“The Chimney Sweeper”: Practical Criticism
William Blake’s poems of “The Chimney Sweeper,” published in 1789, have a lot of
implications to the harsh times in industrial-age Great Britain as seen from the eyes of a young
chimney sweep. This perspective gives Blake a lot of room to voice his grievances about certain
corrupt institutions or norms of the times without receiving the burden for the complaints
himself. William Black uses both the “Songs of Innocence” and “Songs of Experience” to
juxtapose both perspectives against one another in order to offer insight into the inhumane
treatment of chimney sweeps, the corruption of certain institutions in England, and to offer the
idea that neither perspective is right or wrong. Blake begins by using the two poems to give a
clear understanding of the tumultuous and arduous lifestyle that chimney sweeps during this era
had to endure for a plethora of different reasons. This leads into some implicated criticism on one
of the largest political institutions in England at the time, the Church, as there is a societal
understanding that no matter how harsh their life is, they will be granted everything in heaven.
After both of those concepts have been laid out in Blake’s short poems, reader can then use their
understanding of both Experience and Innocence to draw the conclusion that the two poems offer
perspectives that need one another to understand juxtapositions on both sides.
Throughout Innocence, the reader is exposed to some of the worst aspects of the lifestyle
of any given chimney sweep but from the eyes of a child ignorant to his actual position. “So in
your chimneys I sweep & in soot I sleep” (4) is referring to the barbaric idea of the children
themselves sleeping on the bags of soot that they had swept from their days work. This is where
Blake begins to lay out a lot of the evidence for the harsh living conditions of these sweeps, yet
the Innocence perspective keeps a somewhat optimistic viewpoint. “You know that soot cannot
spoil your white hair” (8). This is where the main character provides some optimistic input as to
why it’s good that Tom Ducre’s head was shaved. The idea of death is not far from either poems
as in Innocence “the coffins of black” (12) is an acknowledgement that the main character
understands the gravity of his situation, but only uses it somewhat ignorantly to keep himself
asleep at night because he isn’t in that position himself. “Tom’s dream is a depressing view of
himself and thousands of sweepers locked in dark coffins. These coffins symbolize death as well
as the darkness of being confined in life as a chimney sweeper” (Puchalski). Within Experience
Blake offers the line “they clothed me in clothes of death…” (7), which is the more realistic view
on boy’s current situation and the deathly nature of his enslavement.
Probably one of the biggest criticisms of the time was that of Blake’s, apparently
unintentional, outlook into how the Church of England was prolonging the harsh working
conditions of children and the lower class alike. Although Blake may not have intended on
