Blake’s poem “The Clod and the pebble” represents two different perspectives on love. The clod and the pebble are two characters in the poem who think they know what love means, and we see that they both have very contradicting ideas. Blake plays with the idea of Heaven and Hell to show his opposite meanings. Heaven is known to be very happy and delightful which represents the clods idea of love. While Hell is known to be depressing and scary which represents the pebbles idea on love. The idea of heaven and hell is to show that love can have two very different extremes, and can sometimes have nothing in common with what another person experience of love is. In the first stanza, Blake speaks of love from the perspective of the clod and he uses very positive and uplifting words. Line three he states “Gives it ease”, ease is another word for peace and he describes it as a very happy feeling. In the last stanza, he speaks of love from the perspective of the pebble and he references hell using negative words such as “another loss of ease”.
Most of the engravings are very similar in that they are either all sweet and pretty or all dark and scary. When reading the poem with either the pretty or scary engraving it takes away the idea of having both good and bad love perspectives, and only makes you think of love as the way it is drawn. For example, object 32 looks extremely happy and sunny, so you are only to envision love as having a heavenly feeling. While object 53 is extremely dark so it gives off a depressing hellish feeling.
I agree with your idea that the clod and the pebble have two different perspectives on love, and I like your focus on the giving and taking of “ease”. I also noticed the way the wording about heaven and hell changes between the two perspectives. The clod finds love to be a “Heaven in Hells despair” (line four), and the pebble finds love to be a “Hell in Heavens despair” (line 12). I wonder though, why the clod has such a positive outlook while the pebble has a negative outlook. Being stamped by cattle isn’t such a positive experience that leaves a person (or lump of dirt in this case) feeling very loved, but the clod can still talk about love in a positive way. Meanwhile, the pebble in the brook (which I imagine as this smooth stone in shining, bubbling water), talks about love in a negative way. Anyhow, about how “most of the engravings are very similar in that they are all either all sweet and pretty or all dark and scary”, I noticed this too. Besides the engravings about “The Clod and the Pebble”, it seems likes Blake incorporates two sides of the engraving into every one he does of every poem, just like how each poem has two sides.
I really liked your perspective on this. I agree about your points stating that there are two opposing voices here both providing their perspectives on love. However, I wonder if Blake is showing favor toward a particular side here. Clod has a double meaning. Besides being a lump of dirt or clay, as would fit with the theme of earth along with the pebble, clod also doubles as an insult. It’s a derogatory term for a person one considers stupid. Blake was probably aware of this, so I wonder if Blake is trying to imply favor toward one particular “argument”.
I definitely agree with your reading on two different perspectives. I wonder what contributes to the complete opposite perspectives of love between the beginning and end of the poem. Why the difference between itself and self? Also interesting I think is the idea that a clod is not just a piece of earth, but also another name for a stupid person. Perhaps that’s why the clod has a very different opinion because he is uneducated.