Songs of Innocence contains the spontaneous joy of childhood. In this
collection of poems, life is governed by the state of happiness. However, there are
some poems in this Songs which implicitly describe the suffering conditions in the
state of happiness. These suffering conditions are needed so that the speakers can
grow and progress. Among those poems are "The Little Black Boy", "The
Chimney Sweeper", and "On Another?s Sorrow". I choose to study them because
I am curious to know the ways the speakers in those three poems suffer and
progress in their life. In order to find the ways the speakers suffer and progress, I
use literary approach and as tools to analyze, I employ the elements of poetry,
such as imagery, diction, allusion and figures of speech: dramatic irony,
metaphor, simile, and symbol. Moreover, since the setting of poems was in the
eighteenth century or during the Romantic period, I need the information about
the historical background of England?s condition at that time, especially the
Industrial Revolution that gave huge effects in religion, society, economic
conditions and literature. In the analysis I find the many ways the speakers suffer
in those three poems, and I see the speakers of the poems progress after they come
to self realization in each poem.