Torment in a railway timetable!

The Marriage of Heaven and Hell

The Tate Galley in London has announced a new acquisition of yet unknown William Blake etchings. It is one of those amazing stories by which things lost come back to life (HT Flea):

In among a box of second-hand books bought from a North London dealer in the late 1970s was a thick international railway timetable.

So boring did this tome appear to be that the seller apparently missed the eight small etchings hidden between the pages — a mistake that, in effect, handed the buyer a small fortune when they were identified three years ago as unique works by the visionary artist and writer William Blake.

Tate galleries have now bought these brilliantly executed and disturbing pictures for £441,000 and will exhibit them at Tate Britain in July.

They are not the sort of images that are likely to be ignored again. In one a naked man screams in horror as flames rage around him. In another a figure with long hair bends over a glowing red pool. Blake’s caption reads: “vegetating in fibres of blood...

I couldn't find any web page that has all of the newly-discovered works. This Google News page has links to stories which each feature one or two of the works.