The Torn Book

Unreading William Blake's Marginalia
Argues for the connection between British poet and painter William Blake's marginalia and the role that often multivalent symbols like pens, writers, readers, and books played in his art. This book shows that the marginalia represent important evidence of Blake-as-reader experiencing the typographical features of books.
"The Torn Book: UnReading William Blake's Marginalia" argues for the connection between British poet and painter William Blake's marginalia and the role that often multivalent symbols like pens, writers, readers, and books played in his art. Blake was by no means a copious annotator, but the extant volumes reflect the poet's engagement not only with ideas but also with the materiality through which those ideas are communicated. "The Torn Book" shows that the marginalia represent important evidence of Blake-as-reader experiencing the typographical features of books printed using the conventional, moveable-type methods of the day. The annotated volumes are thus key to understanding Blake both as a poet and as a bookmaker himself. Jason Snart is an Assistant Professor of English at the College of DuPage.