I became quite attached to this image and was actually happy to have it as my desktop wallpaper, even though it's entitled "Death's Door" and might be considered morbid. It's one of Blake's most evocative and well-executed emblems. Blake must have thought so because he used this image again (America A Prophecy Plate 14).
I don't think it's morbid. I found added meaning in the idea that this emblem is a kind of momento mori (something like Durer's "Death and the Maiden," which Blake hung above his work bench)--that is, a reminder of death and the brevity of life. The classic memento mori, often show in the hands of saints in paintings, is a skull.
There is no skull here, but certainly an image to cause and think about mortality. There is an weird, interactive aspect to the image: the figure of the decrepit old man, and the eye that follows the figure, is seemingly sucked into the door. Note the hair, reaching ahead of the figure). The bottom of the long, shroud-like tunic is also shows movement, as if it were also being sucked in (though I'm also aware that Blake often, as in plate 16, often gives this scroll-like flourish to the bottom of robes and tunics).
I've written elsewhere that Blake is very conscious of such effects--using multimedia and framing to create a sense of virtual space--which is why Blake seems so at home on the web. He means to draw in the reader/viewer into his transformative space. This image does it better than most.
Life indeed is transient and precious. During this past week I learned that my father had a mini-stroke, which gave me an opportunity to peek inside death's door. I know I will be peeking again (but hopefully not any time soon regarding my father) and may have to come back to this image again, maybe even make it my computer wallpaper again.
Posted by jeb at September 2, 2005 5:06 PM | TrackBack