Talk:The Tyger

Misc

" 'Tiger! Tiger! Burning bright, / in the forests of the night.'

Blake wrote that. Apparently the tiger was on fire. Maybe his tail got struck by lightning or something.

Flammable felines - what a weird subject for poetry." --Calvin, Calvin and Hobbes

Hmm... I like it ;-) --Ihope127 14:11, 12 July 2005 (UTC)

Blake means the vivid colour of the tiger - not that it is literally on fire!

Maybe its tail got roasted." --Qi Jing

Why does he rhyme "eye" with "Symmetry" they're kinda pushed to rhyme...

Back then, "symmetry" would have been pronounced "sim-mit-try," not "sim-mit-tree." Thorns Among Our Leaves 23:02, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

It might be a bit of a push to make it rhyme but its certain that's how its supposed to read. When its quoted in various places within pop culture it get's misread over and over and its one of my absolute pet peeves. Honestly it's worth including in the main article that it's supposed to be read, it really is THAT commonly incorrectly said. I have no idea how people (especially actors) can read it and not know that its supposed to be "sim-mit-try". It doesn't even scan if the fourth line doesn't rhyme! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.152.33.54 (talk) 18:06, 26 March 2013 (UTC)

Gay/Gigantism

Industrialization

Blake was one of the most noted gay poets and like them he saw the pastoral country side as idyllic and viewed industrialization as a blight.

The word "gay" (vandalism?) has an interwiki to "Gigantism." I have no idea what this meant to say originally. Thorns Among Our Leaves 23:02, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

If someone knows how to do references, David Erdmann's Prophet Against Empire will corroborate the French Revolution connection. CBR

The Lamb/The Tyger Homogenization

Considering the two poems' connections and similarities, the articles for them ought to be more homogeneous. Especially on whether or not to include a copy of the text in the article. Currently, The Lamb does, and The Tyger does not. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.230.161.164 (talk) 23:34, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

Slough Feg?

They have a song called "Tiger, Tiger!" that has the lines "The stars burn bright/In the forest of night/But what mortal hands and eyes will I see there?"

The last bit is a definite reference, as is the title... but does anyone know what the song has to do with the poem aside from those two references? I'm trying to figure out a connection (huge fan of Slough Feg here) but I can't find it. 98.200.52.17 (talk) 00:34, 3 May 2008 (UTC)

Kraven's Last Hunt

There's a spider-man story called Kraven's Last Hunt where the first and last verse is kind of...covered. Tyger is replaced with spyder. I was wondering why it wasn't linked in the article, this article is linked in Kraven's Last Hunt. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Hoopesk2 (talk • contribs) 04:50, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

The Poem

I cannot believe that I had to read the comments here, then go back and read the article searching for the link to the actual poem. Please remove your head from your arse and put at least the first verse here with a link"Click here to read more". ---anon. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 188.29.63.16 (talk) 20:03, 15 May 2012 (UTC)

Not including the quote because some other wiki**** decided that poems is within it's scope is silly.

It's like not displaying a picture because wikicommons already has it or an even better example: not displaying a quote because wikiquotes has it.

I don't know how to do this but I'd like to initiate a vote for whether the poem should be included or not.

--Leav (talk) 09:16, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

I totally agree the poem MUST be part of then entry on one and similar poems. When I went back to my printed Encyclopedia given to me by my Mother, I found poem. If it can include poems and their history, so should this one. The only reason I'm not adding it is because this should occur globally and not on a case by case basis. --Bmoshier (talk) 21:49, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not a democracy. The fact is that "some other wiki****" didn't "decide" that the poem was within it's scope-- wikisource was created by the Wikimedia foundation for exactly this purpose. Sadly, many articles on Blake's poetry contain only the poem, with no critical commentary whatsoever. Lines that are commented upon in the body of the article can be included, but not the thing wholesale. If you want a second opinion, post on the Wikiproject poetry forum, but don't just keep adding the poem wholesale. There is precedent for this removal in many poetry articles, even when the poem is short-- see Strange fits of passion have I known or The Raven or Kubla Khan, for instance. Lithoderm 14:57, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Well, I guess I'll just have to agree to disagree. I really think that people browsing wikipedia would like to read the poem and not search for it elsewhere. at the very least there should be a prominent link to the wikisources page. also this is offtopic but to be blunt, if wikipedia is not a democracy, who died and made you the king of "The Tyger"? :) (please treat that as a question honestly geared at learning about how wikipedia works! :) --Leav (talk) 23:44, 21 December 2008 (UTC)

p.s the 3 edits were just minor changes (I only really added the poem once!)

Thanks for your understanding. I've moved the link to the top of the page, so it should be easier to see. All that "not a democracy" means is that we tend to discourage voting, which was your recommendation. Because this is the internet, people could easily create more than one account and vote multiple times (This is known as Sockpuppetry), or call upon all their internet friends to vote along with them (This is called Meatpuppetry- I didn't make up these names!). Wikipedia tends to go by the consensus of experienced editors, and on reasoned interpretation of policy. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, while Wikisource is a library- the distinction must be kept clear- imagine if the entire text of War and Peace were included in the wikipedia article! We also go by precedent- the precedent in this case is to remove the poem. If we start including text, we get into questions of how long is too long, etc, etc... it's better for it to have its own project. As to who died and left me king of The Tyger, I do have some experience with Blake articles on WP (not that it really matters)- pages I've almost entirely written include William Blake's Illustrations of the Book of Job, William Blake's illustrations of On the Morning of Christ's Nativity, and Template:William Blake. I don't mean to intimidate you, I just wanted to let you know. So, thanks again for asking, and I hope to see you around editing! Cheers, Lithoderm 00:36, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

This is an encyclopedia article. We don't paste entire source works. Wikisource was made specifically to address this project-wide problem long ago. Green Cardamom (talk) 03:06, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

The decision to not include the text of the poem truly beggars belief, especially since a photo of it is on the same page. The justifications and "workarounds" given do not outweigh the absurdity of the matter at all -- they simply add to it. -- Niightblade (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 05:03, 12 February 2014 (UTC)

This is an Essay

This "article" is not written like one. It is an essay through and through. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 142.68.216.196 (talk) 02:00, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

Dramatic monologue .. simple introduction

Monologue is lengthy speech by a singal person . A charactora speaks a monologue the exprssion his or her private thought in a special topic . It is also call soliloque . it is used in drama or poem . Dramatic monologue haweever is not component in a play but a a type of lyric poem also used perfectly in pobert bronning my last dutchless —Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.128.103.129 (talk) 10:31, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

Monologue is lengthy speech by a signal person . A character speaks a monologue the expression his or her private thought in a special topic. It is also call soliloquies. it is used in drama or poem . Dramatic monologue however is not component in a play but a a type of lyric poem also used perfectly in pobert bronning my last ductless —Preceding unsigned comment added by 122.128.103.129 (talk) 10:34, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

Rhyme scheme

Every analysis of this poem that I can find mentions the structure of it and the simple AABB rhyme scheme. But none of them seem to notice that the first and last verses don't follow this scheme. "symmetry", in the way it is usually pronounced, doesn't rhyme with "eye". "symmetry" is usually pronounced so that it rhymes with "tree". So the first and last verses really have an AABC rhyme scheme. Unless you read it with a Birmingham or Black Country accent. Then "symmetry" does rhyme with "eye". But why should Blake, a Londoner who hardly ever left London, write a poem that only rhymes when it's read in a Black Country accent? -- SteveCrook (talk) 05:53, 20 February 2010 (UTC)

There's no need to assume that a certain accent must be used for this to rhyme. Some have speculated that at the time, "symmetry" really did rhyme with "eye". In any case, it's not uncommon for authors to use uncommon pronounciations to make a rhyme work.--RLent (talk) 16:02, 10 August 2010 (UTC)

Some have speculated that, to try to explain away the "elephant in the room" that nobody ever mentions about this poem :) Can anyone ever know what the common British accents were in the 1790s? There weren't many audio recording devices back then. Yes, some poets use "poetic language" or unusual pronunciations to get a rhyme. But this is taking that idea to an extreme that is so far away from the norm to by invisible -- SteveCrook (talk) 00:06, 11 August 2010 (UTC)

My take is that the "fearful symmetry" rhymes with "Did he who made the lamb make thee", from the second-to-last stanza, bringing a bit more emphasis to that line. Haj Ross wrote a 45-page paper about the poem[1] where he goes on for a while about the impact of the "lamb" line. (He says he wants to write a whole book about the poem.) Interestingly he seems to have an engraving of "Songs of Experience" where the "lamb" line doesn't end with a question mark, and he goes on about that too. (All the scans I could find in the Blake Archive had the question mark). It could be cool to use some of the paper in the article; it's from here and the citation is:

The Taoing of a Sound – Phonetic Drama in William Blake’s The Tyger, In Patrizia Violi (ed.), Phonosymbolism and Poetic Language, Brepols, Turnhout, Belgium, pp. 99-145 (2000)

69.111.194.167 (talk) 10:44, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

If the "fearful symmetry" in the last verse is intended to rhyme with "Did he who made the lamb make thee", how does this analysis explain the same lack of rhyme in the first verse? -- SteveCrook (talk) 18:59, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

The same explanation, both uses of "symmetry" alliterate with "lamb make thee". Obviously it's a matter of interpretation (in this case something I thought up at the spur of the moment) but I think pronouncing "symmetry" as rhyming with "eye" doesn't work at all--even some different choice of words that used those sounds wouldn't work so well. I skimmed through Ross's paper (above) but it didn't seem to say anything about the issue. I guess relaxed rhymes here and there aren't really held against a good poem. That said, I'm just a semi-literate math/computer nerd, so my reading counts for squat.

It amazes me how literary analysts (Ross is a linguistic theorist by training, but I guess that paper counts as poetics analysis) can write those interpretations whose points seem almost like free association, yet still manage to hold together. He has written comparable articles about a number of other poems and I'd be interested to know how they have been received by the literary community. 69.111.194.167 (talk) 22:01, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

Pop culture references

An editor removed my addition to this article, calling it "trivia". Well, that's unfair, since so many articles about works of art have similar sections. I'm editing it again. If you disagree with me, please give me good reasons. Casquilho (talk) 20:24, 20 June 2012 (UTC)

I agree with Truthkeepr88's statement on your talkpage that this type of section overwhelms the article as it currently stands and adds little to the reader's understanding of the poem. Per WP:OTHERSTUFF, the fact that other articles contain trivia sections does not to me constitute a strong enough argument here. Kafka Liz (talk) 20:01, 24 June 2012 (UTC)

I agree with Truthkeeper88 and Kafka Liz; the minor pop culture additions to the article are essentially superfluous to the Blake poem; and doesn't add either understanding or quality...Modernist (talk) 22:34, 24 June 2012 (UTC)

Assessment comment

The comment(s) below were originally left at Talk:The Tyger/Comments, and are posted here for posterity. Following several discussions in past years, these subpages are now deprecated. The comments may be irrelevant or outdated; if so, please feel free to remove this section.

There was been not critical censensus about Blake's sexuality. As a DEVOUT Christain he would have been unlikely to have described himself as "gay."

Last edited at 02:35, 26 February 2007 (UTC). Substituted at 08:28, 30 April 2016 (UTC)

Gormless Tyger

Looking at this while listening to In Our Time I noticed Blake's drawing of the beast is about as fearful as fat persian cat. then, lo! The point was brought up in the programme. A tall atle about the French Revolution was aired, but surely there is some scholarly discussion of why such a great artist drew a tiger that looks as aggressive as Tigger and half as intelligent? Stub Mandrel (talk) 08:35, 23 June 2016 (UTC)

Yes, I am surprised that the figure of the tiger is not really discussed here at all, especially (as the programme took pains to explain) Blake produced these works by direct engraving onto metal - the words were produced as part of the picture and not printed separately. The words and the images were treated as one organic whole. The tyger looks quite smug, but is he really smiling? One assumes that Blake would have been able to observe a real tiger, at least in captivity? Martinevans123 (talk) 10:20, 23 June 2016 (UTC)

Few citations

There aren't that many citations in the structure or analysis section so it reads a lot like original research. Just putting this down ChuckedGryphon (talk) 05:50, 22 March 2022 (UTC)

ee

Regarding the rhyme: rather than distorting "symmetry" to rhyme with the modern "eye", could in be that "eye" is supposed to be pronounced as the archaic "ee"? That would not only rhyme with symmetry, but with the "thee" in the other verse that people have been suggesting it should match as well. Are there any citable sources suggesting or discussing this? Iapetus (talk) 09:40, 29 June 2016 (UTC)

Wiki Education assignment: LIT 3319 Contexts

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 16 January 2024 and 2 May 2024. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): MoLozano (article contribs).

— Assignment last updated by MoLozano (talk) 19:36, 23 April 2024 (UTC)