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Abstract Description
William Blake’s The Book of Los ends with this vision of a human form appearing through darkness, reinforcing a similar image presented in an earlier poem The [First] Book of Urizen (1795). While this form is determined ‘a Human Illusion,’ the poem preceding this statement explores the different facets of embodiment and bodily functions. The poem is framed as a prophetic cry, and it addresses the ways in which the physical embodiment of a form conflicts with the conceptualising of the form itself. The disjunction between perception and presentation creates an epistemological break in what constitutes the human body. Grounding itself in Disability theory, this paper will examine how encountering the human form in Blake necessitates the erasure of what we understand as ‘normative’ and able-bodied. Standardisation is an illusion, one that when pressed, can copen the form to post-human possibilities.
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Dr Sharon Choe - University of York (United Kingdom)