured and furious fellow in
the chimney sweeper who doesn't acknowledge his forlorn part with confidence in
God and Christian ethical quality. All things considered, the poem stays a
kid's melody. This is obvious in the graceful procedure that has an innocent
quality in its straightforwardness of style and thought. The style of the poem
is all as straightforward and persuading as possible stand up. The music of the
poem is pleasant to get the ears effectively and to dive deep into the
listener's heart. In this regard, both the Chimney-Sweeper poems have a similar
perfection, straightforwardness, and resonance of a true child song. The poem,
a lot more limited than its friend sonnet involves three refrains of four lines
each. The lines are found to rhyme not uniformly as in the sister poem. Truth
be told, a decent arrangement of varieties happens in the artist's plan of
rhyming. While in the first stanza, the lines rhyme in the couplet, in the
subsequent refrain and the third the other lines rhyme. Such a variety may have
been liked by the poet to give the poem somewhat more unpredictable tone than
the vast majority of his child songs.
