William Blake

William Blake was born in 1757, the son of a London hosier, and became an apprentice engraver at fourteen. He lived on engraving commissions, after attempting in 1784 a print shop that did not last. He said he had seen visions since childhood and was thought mad by his contemporaries. Accused in 1803 of seditious remarks by a soldier, he was acquitted in January 1804. He died in 1827, almost unknown as a poet, supported at the end by a few young painters.

In the catalogue 1

• PoetrySongs of Innocence and of ExperienceWilliam Blake · 1794LiteraturePublic domain