The poem “The Chimney
Sweeper” by William Blake appears in his collection of poems titled Songs of Innocence. It is written in the form of a story which is narrated
by a small child who works as a chimney sweeper. During Blake’s time the
English society employed little, almost infant children as chimney sweepers.
Their small size made them the perfect tools to go down the narrow chimneys and
clean them while the children themselves remained covered in black soot. Many
of these children also faced premature death owing to injuries and constant
inhalation of the chimney fumes. They were not cared for and lived in hunger
and poverty. The poem depicts the innocence of a small child who can still
dream about angels in spite of a cruel society which imposes a life of misery
upon him.
The narrator begins by
telling the story of his own life. His mother died when he was very young and
his father sold him as a chimney sweeper when he could barely utter the word
‘sweep’ and cried ‘weep’ ‘weep’ instead. This refers to the cry of chimney
sweepers who go down the street crying ‘sweep’ ‘sweep’, offering their
services. But they are often so young that they can only pronounce the word as
‘weep’ ‘weep’. Ironically, the word ‘weep’ here also indicates that the child
is actually crying out of pain and hunger. The child says that he sweeps chimneys
and goes to bed covered in soot.
The child goes on and
narrates the story of Tom Dacre, a young boy who is new to the world of chimney
sweepers. His curly white hair is compared to the fleece of a lamb reinforcing
the idea of innocence as the motifs of a lamb and a child often represent. He
cried when his head was shaved. But the narrator, who already has some
experience, comforts his new comrade saying that if he does not have any hair
on his head the soot cannot spoil his white hair. This again indicates a
child’s innocent logic that he uses to look at misery with a positive attitude.
Then the narrator says
that on that very night Tom Dacre had a nightmare. He saw thousands of chimney
sweepers along with his fellows- Dick, Joe, Ned and Jack, locked in black
coffins. This nightmare may be interpreted as a result of a claustrophobic
experience that Tom Dacre may have faced the very first time he went down a
chimney. A black coffin also symbolizes death. This again shows the near death
experience that the children undergo while they sweep the chimneys.
However, a child’s
imaginative capacity is powerful enough to surpass a nightmare and thus Tom Dacre
dreams that an angel comes with a key and liberates them from their coffins.
They find themselves upon a green plain and run through it down to the river
where they wash off their soot and emerge clean and naked, leaving behind their
bags and tools. Nakedness is again a symbol of an innocent and pure state of
being. Then the children rise upon the clouds and play with the wind,
suggesting an image where the children themselves can be viewed as angels. Then
the angel tells Tom that if he is a good boy God will always remain by his
side.
Thus Tom Dacre and the
other children wake up to a dark and cold morning and collect their bags and
brushes to go to work. This brings back the image of the harsh reality that the
children live in. But Tom feels happy and warm as he now believes that if he
does his duty he need not fear harm. The last line brings the tale to a conclusion
by providing a moral as is common in children’s stories. But Blake also uses
this line to criticize the hypocrisy if the society. It teaches poor and
miserable children to do their duty while it reaps the benefit of their labour
and then ignores their plight.
