Month: November 2021

Embodying Heaven: The Body in Blake’s Dante, by Silvia Riccardi

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Images of Transfiguration: Trasumanar and Transformation in Paradise

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Introduction: Inside Blake’s Body

Dante’s journey in the otherworld has introduced generations of readers to the consequences of the divine judgment, the architecture of sin and salvation, the moral condemnation of materialism, and the pilgrim’s encounter with God. God is the “somma luce” (“eternal beam”), which cannot be grasped by means of human understanding. The blinding light of redemption thus remains a mystery untold in the Commedia.

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Blake and Zoroastrianism, by Mary Jackson

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Ahriman and Ormazd: The Creation of Urizen and the Billateral Mind

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There is considerable evidence that Blake was influenced by Zoroastrian and Mithraic iconography in several illuminations for his and other’s poetry. When one compares the figures of god and daeva (diabolical spirit) with Blake’s drawings and engravings, the sheer number of parallels argues convincingly for some form of influence. Were there no other data than this to prove that Blake may have incorporated elements of representations of the bull-slaying ritual, of Arimanes or Ahriman, god of dark, and Ormazd, god of light, into his visual art, the evidence would seem persuasive.

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