The Echoing Green

Songs of Innocence and of Experience, copy Y, 1825 (Metropolitan Museum of Art) object 6 (The Echoing Green 1)

The Echoing Green (or Ecchoing Green) is a poem by William Blake published in Songs of Innocence in 1789. The poem talks about merry sounds and images which accompany the children playing indoors. Then, an old man happily remembers when he enjoyed playing with his friends during his own childhood. The last stanza depicts the little ones being weary when the sun has descended and going to their mother to rest after playing many games.

Style

The poem follows the structure of a day— 'the sun does arise' in the beginning of the first verse, and 'the sun does descend' in the middle of the third stanza, and can be read as a metaphor for human life. The poem is the contrast of innocence and experience, but also the contrast between perception of joys and sorrows. What is happening on the Green will happen again, shown by the 'old folk' who watch the children and reminisce about their own childhood on the Green. The whole poem is written in six sentences with much repetition.

The poem by Aisha Mumtaz

The Sun does arise,
And make happy the skies.
The merry bells ring
To welcome the Spring.
The sky-lark and thrush,
The birds of the bush,
Sing louder around,
To the bells cheerful sound.
While our sports shall be seen
On the Echoing Green.

Old Soph with white hair
Does laugh away care,
Sitting under the oak,
Among the old folk,
They laugh at our play,
And soon they all say.
Such, such were the joys,
When we all, girlies & boys,
In our youth time were seen,
On the be au ti ful Echoing Green.

Till the little ones weary
No more can be merry
The sun does descend,
And our sports have an end:
Round the laps of their mothers,
Many sisters and brothers,
Like birds in their nest,
Are ready for rest:
And sport no more seen,
On the darkening Green.

Gallery

Scholarly editions all place "The Echoing Green" as the sixth object in the print order for the Songs of Innocence and of Experience. The following, represents a comparison of several of the extant copies of the poem, their print date, their order in that particular printing of the poems, and their holding institution:^[1]