Illuminated instruction : a paratextual, intertextual, and iconotextual study of William Blake

Traditional Blake scholarship has rarely ascribed value to the materiality of William Blake’s illuminated manuscripts. My on-going PhD project aims to demonstrate the necessity of studying the materiality of Blake’s texts by using an interdisciplinary methodological framework to highlight the pedagogical functions of illuminated printing. Exploring the composition, printing, and distribution of Blake’s prints in a series of focussed micro-histories and paratextual micro-studies has helped the project to identify the various ways in which Blake manipulated his media to educate his readers. In unravelling the pedagogical potential of Blake’s works, the project promotes an understanding of a material medium which has remained largely unexplored in terms of its print culture contexts, revealing how Blake’s unique position as an engraver, artisan, and educator was hinged upon the materiality of his prints