The Little Boy Lost
By William Blake
“Father, father, where are you going?
O do not walk so fast!
Speak father, speak to your little boy
Or else I shall be lost.”
The night was dark no father was there,
The child was wet with dew;
The mire was deep, & the child did weep,
And away the vapour flew.
What is the poem about?
The poem is primarily concerned with how a little boy is lost in the shadows, and is looking for the light, his father. However, his dad is moving too quickly, leaving the boy behind. Abandoned, the boy continues the plight to find his father but after some time he loses hope, and begins to cry, signaling that the gravity of the situation has set in, further intensifying the sense of hopelessness. While that is the story from a literal sense, if you look at it from a different lense you are able to see that it actually is a religious allegory. This is mainly about how in the bible, after Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit, their “connection with God” was severed, and they were thrown into the world, abandoned by their father. William Blake describes this severance and their feeling of being completely, and utterly, alone.
What was the process used to annotate the poem to come to this conclusion?
The first read-through was to get an initial feel for it.
The second read was to find the meaning/message of the poem.
The third was to annotate the poem and define what each of the literary elements found meant (i.e. Father could indicate a religious reference to god).
The fourth was to soapstone.
The last read was to find “so what?” piece, or how and why this applies still today.
How does the form affect the poem? How does the structure affect the poem?
The form of this poem is that of a series of nursery rhymes. Nursery rhymes are small ballad stanzas, limericks or like types that are aimed towards children. These forms are intended to tell a darker story in a light tone that children can relate to and understand. For example, “Ring-Around-the-Rosies” is set to sound like a game that children to this day play. However, the limerick is actually about the bubonic plague and how it killed almost 2/3rds of the European population during the Dark Ages. Not as kid-friendly as you think. This poem is set in a similar stance. It sounds like a hide-and-seek game a boy is playing with his father and he is crying about it because he can’t find the dad. However, it is actually about how when man sinned by eating the forbidden fruit, God cast them down from the Garden of Eden onto earth, in essence abandoning them to fend for themselves. A task that neither they, nor the boy, were prepared for.
A ballad stanza is composed of two equal stanzas with four lines each. It follows a rhyming scheme of abcb: the second line and the fourth line usually rhyme. This allows for Blake to tell the story and have a time-jump in between, where the second stanza is a continuation of the first stanzas’ tale. By doing this it emphasizes the time passing between the father leaving and how long the boy has been searching for answers, for guidance, for his father.
How do both--together--create the reader’s perspective (a.k.a. affect the reader)?
The reader’s perspective is affected to where it seems like between the two stanzas there is a time-jump, and at the second stanza the father is now long gone with the child very distressed in his search for answers. This allows the reader to sympathize with the child, creating a connection with the character. The little boy is then portrayed as innocent, which makes readers wonder what he did wrong.
What is important with using such a form?
The form of a ballad stanza creates a simple structure allowing the message to be delivered clearly and concisely. This allows itself to then be able to be interpreted by the likes of many, young and old, rich and poor. The structure allows the poem to be more popular through a wide range of audience members.
Bibliography
Little Boy Lost." Romantic Circles. N.p., n.d. Web. 10 Apr. 2015.
Saroyan, Aram. "The Little Boy Lost." Poetry Foundation. Poetry Foundation, n.d. Web. 03 Apr. 2015.
"The Ballad." The Ballad. N.p., n.d. Web. 10 Apr. 2015.
