Reclaiming the heart, the soul and the flag: William Blake and radical England.
Saturday 18th October
7.30pm, Free / Donations

An evening of poetry and live music with local musicians and writers in the creative and revolutionary spirit of Blake’s visions of Albion.

William Blake was essentially an antinomian and a part of an Nexus of radical Christian sects in late 17th and early 18th Century London. This Nexus grew out of the Diggers, the Ranters, the Levellers and other groups resisting Cromwell’s betrayal of the people during the English Civil War and the Commonwealth. He knew Thomas Paine (American and French Revolutions), Mary Wollstencraft and others surrounding Joseph Johnson a radical publisher, who was eventually imprisoned for sedition.

The basic theme of antinomianism is that once you accept Christ in your heart the set of laws perpetrated by Moses (Mosaic laws) were no longer relevant to your actions. All that applied were the laws your heart, acting with love told you. This seemed to drive Blake’s preoccupation with racism, gender and class/status inequalities, economic fairness, and his loathing of the Church and State Establishments of the time. and justice social status hierarchy. There was also the placing of creativity and imagination above reason, and science

We aim to entertain with poetry, music and images which capture the continuing relevance of Blake to the present day.