The Tyger By William Blake

The Tyger

Tyger! Tyger! burning bright

In the forests of the night,

What immortal hand or eye

Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

In what distant deeps or skies

Burnt the fire of thine eyes?

On what wings dare he aspire?

What the hand, dare sieze the fire?

And what shoulder, & what art,

Could twist the sinews of thy heart?

And when thy heart began to beat,

What dread hand? & what dread feet?

What the hammer? what the chain?

In what furnace was thy brain?

What the anvil? what dread grasp

Dare its deadly terrors clasp?

When the stars threw down their spears,

And water'd heaven with their tears,

Did he smile his work to see?

Did he who made the Lamb make thee?

Tyger! Tyger! burning bright

In the forests of the night,

What immortal hand or eye

Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?

William Blake

Analysing:

The poet uses rhyming words at the end of sentences, repetition, imagery and rhetorical  questions pertaining to “The Tyger” throughout the whole poem.

The poet uses structure in the poem which can be seen from the use of repetition of “Tyger” in the first stanza. This is to express that “The Tyger” is being called repeatedly, thus creating a chanting mood and catches the attention of the reader.

The poet also uses imagery in the poem to describe “The Tyger”. This is evident from “burning bright” which tells us that “The Tyger” as a ferocious, intelligent and powerful creature.

The poet also uses language in the poem to further talk about “The Tyger”. This is evident from “What immortal hand or eye. Could frame thy fearful symmetry?” which tells us that which “immortal hand or eye”, which may most likely be pertaining to God or someone who is big and powerful, can “frame thy fearful symmetry”. From “frame thy fearful symmetry”, “frame” can refer to putting something in something else, so as to contain it, like framing a picture, so if we frame something, it would not be able to get away. While for “fearful symmetry”, “fearful” can mean the scariness of “The Tyger” and ”symmetry” can mean the artistic beauty of something, which can refer to “The Tyger”. Therefore, the poet is saying that what God “frame” is a beautiful creature which is fearful.

The poet uses imagery and language to create a picture of Heaven and Hell and talking about the God. This is evident from “distant deeps or skies”, “distant deeps” referring to Hell and “skies” referring to Heaven. With this, the poet asks about who is the God who created “The Tyger” by writing “Burnt the fire of thine eyes”. Then, he goes on to ask if it’s the God in the “skies” or the Lucifer in the “distant deeps”. The poet goes on wondering about what God could have created “The Tyger” by writing “On what wings dare he aspire? What the hand, dare sieze the fire?” which tells us that the poet is asking what does the God do.

The poet then again uses language and imagery to ask who was the one to create this creature by using rhetorical questions. This is evident from “And what shoulder, and what art could twist the sinews of thy heart?”, the “thy” is referring to “The Tyger” and “Could twist the sinews of thy heart.”, the word “twisted” used to tell us how “twisted” or sometimes corrupt Humans can be.

The poet also uses language to talk about the creation of “The Tyger”. This is evident from “And when thy heart began to beat, What dread hand? & what dread feet?”, which tells us when the heart of “The Tyger” beats, God asks himself if he dreaded creating “The Tyger”, which is powerful and capable of doing good and evil.

The poet also uses imagery and language to create an image of a God trying to create “The Tyger” and what was “The Tyger” like. This is evident from “What the hammer? what the chain? In what furnace was thy brain? What the anvil?” which shows us a God is hammering away to create his creature and from “In what furnace was thy brain” tells us that the creature was made of hard and metallic materials. And the poet goes on to say that “The Tyger” is a evil creature which is evident from “what dread grasp, Dare its deadly terrors clasp?”. The words “dread”, “deadly” and “terrors” gives us a feeling of something dark and evil, thus by using these words, it tells us that “The Tyger” was created by a God in Heaven and therefore is capable of doing good and also bad.

The poet uses imagery to express the feelings of God after creating “The Tyger”. This is evident from “Did he smile his work to see? Did he who made the Lamb make thee?” which tells us if God was happy with his creation and did he actually smile upon that. “the Lamb” refers to innocence due to it being white and it is pure, thus it is incapable of doing wrong and only doing good. Therefore, this tells us that it is hard to believe but it is true that it is was the same God who had created two creatures, one being pure but the other known as being evil.

The poet then again uses repetition of “Tyger! Tyger! burning bright, In the forests of the nights, What immortal hand or eye”, which are present in the first three lines of the poem. Unlike in the first stanza, the last sentence of the last stanza is different. Instead of “Could frame thy fearful symmetry?”, the rhetorical question is now “Dare frame thy fearful symmetry”, which tells us that it is not if God is powerful enough to create a creature like “The Tyger”  but whether or not he dares to create a create like “The Tyger”.

All in all, this poem talks about the creation of “The Tyger”, which can do both good or evil, depending on its choice and thus is terrifying as we will not know which it will choose and with a free will to choose, it may lead them astray from being loyal to their creator. But despite the fact that “The Tyger” might turn his back on his creator, God, due to possessing traits of evil, God still created “The Tyger”.

Picture of a tiger, which is a ferocious creature just like "The Tyger"

Video on The Tyger