A Visit to William Blake's Inn: Poems for Innocent and Experienced Travelers is a book by Nancy Willard

Nancy Willard

Nancy Willard is an award-winning children's author, poet, and novelist. In 1982, she received the Newbery Medal for A Visit to William Blake's Inn...

 that won the Newbery Medal

Newbery Medal

The John Newbery Medal is a literary award given by the Association for Library Service to Children, a division of the American Library Association . The award is given to the author of the most distinguished contribution to American literature for children. The award has been given since 1922. ...

 for excellence in American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 children's literature

Children's literature

Children's literature is for readers and listeners up to about age twelve; it is often defined in four different ways: books written by children, books written for children, books chosen by children, or books chosen for children. It is often illustrated. The term is used in senses which sometimes...

 in 1982. It is also the only book to have won both the Newbery Award and the Caldecott Honor Award. (The Caldecott Medal

Caldecott Medal

The Caldecott Medal is awarded annually by the Association for Library Service to Children , a division of the American Library Association, to the artist of the most distinguished American picture book for children published that year. The award was named in honor of nineteenth-century English...

 in 1982 went to Jumanji

Jumanji

Jumanji is the title of a 1981 children's illustrated short story and fantasy story written and illustrated by the American author Chris Van Allsburg. It was made into a 1995 film of the same name. Both the book and the movie are about a magical board game that implements real animals and other...

.)

In a prose introduction, Nancy Willard tells how she was first introduced to the poetry of William Blake

William Blake

William Blake was an English poet, painter, and printmaker. Largely unrecognised during his lifetime, Blake is now considered a seminal figure in the history of both the poetry and visual arts of the Romantic Age...

 when she was ill as a seven-year-old. When she asked her babysitter, Miss Pratt, for a story "about lions and tigers," Miss Pratt responded with Blake's "The Tyger

The Tyger

"The Tyger" is a poem by the English poet William Blake. It was published as part of his collection Songs of Experience in 1794 . It is one of Blake's best-known and most analyzed poems...

," and two days later she received a copy of "Songs of Experience" and "Songs of Innocence," inscribed Poetry is the best medicine. Best wishes for a speedy recovery. yrs, William Blake.

The fifteen poems that follow, plus an epilogue, describe the events of a day and a half of a child's visit to William Blake's Inn. Inhabited by such creatures as the Rabbit, the Rat, the Wise Cow, the King of Cats, the Tiger, the Man in the Marmalade Hat, and of course William Blake himself, it is a place of wonder and magic.

Willard's poetry is metrical and rhyming, simple in many ways but never simplistic. Hints of a larger universe or magical forces at work are never far from the surface. In the central "Blake Leads a Walk on the Milky Way," most of the characters express wonder and awe at the eternal beauty around them and are rewarded by Blake with gifts of stars, while the rat, sullen and cynical, receives only "a handful of dirt."

The illustrations are beautiful gouache

Gouache

Gouache[p], also spelled guache, the name of which derives from the Italian guazzo, water paint, splash or bodycolor is a type of paint consisting of pigment suspended in water. A binding agent, usually gum arabic, is also present, just as in watercolor...

paintings which are whimsical and iconic, making great use of the architecture of Blake's England.

The poems are:

• William Blake’s Inn for Innocent and Experienced Travelers
• Blake’s Wonderful Car Delivers Us Wonderfully Well
• A Rabbit Reveals My Room
• The Sun and Moon Circus Soothes the Wakeful Guests
• The Man in the Marmalade Hat Arrives
• The King of Cats Orders an Early Breakfast
• The Wise Cow Enjoys a Cloud
• Two Sunflowers Move into the Yellow Room
• The Wise Cow Makes Way, Room, and Believe
• Blake Leads a Walk on the Milky Way
• When We Come Home, Blake Calls for Fire
• The Marmalade Man Makes a Dance to Mend Us
• The King of Cats Sends a Postcard to His Wife
• The Tiger Asks Blake for a Bedtime Story
• Blake Tells the Tiger the Tale of the Tailor
• Epilogue

A Visit to William Blake's Inn has been set to music as a song cycle by American composer Dale Lyles.