System in William Blake's 'prophetic books'

威廉·布莱克“预言书”中的系统

• 批准号: 2606067
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: University of York
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Studentship
• 财政年份: 2021
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2021 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=studentship-2606067
• 关键词: System; William; Blake; prophetic; books

In Jerusalem William Blake's creative figure Los declares 'I must Create a System or be enslav'd by another Man's.' My thesis will seek to question the meaning and nature of 'system' in the long illuminated poems known as the 'prophetic books.' Recent studies in social theory have shown a great interest in systems as networks. Clifford Siskin's System (2016) places the idea of 'system' as a species of knowledge formation squarely in the long eighteenth century Blake inhabited. My research questions in their broadest form will move between the specific enquiry 'what is Blake's system?' to the wider question of 'what is a system?'. From a broader historical perspective, Blake's will to system reflects a wider impulse to classify and systematise knowledge associated with the Enlightenment. Critics have often overemphasised Blake's opposition to Enlightenment thinkers as evidence of his anti-systematicity; however, my thesis will propose that the nature of system within Blake's work shows that the poet and artist was aligned with contemporary system-builders, such as Kant, Godwin and Bentham, more closely than previously thought.My methodology combines theoretical and material approaches to the texts. I will consider systems aesthetically and formally through the framework of architectonics, alongside the material study of Blake's medium, through which his system comes into being and can be dis- or re-assembled. Kant's architectonics will provide a useful way into interpreting system in Blake's. Not only were they near-contemporaries, but there are important parallels between their conceptions of the nature and formation of the world. Both experience the world as something not yet conceptualised but offering itself to be formed; in other words, a potentiality, in which the ordering subject becomes the synthesising and systematising power. Kant defines architectonics as 'the art of constructing systems.' Blake similarly clearly understood system-building as an art; but he also understood art as a form of system building. My thesis will be separated into three sections, on 'Building', 'Bodies', and 'Books'. In order to chart Blake's systematisation of not only the poetry of his prophetic books but his method of producing them, I will work on a selection of his poems: from the early manuscript An Island in the Moon, to the later prophecies, The Four Zoas, Milton, and Jerusalem. To enhance a full engagement with the physical form of Blake's book, I will study his final prophetic poem Jerusalem in particular detail because it represents his latest and most sustained attempt to produce his own system. In addition to present-day systems theory from Siskin, who claims system is best understood as a genre, and De Landa's assemblage theory, I will address recent deconstructive angles on systems in the Romantic period. For example, work from Rajan and Colebrook, who study the prophetic books through Deleuze's 'body without organs,' and work from Connolly on Blake and the body, which exemplifies Blake's vexed relationship with systems by exploring his 'simultaneous adoration and abomination of the human body.' I will also examine theories of the virtual, including Otto and Makdisi's work on unfinishability and open-ended texts, following the idea of the 'indeterminate text' popularised by McGann. My research will investigate how the medium of the prophetic book reinvents traditional systems of knowledge by subverting the idea of the codex as a site for its dissemination. By contrast, Blake's illuminated books of relief-etched plates are neither stable nor identical between copies, undermining the idea of the book as a reliable source of truth. Kant's architectonics will bring a new lens to these texts, and will highlight the cultural purchase that Blake's art has today by engaging with wider debates within Romantic studies and the humanities regarding systems and the formations of knowledge.

在耶路撒冷，威廉·布莱克的创造性人物洛斯宣称：“我必须创造一个系统，否则就被另一个人的系统奴役。”我的论文将试图质疑在被称为“预言书”的长的被照亮的诗中的“系统”的意义和性质。“最近的社会理论研究表明，人们对网络系统非常感兴趣。克利福德·西斯金的《系统》（2016）将“系统”作为一种知识形成的概念直接置于布莱克所居住的漫长的十八世纪。我的研究问题在他们最广泛的形式将移动之间的具体询问'什么是布莱克的系统？“什么是系统？”'.从更广泛的历史视角来看，布莱克的系统意志反映了一种更广泛的冲动，即对与启蒙运动有关的知识进行分类和系统化。批评家们经常过分强调布莱克对启蒙思想家的反对，作为他反系统性的证据;然而，我的论文将提出，布莱克作品中的系统性质表明，诗人和艺术家与当代系统建设者，如康德，戈德温和边沁，比以前认为的更紧密地联系在一起。我将通过建筑学的框架从美学和形式上考虑系统，同时对布莱克的媒介进行材料研究，通过这种媒介，他的系统得以形成，并可以被分解或重新组装。康德的建筑学为解读布莱克的体系提供了一条有益的途径。他们不仅是同时代的人，而且他们对世界的本质和形成的概念之间有重要的相似之处。两者都把世界经验为某种尚未概念化但却提供自身以待形成的东西;换句话说，这是一种潜在性，在这种潜在性中，秩序化的主体成为综合和系统化的力量。康德将建筑学定义为“构建系统的艺术”。布莱克同样清楚地将系统构建理解为一种艺术;但他也将艺术理解为一种系统构建的形式。我的论文将分为三个部分，“建筑”，“身体”和“书籍”。为了说明布莱克不仅将他的预言书中的诗歌系统化，而且还将他的创作方法系统化，我将挑选他的诗歌：从早期的手稿《月亮上的一个岛》到后来的预言《四个佐阿斯》、《米尔顿》和《耶路撒冷》。为了更好地理解布莱克这本书的物理形式，我将特别详细地研究他最后一首预言诗《耶路撒冷》，因为这首诗代表了他最新的、最持久的尝试，以建立自己的体系。除了Siskin的现代系统理论（他声称系统最好被理解为一种类型）和De Landa的组合理论之外，我将讨论浪漫主义时期系统的解构角度。例如，拉詹和科尔布鲁克的作品，他们通过德勒兹的“没有器官的身体”来研究先知书，康诺利的作品是关于布莱克和身体的，通过探索他对人体的“同时崇拜和憎恶”来阐明布莱克与系统的烦恼关系。我也将研究虚拟的理论，包括奥托和马克迪西关于不可完成性和开放式文本的工作，遵循麦甘普及的“不确定文本”的想法。我的研究将探讨先知书的媒介如何通过颠覆法典作为其传播场所的想法来重塑传统的知识体系。相比之下，布莱克的浮雕蚀刻版插图书籍既不稳定，也不相同的副本，破坏了这本书作为可靠的真理来源的想法。康德的建筑学将为这些文本带来一个新的透镜，并将通过与浪漫主义研究和人文学科中关于系统和知识形成的更广泛的辩论相结合，突出布莱克艺术今天的文化购买力。