Tags
Cameron, class, Clegg, economy, human rights, international, Osborne
Is this a holy thing to see
In a rich and fruitful land,
Babes reduced to misery,
Fed with cold and usurous hand?
Is that trembling cry a song?
Can it be a song of joy?
And so many children poor?
It is a land of poverty!
And their sun does never shine,
And their fields are bleak and bare,
And their ways are filled with thorns:
It is eternal winter there.
For where’er the sun does shine,
And where’er the rain does fall,
Babes should never hunger there,
Nor poverty the mind appall.
This remarkable poem – called Holy Thursday – perfectly sums up austerity Britain today.
Which is rather surprising as it was written in 1794.
At the time William Blake wrote the poem, the nation was supposed to be ‘rich and fruitful’ and the economy was growing – just as we are told it is today by Cameron and Osborne and Clegg.
But just like today the prosperity was only being felt by a few people at the top – and while they feasted and gloried in their newly acquired riches, around them there was poverty and hunger and children were ‘reduced to misery’.
And when Blake wrote that children were being fed by ‘usurous’ hand – (‘usury‘ – the practice of lending money and charging the borrower interest, especially at an exorbitant or illegally high rate) he could have been talking about Wonga.
Perhaps Cameron and Osborne and Clegg should remember that the massive inequalities Blake wrote about in this poem led to the French and American revolutions – and led directly to the birth of socialism in a much more radicalised Britain.
This poem reminds us that a society which is as blind to inequality as ours is today, should be prepared to reap what it sows.
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(A big thanks to writer and author Carol Hedges for reminding me about this poem)
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Related articles by Tom Pride:
How The Gove Stole Summer (with apologies to Dr. Suess)
Between 1998-2011 child poverty plummeted. Under Clegg and Cameron it’s soaring.
SERCO wins bid to run UK as Victorian theme park
Third-World Britain – over 25% of parents struggling to feed kids during school holidays
Parliament backs plans to cull paupers
57 out of 58 Lib Dems voted with Tories to cut pay for low-waged farm workers
Class warfare comes to the Tory Party
Cameron’s Big Society – TOFFS paying SPIVS to rip off PLEBS
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Please feel free to comment.
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I am always somewhat amused by the ”patriotic” interpretation put upon Blake’s ”Jerusalem” ..which again can be interpreted, in the light of his political views, as a bitter comment upon the effects of Industrialization upon the ”green and pleasant land” that he knew. As a boy, Blake walked in the fields surrounding London and saw”angels in the tress, their wings spangling the branches.’ By the time he was an adult, those fields had been built upon by speculators and had disappeared under row upon row of meanyl built houses, thrown up to accomodate the teeming masses that came to the city to find work.
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Plenty of Blake’s poems are relevant to our lives now…
I use Tyger in teaching about Victorians to Y5 – and the kids get it completely because of Danny Boyle’s Olympic opening.
That point where the Olympics stopped being the ConDems moment of xenophoblic glory – and became something we could all get behind. Funny how much they – and the Daily Mail – hated it. Just like they’d hate Blake if they thought about what he really meant.
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Before my mother died earlier this year we were talking about how much of what she and her generation had literally fought for was being dismantled, trashed by the current government, by the whole of British society that appears to have fallen in to the avaricious swamp of material acquisition. After WWII she had been inspired by people like Paul Robeson and made it very clear she expected us baby boomers (who had it all) to do something about it before we recreated the evils of the thirties.that she had grown up in
Revolution in what are becoming interesting times? I hope not but I fear that there will be blood on he streets in my lifetime 😦
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“Fed with cold usurious hand” is particularly apt right now.
Usury means lending money at (ruinous) rates of interest.
Many families, especially those on zero hours contracts or who have been sanctioned to make the Job Centres’ targets, are relying on loans from sharks like Wonga to put food on the table.
Children are being targeted by loan company ads to believe their parents can solve their problems by getting “quick easy” loans.
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Bluecat – yes, it’s remarkable how relevant the poem is to today’s Britain. I’ve added a comment about Wonga in the blog post – so thanks for that.
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Thanks Tom.
Again you hit the nail on it’s head. How much more can this country take before it’s Tipping Point is reached?
Pat xx
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Interesting that Dave, some months ago, quoted Blake’s ‘Jerusalem’ as somehow symbolic of UK culture. There was no reference by him (Dave) to ‘dark satanic mills’. Not surprising, really, since they’ve been probably privatised or closed down as not ‘cost-effective’. Whatever you do with Dave, don’t mention Magna Carta. You’ll just confuse him.
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Dave may not get his Magna Carta right but he certainly understands about removal our rights to the forests and the Inclosure acts. Asset stripping the UK to the detriment of poor children is the order of the day.
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Reblogged this on HUMAN RIGHTS & THE SIEGE OF BRITAIN POLITICAL JOURNAL.
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