14 June 2007

The William Blake Archive is pleased to announce the publication of an electronic edition of Blake's illustrations to John Milton's Comus. This group of eight water colors was acquired, and probably commissioned, by the Rev. Joseph Thomas in 1801. These designs, now in the Huntington Library and Art Gallery, are presented in our Preview mode, one that provides all the features of the Archive except Image Search and Inote (our image annotation program).

In his Comus designs, as is usual in his work as an illustrator of other poets' writings, Blake paid close attention to the text, but this disciplined approach did not preclude his own interpretations. For example, Milton ends his masque with joyous dance and song, but Blake ends his illustrations on a more serious note, as indicated by the facial expressions of all six figures. His selection of poetic passages to illustrate reveals, in itself, Blake's emphasis on unusual states of consciousness, including trances and visions.

The Thomas Set of Comus designs shows strong outlines and relatively subdued colors. In about 1815, Blake's great patron Thomas Butts commissioned a second suite of eight Comus illustrations. This later group, now in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, shows more interior modeling and an emphasis on complex surfaces created with small brush strokes. The Butts set is forthcoming in the Archive.

As always, the William Blake Archive is a free site, imposing no access restrictions and charging no subscription fees. The site is made possible through the continuing support of the Library of Congress, the Institute for Advanced Technology in the Humanities at the University of Virginia, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and by the cooperation of the international array of libraries and museums that have generously given us permission to reproduce works from their collections in the Archive.

Morris Eaves, Robert N. Essick, and Joseph Viscomi, editors
William Shaw, project manager
The William Blake Archive