William Blake's "Little Lamb"
The alliance between children, animals, and the pastoral as tropes of innocence is not a novel or culturally-specific association. What is interesting, however, is the way certain types of animals are evoked with strikingly different connotations. Domesticated farm animals retain an innocence that is lost with their wild counterparts. This distinction was epitomized and prodded and William Blake’s Songs of Innocence and Songs of Experience, which frequently evoked the image of a lamb as a symbol of innocence, childhood, and purity. “Little Lamb” appropriates the symbolic weight of this lamb; Its plate contains a stereotypically pastoral scene.
As though an image straight out of Eden, this quaint world contains a naked child and little lambs frolicking under the protection of trees and vines. The lamb is an image of the untouched, unblemished countryside. The text of the song hints at the precise material features that make the lamb good, primarily its soft fur, bright color, and tender voice. The song begins with a creation question— “Little Lamb who made thee”—and ends with an answer the binds lambs to Christ and children:
“Little Lamb I’ll tell thee;
He is called by thy name,
For he calls himself a Lamb:
He is meek & he is mild,
He became a little child:
I am’ child & thou a lamb,
We are called by his name,”
These lines also show a reverse causality. It is not that god creates lambs and children to embody the Christ-like, virtuous characteristics of mildness and meekness. Instead, Christ becomes these things, imitating the behavior of children and lambs. This alternate creation story suggests that man must practice innocence. This song evokes an association between lambs, children, and Christ, simultaneously producing the innocence of the child and the lamb. Unlike the lamb, who is biologically and molecularly constituted to be meek and mild, the human must depart from his natural disposition to develop these qualities.
William Blake's "The Tyger"
“Little Lamb” is often read alongside “The Tyger,” its complementary piece in Songs of Experience. Like “Little Lamb,” the song is addressed to its main subject, the tiger. Unlike the little lamb, however, the tiger does not have a qualifying adjective. The address can only repeat his symbolic name like a mantra that gains force and momentum with repetition. The descriptive phrase, “Little Lamb,” stands in opposition to the repetitive chant of “Tyger Tyger.” The latter is almost accusatory. The tiger’s “fearful symmetry” is a peculiar phrase that draws attention both to the divine order of the tiger and to the questioned goodness of the tiger’s creator. The bright clothing of the lamb is revalued here. The coat of the tiger illuminates darkness, which should have a positive association with God’s performative speech act, “let there be light.” Instead, this illumination is described as “burning.” This song takes us out of the cool, pastoral domain of streams and valleys to the underworld of fire and destruction.
The difference between “The Tyger” and “The Lamb” represents the difference between the wild animal and the domesticated animal. In contrast to many tales of pastoral innocence that figure culture and civilization as the antithesis of innocence, the lamb-tiger distinction evokes symbols that point to domesticity as a feature of innocence.
