begin page 45 | back to top

Blake’s Advent Birthday

After long debate, the dating of The Marriage of Heaven and Hell has been firmly laid to rest by Joseph Viscomi; Marriage can safely be dated 1790.11. “The Evolution of The Marriage of Heaven and Hell,” Huntington Library Quarterly 58.3-4 (1997): 284, especially note 7. The opening words are well known, and the coincidence, but not accident, of Swedenborg’s proclamation in 1757 of the New Age:

As a new heaven is begun, and it is now thirty-three years since its advent . . .

One detail, I believe, has not been previously noted. Consider the words “now” and “advent.” Advent Sunday, the fourth Sunday before Christmas Day, ranges between 27 November and 3 December. Blake, a lifelong nonconformist, would largely ignore the church year, but there is no reason for him not to notice that, in 1790, it fell on 28 November; his 33rd birthday.

Just another coincidence, this time quite accidental? Blake is already set to associate his own age, Christ’s age, and Swedenborg’s New Age, and to elide nativity and resurrection, in a total inversion of tradition—the marriage of heaven and hell. In his conviction that he was the man to bring all this before a world ready for revolution, why should he not also, in the same cheeky mood, point to the Advent significance of his birthday?

Print Edition

  • Publisher
  • Department of English, University of Rochester
  • Rochester, NY, USA
    • Editors
    • Morris Eaves
    • Morton D. Paley
    • Managing Editor
    • Sarah Jones
    • Bibliographer
    • G.E. Bentley, Jr.
    • Review Editor
    • Nelson Hilton
    • Associate Editor for Great Britain
    • David Worrall
    • Advisory Board
    • G.E. Bentley, Jr.
    • Martin Butlin
    • D.W. Dörrbecker
    • Robert N. Essick
    • Angela Esterhammer
    • Nelson Hilton
    • Anne K. Mellor
    • Joseph Viscomi
    • David Worrall
    • Contributors
    • G.E. Bentley, Jr.
    • C.S Matheson
    • Robert N. Essick
    • David Groves
    • William Stevenson
    • David Betteridge

    Digital Edition

    • Editors:
    • Morris Eaves, University of Rochester
    • Robert Essick, University of California, Riverside
    • Joseph Viscomi, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
    • Project Manager
    • Joe Fletcher
    • Technical Editor
    • Michael Fox
    • Previous Project Manager and Technical Editor
    • William Shaw
    • Project Director
    • Adam McCune
    • Project Coordinator, UNC:
    • Natasha Smith, Carolina Digital Library and Archives
    • Project Coordinator, University of Rochester:
    • Sarah Jones
    • Scanning:
    • UNC Digital Production Center
    • XML Encoding:
    • Apex CoVantage
    • Additional Transcription:
    • Adam McCune
    • Jennifer Park
    • Emendations:
    • Rachael Isom
    • Mary Learner
    • Adam McCune
    • Ashley Reed
    • Jennifer Park
    • Scott Robinson
    • XSLT Development:
    • Adam McCune
    • Joseph Ryan
    • William Shaw
    • PHP and Solr Development:
    • Michael Fox
    • Adam McCune
    • Project Assistants:
    • Lauren Cameron,
    • Rachael Isom,
    • Mary Learner,
    • Jennifer Park,
    • Ashley Reed,
    • Adair Rispoli,
    • Scott Robinson
    • Sponsors
    • Funders
    • Blake/An Illustrated Quarterly
    • William Blake Archive
    • Carolina Digital Library and Archives
    • Use Restrictions
    • Copyright © 2015 Blake/An Illustrated Quarterly, all rights reserved. Items in this digital edition may be shared in accordance with the Fair Use provisions of U.S. copyright law. Redistribution or republication on other terms, in any medium, requires express written consent from the editors and advance notification of the publisher. Permission to reproduce the graphic images in this digital edition rests with the owning institutions.