FOUR ZOAS I / 4:8-12


 Revisions to line 4:8
 confirm the text as
undergoing the division
 it describes.



























 "Her": first emergence
 of gender difference in
 the narrative proper.


 In another construction of line 4:8, however, even these tenuous holds
on the separate identities of characters are undermined. Because of the
absence of punctuation, the following reading is also possible: "Enion O
Enion / We are [.] become a Victim to the Living We [.] hide in secret." In
this reading,9 Tharmas' anguish derives from the assertion of separateness
-"We are" rather than "I am" (as Blake's original text read). 0 The speaker
is then commanding Enion to become a Victim of this state of separate
existence, and is identifying this victimization with hiding in secret. In
this construction, the grammatical divisions of the previous readings
break down. Even though all these possibilities are vying for dominance
in the reader's experience, no reader can consciously entertain them all
simultaneously, since each demands a crucial revision of the syntactic
status of the words in the alternative readings. The text thus thwarts the
reader's desire to find a unified identity reflected in the text itself.
 In line 4:9, "Jerusalem" is either (most obviously) the object of Thar-
mas' hiding or (less obviously) the character he is addressing: "I have
hidden [,]Jerusalem [,] in Silent Contrition." In the former reading Thar-
mas claims to have hidden a separate character; in the latter he claims to
have hidden himself ("Silent Contrition" seems as much a place as an
emotion). These opposed readings serve to split Tharmas further in two at
precisely the point at which a separate "I" emerges accompanied by a
shift from the present to the past perfect tense (enacting a temporal divi-
sion). The term "Jerusalem" thus exhibits characteristics of both "We" and
"the Living" of the previous line: this apparently separate character is an
external projection of the hiding process itself while being a product of
division.
 In a desperate attempt to sustain his identity, Tharmas is forced to
undergo radical changes as he speaks:
 I have hidden Jerusalem in Silent Contrition O Pity Me
 I will build thee a Labyrinth also O pity me O Enion
 Why hast thou taken sweet Jerusalem from my inmost Soul
 Let her Lay secret in the Soft recess of darkness & silence
 (4:9-12)

 A crucial gap exists between Tharmas' admission that he has hidden
either Jerusalem or himself and his offer to build a "Labyrinth also" for
Enion. By using "also" Tharmas acts as if Enion already knows that the
form of "Silent Contrition" in which he has hidden Jerusalem or himself is
a form of "Labyrinth." (In the earlier text, this gap does not exist: "thee
Enion" which "Jerusalem" replaces both cancels out the syntactic multiva-
lence and implies that Tharmas is offering Enion a "Labyrinth" in addition
to hiding her, rather than as a fonn of hiding her.) As the primary image of
the possibility of hiding at this point in the poem, the "Labyrinth"
reflexively refers to the immediate tangle of complexities in the text itself.
To call attention to the "Labyrinth" as a self-conscious aspect of the text,
Blake brackets Tharmas' offer of a "Labyrinth" with "O Pity Me" and "O