Who among the following was not associated with the Cockney School of Poetry?

The correct option is William Blake.

The term "Cockney School of Poetry" was a derogatory label coined by conservative critics in Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine in 1817. The critics used this term to mock and dismiss a group of London-based Romantic writers who did not come from traditional aristocratic or elite university backgrounds, criticizing their style, diction, and social class.

The primary figures associated with this group included:
1. Leigh Hunt: He was the central figure and editor of the radical journal The Examiner, around whom this literary circle gathered.
2. John Keats: He was heavily targeted by the critics, who mockingly advised him to return to his former profession as an apothecary.
3. P.B. Shelley: Although from an aristocratic family, his close association with Hunt and his radical political views led critics to group him with the school.

William Blake, on the other hand, was an older Romantic poet, artist, and printmaker who worked in relative obscurity and isolation. He operated entirely outside the literary circle of Leigh Hunt and was never associated with or targeted as part of the Cockney School.