The Birth of Los(s) from Tharmas
This chapter analyses the meaning of the opening pages of William Blake's The Four Zoas, particularly the part where Tharmas (unity of the body) and Enion give birth to Los (imagination). It suggests that these opening pages provided an account of the prelapsian relation between the sexes. In this part of the prophetic poem, the identification of the male power as an active, immortal self, and the female as a passive body that sacrifices herself for the life of the male is hardly remarkable.
Keywords: The Four Zoas, William Blake, gender relation, Tharmas, Enion, Los, prophetic poem
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