Customer Reviews

Jerusalem (The Illuminated Books of William Blake, Volume 1)

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I recommend that any fan of William Blake buy this volume and the other 5 in the series. The books are beautiful, large, and handsomely bound. Each book is reproduced in full color, using a six-color printing process rather than the standard four. The pages are heavy, opaque and have a gorgous lustre indicating very high quality paper. The text of each book accompanies the color reproductions in standard typeface with very competent commentary to boot.

I am drawn to this work. When the British Museum at Yale held a special Blake exhibition my family and I were lucky enough to attend and see all 100 plates of this book on display. They were breathtaking. This edition is a very fine reproduction and deserves the highest praise. It isn't the real thing, but amazingly close for the price. It is so good that it rewards study with a magnifying glass. Obviously, the real gold Blake put into the original (at what must have been staggering expense for a man that was so poor there were times he couldn't afford food) doesn't duplicate its brilliant sheen, but this is pretty good.

Not only are there the 100 plates of copy E (the one in the Mellon collection in the British Museum at Yale), there are some sample plates from other version and all of the text in printed form with commentary.

This is an incredible work that is bewildering in scope in a joy to lose yourself in. Extremely recommended if you love Blake at all.

Why is it that on every bargain table in America you can find countless decent reproductions of The Impressionists and Picasso and Dali etc etc, but Blake's vast body of work is only available in esoteric and expensive editions? Princeton University Press has filled this void more or less affordably with a beautifully recreated series of the Prophetic Books. Now if we can just get someone to do The Illustrations to Gray and Edward Young and The Bible and Milton and Dante and and and!!!

This is one of the most truly incredible books I have ever read. Every page is gorgeous.

It is a "modern" retelling of Revelations through the eyes of Blake using characters and a world essentially created by Blake himself. For instance, the Holy Land is now England.

You'll want to study the accompanying notes for each plate. For as you're reading the story, you're also researching how it came about, why certain characters act the way they do, and what the images on each plate represent. I was wondering why it was taking so long to complete the book, then i realized I was taking 5-10 minutes per page. First, reading it. Then examining the plate's art. Then reading the text's notes. And finally, reading the author's notes.

The way the book was put together is perfect for modern presentation. I haven't seen any of the older copies of this story, but I can't see how much better they could have done. It has a special spot on my bookshelf, unparalleled.

Don't be fooled by the reviews here. They are actually reviews of the Princeton University edition, which is what most students of Blake will want to have. This book, printed by Kessinger Publishing, is simply a copy of the text that can be easily gotten from the internet and printed off on your home computer. There are no reproductions of Blake's images.

Jerusalem is Blake's monumental final work, 100 densely filled large plates/pages. It also seems the most Blakean (it begins with a friendly address to the reader that has had all the friendly words gouged out); not surprisingly, Blake produced only one color copy (reproduced here), which he never sold. The book overwehlms, presenting essentially all of Blake's very complicated questions about authenticity and creation through particularly abstract mythology. It is therefore a good idea to have some experience with Blake's earlier books before attempting J. The text does not exist without Blake's awesome illustrations/illuminations. While this edition is excellent, I give it only four stars because 1. the transcription of the plates does not occur on opposite pages, but rather in a separate section, and 2. the editorial assistence is scarce, and when present, oblique. These faults are noticable mainly in relation to other outstanding titles in the Blake Trust series (published later), and are hardly fatal. You're unlikely to find a better edition.

I recommend that any fan of William Blake buy this volume and the other 5 in the series. The books are beautiful, large, and handsomely bound. Each book is reproduced in full color, using a six-color printing process rather than the standard four. The pages are heavy, opaque and have a gorgous lustre indicating very high quality paper. The text of each book accompanies the color reproductions in standard typeface with very competent commentary to boot.