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1
Tournu, Christophe. "Théologie & [et] politique dans l'oeuvre en prose de John Milton." Clermont-Ferrand 2, 1996. http://www.theses.fr/1996CLF20100.
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Cette étude se propose d'examiner les interactions du discours sur Dieu de Milton avec sa vision de l'organisation de la cité dans ses pamphlets, où il s'est appliqué aux divers champs de la liberté. Lorsqu'il se penche sur la vie privée pour prouver que le divorce se justifie en cas d'incompatibilité d'humeur, le publiciste se voit obligé de créer une herméneutique : "la règle de charité" devait servir d'argumentaire à sa politique. Sa théologie, essentiellement christologique, aboutit à une revalorisation de l'homme faillible. L'évocation de l'éducation des enfants l'amène à souligner la perfectibilité de l'homme par le savoir. Si elle forme à la connaissance de Dieu, l'école prépare une élite au commandement des affaires publiques : le théologique, sans le politique, reste vide. Avec le dossier de la liberté d'imprimer, où il plaide pour l'abolition de la censure d'avant publication, le polémiste cherche à cautionner par sa théologie un projet politique, bien que celui-ci déborde son cadre spécifique : Milton souligne la responsabilité de l'homme pour demander l'affranchissement des consciences. Avec la cause ecclésiastique, il affirme l'irréductible dignité des croyants, d'où son antiprélatisme ; il se prononce pour une séparation des 2 sphères. Il dégage complétement l'église du politique, jusque dans ses infrastuctures, pour l'investir d'une dimension supra-théologique. Sa conception de l'autorité fait apparaître que le politique, sans le théologique, n'aurait aucune assise. Il réfute le jure divino des rois pour avancer le droit inaliénable des peuples à disposer d'eux-mêmes ; à l'aide d'arguments philosophico-historiques, il légitime le tyrannicide ; aux prises à l'anarchie, il préconise un républicanisme aristocratique. Ce schéma fait voir une symbiose théologie-politique : la minorité, dirigeants ou hommes bons, ne correspond-elle pas à la poignée d'élus de Dieu ? Cependant, les 2 pôles ne sauraient obéir à une logique identique : l'homme ne voit pas comme Dieu voit ; d'autre part, chez Milton, ils suivent une évolution parallèle : le politique doit disparaître dans la mesure où chacun est appelé à la discipline de soi, à une intériorisation de la loi ; le théologique cesse d'être un prototype pour les situations collectives présentes pour s'employer à une transformation de l'individu : il s'efface au profit de l'écriture non-écrite : la paroleThis study purports to analyse the interactions between j. Milton's discourse on god and his view of man's organized society in the works "of (his) left hand", where he applied himself to the various fields of liberty. Examining private life, the polemicist must devise his own hermeneutics to justify divorce in case of mutual incompatibility; "the rule of charity" was to account for his politics of marriage. What is essentially a christology leads to a radical upgrading of fallible man. When he deals with the problem of education, he insists on the perfectibility of man through learning. If j. Milton's accademy forms man to a knowledge of god, its program prepares an elite to leadership. Theology, without politics, appears to be an empty husk. Then the pamphleteer pleads for the abolition of pre-publication censorship: he strives to support a political project by his theology, although the former will further ask for liberty of conscience. Emphasizing the responsibility of man, j. Milton rejects calvins and come close to arminianism. In discussing the ecclesiastical cause he asserts the dignity of believers and positions himself for a segregation of the two spheres. Divesting the church of politics, he would invest the institution with a supra theological dimension. That politics, without theology, would be unfounded is the conclusion of his vision of power. Confuting the jure divino of kings to put forward the imprescriptible rights of the people to self-government, he legitimizes tyrannicide with philosophical and historical arguments, before advocating an aristocratic republic. Thus theology and politics would completely agree : the minority of good men or of rulers corresponds to the handful of god's elect. Yet the two poles cannot obey one logic, for man sees not as god sees, but they follow the same pattern of evolution. Just as politics is eventually t o disappear because man should master himself by interiorizing the law, theology will no longer be a prototype for all present collective situations: the ways of god to man aim at a renewing of the individual(s) and are to be found in the unwritten scripture - the word
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Voss, Annemarie. "John Milton's Paradise lost in Germany : reception and German-language criticism." Virtual Press, 1991. http://liblink.bsu.edu/uhtbin/catkey/762991.
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This survey focuses on German-language studies of John Milton's Paradise Lost, based on a bibliography of more than 140 German-language publications dating from 1651 to the present. Its purpose is to describe and evaluate these studies and to make their arguments accessible to readers who have difficulties locating, obtaining, and/or reading these texts.Chapters 1-4 give an account of Milton's reception in Germany and Switzerland. Topics discussed include the evaluation of Milton as poet and man, the influence of Milton's Paradise Lost on the development of German literature (Klopstock's Messias), early Milton studies, German translations of Milton's Paradise Lost, the teaching of Milton's works in Germany, and the evaluation of the poem for the present generation. Chapters 5 to 10 survey twentieth-century German-language criticism of Paradise Lost. Topics include the literary tradition; the drama plans; structure and style; cosmology and theology; and interpretations of the fall.Outstanding twentieth-century German studies include Hiibener's analysis of stylistic tension (1913); Bastian's analysis of the problem of temptation (1930); Wickert's examination of Milton's drama plans (1955); Grun's interpretation of the fall (1956); MoritzSiebeck's structural and aesthetic justification of the last two books of Paradise Lost (1963); Spevack-Husmann's examination of the relevance of the medieval tradition of allegorical and typological myth interpretation for Milton's mythological comparisons (1963); Markus's study of the parenthesis as rhetorical means of psychological influence (1965); Hagenbuchle's analysis of the fall(1969); Maier's examination of contrast and parallel as structural elements (1974); Slogsnat's exploration of the dramatical structure and tragic nature (1978); Schrey's account of Milton's reception in Germany (1980); and Klein's study of astronomy and anthropocentric in Milton's attitude towards science (1986). These studies deserve to be better known by the English-speaking scholarly community for their different points of view and their good understanding of Milton's art.Milton's Paradise Lost is still appreciated in Germany and continues to have many readers.Department of English
3
Wilson, Emma Annette. "John Milton's use of logic in 'Paradise Lost'." Thesis, St Andrews, 2009. http://hdl.handle.net/10023/850.
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Hannon, Elizabeth. "The influence of Paradise Lost on the hymns of Charles Wesley." Thesis, University of British Columbia, 1985. http://hdl.handle.net/2429/25417.
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An overview of the prose writings of John Wesley, and the hymn writing of his brother Charles, shows that John Milton was an important influence on both men. A search of the literature indicates that critics have rarely noticed this, and although some work has been done on John's abridgement of Paradise Lost, there are no qualitative studies of its effect on the hymnody of Charles. Although the singing of hymns is a potential way of influencing language and doctrine of all singers, it is particularly important for people who have little other education.
Charles Wesley, as the most prolific English hymnwriter, was influential in educating generations of church-goers.
He used Paradise Lost in several ways: l)by simple appropriation
of diction, 2) by combining it with the Bible in four specific ways, i.e., a) simple addition of images and language from Paradise Lost to biblical sources, b) magnification of a biblical idea by projecting it through a scene in Paradise Lost, as in the case of the hymn, "Soldiers of Christ Arise" which is influenced by Book 5, c) the use of the Bible and Paradise Lost as joint "pre-text" to create a new concept, and d) the use of Paradise Lost to "Christianise" a Psalm. Psalm 24 is used as an example.
Obvious reasons why Charles Wesley might wish to imitate Milton, such as Milton's popularity in the eighteenth century, and Wesley family connections with Milton, are explored and considered not significant, but a common classical education is important. The two men have similar theological views in two doctrines essential to the Wesleyan revival: a) justification by faith and b) universal redemption. Other similarities are their expression of views on covenant theology, the nature of the goodness of God, and the name of God as "all in all." Their audiences were different but their purposes were similar: to teach "serious godliness" by inculcating doctrine and inspiring faith in a way that would touch the minds and hearts of their readers.
Three appendices are presented: one on the problem of the hymn as a literary genre, the second on the audience for Wesley hymns, and the third on the history of literary criticism of the Wesleys.Arts, Faculty of
English, Department of
Graduate
5
Padgett, Jeffrey Lynn. "The monistic continuity of the Miltonic heresy." Virtual Press, 1987. http://liblink.bsu.edu/uhtbin/catkey/514853.
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John Milton's Christian Doctrine reveals a number of doctrinal opinions clearly in disagreement with the orthodox Christianity of his day. His four major heresies, his monism itself, his theory of creation ex Deo, his anti-Trinitarianism, and his mortalism, form a logical system, developed in accordance with his monistic conception of the cosmos.Milton's monism denies the Platonic dualism between matter and spirit. He presents a world which is a continuum in which that which is usually called material is merely further removed from God than that which is normally called spiritual. This monism serves as the basis of his concepts of the universe, God, and humanity.Since Milton sees God as the total of reality, the things of this world cannot have their source in anything outside God. They cannot be created either from a preexistent prime matter or from nothing. His monism requires that they somehow be created ex Deo, from God's own substance.Milton's monism denies the possibility of the traditional concept of the Trinity. The Son is neither coeternal, co-essential, nor co-equal with the Father. The Holy Spirit is even less important, subordinate to both Father and Son. Since Christ must also be a unity, Milton presents a unique concept of the Incarnation, in which two total persons are mysteriously combined into one new person.His monism requires that the human being also be a unity. Two heresies result: (1) Traducianism, in which the soul is generated by the parents just as is the body; (2) Thnetopsychic mortalism, in which the entire human being dies together and then is resurrected to either reward or punishment.Through a study of monism, Milton's reader can find a key to the phenomenon of John Milton. He uniquely combines his monism with a staunch Biblical literalism, presenting himself as a Christian, but a Christian with a difference-a Christian who will allow no outside authority of any kind to define his faith. As a part of Milton's general application of a monistic cosmos to all his thought, the monistic continuity of the Miltonic heresy can clearly be discovered.
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Koo, Youngwhoe. "Idea of Natural Law in Milton's Comus and Paradise Lost." Thesis, University of North Texas, 1998. https://digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc277958/.
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This dissertation tries to locate Milton's optimistic view of man and nature as expressed in Comus, Doctrine and Discipline of Divorce, and Paradise Lost in the long tradition of natural law that goes back to Aristotle, Cicero, and Aquinas.
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Oberson, Frédéric. "Image, symbole et signe dans les pamphlets anti-royalistes de John Milton." Paris 10, 2001. http://www.theses.fr/2001PA100114.
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Les pamphlets anti-royalistes de John Milton sont composés dans la grande tradition des duels rhétoriques. Il se préoccupe peu de théorie politique et s'intéresse, avant tout, à la liberté de conscience et d'expression. Il critique une société qui se laisse trop facilement manipuler par la propagande. Milton devient le chantre du nouveau gouvernement républicain et compose pour lui plusieurs défenses destinées à un public européen. Sa première cible est le roi Charles Ier, dont il critique point par point les supposées « mémoires », publiées au lendemain de son exécution. Il s'en prend à un roi-acteur qui, à l'image des personnages shakespeariens, joue plusieurs rôles, tantôt poète, tantôt martyr éploré. Ses deux principaux adversaires sont des royalistes étrangers, les Français Claude Saumaise et Alexandre More. Pour les discréditer, il utilise contre eux un bestiaire foisonnant et une satire aux nombreuses références sexuelles. Il développe aussi toute une série de signes de l'étranger auxquels il oppose, avec un patriotisme virulent, un portrait glorieux de la nation anglaise. Ses ennemis l'accablent d'injures, relatives notamment à sa cécité et il se réfugie dans la littérature et le mythe pour élever le débat, jusqu'à créer pour lui-même le personnage du barde aveugle, qu'il reprend dans sa tragédie de Samson Agonistes. Il affronte ses adversaires royalistes au moyen de signes qu'il partage avec eux, mais dont chacun use différemment. Il s'intéresse avant tout à la responsabilité de l'homme à l'égard de son choix du juste ou du faux. Le tyran sous tous ses avatars, de Charles Ier à Satan, symbolise la tentation de l'illusion. Milton se transforme souvent en médecin du corps politique lorsqu'il pratique une dissection des textes de ses adversaires, pour en exposer les artifices, en ayant recours à de nombreuses images liées au corps humain et à la médecine. Il met en scène les illusions de ses ennemis, en puisant abondamment dans le répertoire théâtral de l'époque et s'inspire abondamment des tragédies de William ShakespeareIn his republican pamphlets, John Milton fights against three main enemies, i. E. The late king Charles I and two French monarchists, Claude Saumaise and Alexander More. Against them, he builds up a lot of satirical images, involving animals, sexual behaviours, the medicine and the theatre. He is influenced by William Shakespeare. A lot of bodily images and symbols are derived from contemporary medical thought. Milton's main purpose in his republican pamphlets is to expose in public view the illusions which enslave men and to fight political propaganda. He presents himself like a hero, a bard, a prophet and a soldier, with a mission. In doing so, lie compares himself with a lot of mythological figures, from Orpheus and Osiris, to Samson and Hercules
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Ghermani, Laïla. "Le visible et l'invisible dans Paradise Lost de John Milton (1608-1674) : genèse et essor d'une poétique hérétique." Paris 3, 2008. http://www.theses.fr/2008PA030133.
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Comment le poète miltonien peut-il affirmer qu’il va voir et dire les choses invisibles aux yeux des mortels (« […] see and tell / Of things invisible to mortal eyes » (III, 54-55)) ou encore qu’il va montrer les exploits invisibles des anges (« invisible exploits » V, 565) dans son épopée ? L’objectif de la présente étude est de montrer que l’entreprise de rendre visible l’invisible est profondément originale d’un point de vue à la fois esthétique et théologique. En effet, pour formuler un tel argument, John Milton s’appuie sur une théologie qui lui est propre et qu’il revendique comme hérétique. Ainsi, en refusant la prédestination calviniste pour lui préférer la pensée d’Arminius sur le libre-arbitre, Milton forge une personnalité poétique qui bénéficie d’une illumination spécifique et supérieure. Par ailleurs, en réfutant le dogme de la Trinité pour lui préférer une conception unitaire, Milton conçoit le Fils de Dieu comme la première image visible et créée du Père invisible. Le modèle du Fils lui permet de penser une poétique de l’invisible. Enfin, sa poétique s’appuie sur une définition de l’accommodation scripturaire qui contredit celle de Saint Augustin, pourtant couramment utilisée par les protestants. Pour donner forme à son projet, Milton élabore une poétique épique, centrée sur les personnes du poète et du Fils, dont la fin dernière est la représentation visuelle. Pour rendre visible l’invisible gloire divine, il met en place une hiérarchie des images et du lexique de la lumière analogue à celle des créatures. La fragmentation du regard et sa réunification par le narrateur omniscient constituent le second élément de son esthétique visuelleHow can Milton’s poet claim that he intends to «see and tell / Of things invisible to mortal eyes » (III, 54-55) or that he is going to disclose the « invisible exploits » (V, 565) of the angels in the epic? The aim of this study is to show that Milton’s project to make invisible things visible, is profoundly original in both aesthetic and theological terms. His argument is rooted in a theology of his own which he acknowledges to be heretical. By rejecting the Calvinist idea of predestination, preferring instead the doctrine of Arminius, Milton forges a poetic persona who is granted a specific and superior illumination. Moreover, Milton refutes the dogma of the Trinity, and conceives the Son as the first created image of the invisible Father. Such a conception of the Son provides him with a model for his poetics of the invisible. Finally, Milton's poetics is based on a definition of scriptural accommodation which is in opposition to the Augustinian definition usually adopted by the Protestants. To give coherence to his project Milton elaborates an epic poetics which is centred on the figures of the poet and the Son and whose final aim is the representation of the invisible. To make the invisible glory of God visible, he introduces a hierarchy of images and words concerning the manifestations of light which parallels the hierarchy of living things in the universe. The second aspect of Milton’s visual aesthetics concerns a fragmenting of unified sight and its subsequent reconstruction by the omniscient narrator
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St-Jacques, François. "Étude comparative de trois traductions de Paradise Lost de l'anglais au français : définition d'une méthodologie quantitative de l'équivalence en traduction littéraire." Thesis, Université Laval, 2011. http://www.theses.ulaval.ca/2011/27977/27977.pdf.
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Midan, Marc. "Milton & Melville : le démon de l'allusion." Paris 7, 2014. http://www.theses.fr/2014PA070086.
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Milton & Melville : Le Démon de l'allusion étudie la signification de l'allusion à Milton dans Taïpi, Moby¬Dick, L'Escroc à la confiance et Billy-Budd, Marin. Un état détaillé de la recherche sur les rapports entre les deux auteurs montre la prédominance d'une conception de l'allusion comme moyen d'identifier le sens d'un texte incertain à celui d'un autre, supposé stable ; or, il s'agit, en réalité, d'une relation dynamique et réciproque. Ludique, satirique, impie, ou érotique, l'allusion melvillienne est multiforme et variable ¬ondoiement qui la dérobe à une approche trop générale, mais en lequel réside justement un sens plus global, au-delà de simples effets locaux. Loin d'être un ornement ou un supplément, elle fait partie de la trame même du texte ; oblique, déroutante, elle n'en sert pas moins la grande ambition melvillienne d'« énoncer la Vérité ». C'est, en effet, allusivement — dans une relation, en particulier, au Paradis perdu — que Melville décrit à la fois les travers de la société contemporaine, l'aliénation du moi et la terreur des « sphères invisibles ». Le poème melvillien peut se concevoir comme un lieu où la vérité est, dans le même mouvement, dégagée et exhibée, par une chimie à la fois expérimentale et picturale. Le processus mobilise ¬selon un modèle fédéral où s'affirme une originalité américaine — une allusion complexe, dont le sens ne réside pas seulement dans les éléments importés par les textes simultanément convoqués, mais aussi dans leur interaction conflictuelle. Cet agôn allusif récurrent — qui définit notamment l'écrire-blanc de Moby-Dick — participe d'une violence relationnelle dont le Satan de Milton est le plus puissant symboleMilton & Melville: The Demon of Allusion studies the significance of allusions to Milton in Typee, Moby¬Dick, The Confidence-Man and Billy-Budd, Sailor. Examining the state of research shows that allusion tends to be seen as a way to identify the meaning of an ambiguous Melvillean text with a supposedly stable Miltonic one – when in fact the allusive relationship is dynamic and reciprocal. All at once playful, satirical, impious, and erotic, Melvillean allusion is protean and thus eludes generalization. However, its very elusiveness hints at a more global significance, going beyond merely local import. Far from being just a flourish or a supplement, it is the very stuff that the text is made of. However oblique and disconcerting, it plays a crucial part in Melville's ambition to master the "great Art of Telling the Truth". Indeed, it is through allusion—in particular to Paradise Lost—that he satirizes contemporary society, explores the alienation of the self and expresses the terror of the "invisible spheres". Melville's text can be conceived of as the locus where truth is both achieved and exhibited to the reader, through a chemistry that is experimental as well as pictorial in nature. Based on a uniquely American federal model, such a process involves a complex allusive mix, the meaning of which lies not only in what the different texts bring to their host, "'but also in the destructive interaction between them. This recurrent allusive agon – the "colorless all-color" of writing – speaks to the violence of Melvillean relationships, the most powerful symbol of which is Milton's Satan
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Liebert, Elisabeth Mary, and n/a. "Speaking selves : dialogue and identity in Milton�s major poems." University of Otago. Department of English, 2006. http://adt.otago.ac.nz./public/adt-NZDU20061106.160106.
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In his Dialogue on the State of a Christian Man (1597), William Perkins articulated the popular early-modern understanding that the individual is a "double person" organised under "spiritual" and "temporal" regiments. In the one, he is a person "under Christ" and must endeavour to become Christ-like; in the other, he is a person "in respect of" others and bound to fulfil his duties towards them. This early-modern self, governed by relationships and the obligations they entail, was profoundly vulnerable to the formative influence of speech, for relationships themselves were in part created and sustained through social dialogue. Similarly, the individual could hope to become "a person...under Christ" only by hearing spiritual speech - Scripture preached or read, or the "secret soule-whisperings" of the Spirit. The capacity of speech to effect real and lasting change in the auditor was a commonplace in seventeenth-century England: the conscious crafting of identity, dramatised by Stephen Greenblatt in Renaissance Self-Fashioning, occurred daily in domestic and social transactions, in the exchange of civilities, the use of apostrophe, and strategies of praise. It happened when friends or strangers met, when host greeted guest, or the signatory to a letter penned vocatives that defined his addressee. It lacked a sense of high drama but was nonetheless calculated and effective.
Speaking Selves proposes that examining the impact of speech upon the "double person" not only contributes to our understanding of selfhood in the seventeenth century, but also, and more importantly, leads to new insights into some of that century�s greatest literary artefacts: Paradise Lost, Paradise Regained, and Samson Agonistes. The first chapter turns to conduct manuals and conversion narratives, to speech-act theory and discourse analysis, and draws out those verbal strategies that contributed to the organisation of social and spiritual selves. Chapter 2 turns to Paradise Lost and traces the Father�s gradual revelation to the Son, through apostrophe, how he is to reflect, how enact the divine being whose visible and verbal expression he is. Chapter 3 discusses advice on address behaviour in seventeenth-century marriage treatises; it reveals the positive contribution of generous apostrophe and verbal mirroring to Adam and Eve�s Edenic marriage. The conversational dyads in heaven and prelapsarian Eden enact positive identities for their collocutors. Satan, however, begetting himself by diabolical speech-act, discovers the ability of words to dismantle the identity of others. Chapter 4 traces the development of his deceptive strategies, drawing attention to his wilful misrepresentation of social identity as a means to pervert the spiritual identity of his collocutor. The final chapter explores the reorganisation of the complex social-spiritual person in the postlapsarian world. We watch the protagonist of Samson discriminate between the many voices that attempt to impose upon him their own understanding of selfhood. Drawing on spiritual autobiographies as structurally and thematically analogous to Milton�s drama, this final chapter traces the inward plot of Samson as its fallen hero redefines identity and rediscovers the "intimate impulse" of the Spirit that alone can complete the reorganisation of the spiritual self.
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Learmonth, Nicola K., and n/a. "Definitions of obedience in Paradise regained." University of Otago. Department of English, 2007. http://adt.otago.ac.nz./public/adt-NZDU20071108.162331.
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The thesis has two parts. Part One surveys the debate on how to define Christian obedience and Milton�s prose contributions to that discourse. In the century leading up to Milton�s prose writings there was much debate in England over how to define spiritual obedience. Civil authorities argued that matters of religion fell within state jurisdiction and that an individual�s spiritual obedience should be subject to outward scrutiny and external control; but these definitions were contested by Protestant reformers. Chapter One traces the issue up to Milton�s contributions.
Chapter Two traces Milton�s thinking about obedience, spiritual and secular, through his own prose writings: Milton defines obedience as a responsible freedom which requires continual critical assessment of authority. In reaction to the political and ecclesiastical developments of his own time, Milton places increasing emphasis on the role of the individual in defining and expressing obedience to God by means of scriptural study and open discussion. Milton argues that liberty is a necessary pre-condition for giving true obedience to God, and this idea comes to the fore in the later prose tracts, which respond to political and ecclesiastical developments that Milton interpreted as threatening the individual�s liberty of conscience.
Part Two examines Paradise Regained (1671), in which Milton advances his interpretation of obedience through his characterisation of the Son of God. Chapter Three shows how Milton links those forms of Christian obedience which he rejects in his prose writing to either Satan or satanic influence. Through his depiction of the Son�s responses to Satan, Milton indicates that Satan�s versions of obedience are designed to distract the Son, and any other believer, from giving proper obedience to God.
Chapter Four traces how Milton�s depiction of the Son of God demonstrates his understanding of the right reasons for, and ways of, giving proper obedience to God. The Son�s firm obedience is a state of mind and comprises knowledge of God through scriptural study, conversation and meditation. This exemplary obedience is motivated by an appreciation for and desire to participate in God�s glory (ie., Creation), and Milton indicates that it is this appreciation of divine glory that enables the Son of God to successfully resist Satan�s temptations.
Chapter Five examines Milton�s final episode, the pinnacle temptation, in terms of the obedience which he has approved throughout the poem. This chapter addresses Milton�s handling of the reader�s expectations for this scene, and the symbolic language and setting of the pinnacle episode. Unlike any other writers on the temptations in the wilderness, Milton invests the Son�s victory (and Satan�s defeat) on the pinnacle with symbolic power by depicting the Son standing in firm obedience to God. Thus Milton presents his reader with the definitive expression of humanity�s obedience to God: the Son�s stand is a symbolic return to the "Godlike erect" stance ascribed to prelapsarian humanity in Paradise Lost (PL, IV.289), and with this firm, upright obedience Milton shows the rest of humanity how to regain Paradise.
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Wallbanks, Mark. "The vicissitudes of the authentic self: a literary mapping of the authentic self from John Milton's Paradise lost to Bret Easton Ellis' Glamorama /Mark Wallbanks." HKBU Institutional Repository, 2017. https://repository.hkbu.edu.hk/etd_oa/364.
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Since the rise of individualism in the seventeenth century there has been increasing pressure on individuals to define themselves in the public eye. This has led to the recent phenomena of identity politics and self-branding. Yet how is one's true identity - if such a thing exists - ever expressed externally? How do individuals deal with the inner and outer aspects of identity? These are some of the issues which impinge upon the ethics of authenticity. This thesis investigates the development of the concept of the authentic self from its inception in the modern period to the postmodern. Through an analysis of the various tropes of literary texts, I shall illustrate how the concept of authenticity has travelled and transformed between cultural and temporal contexts. The body of the thesis contains five central chapters. Chapter 1 represents Paradise Lost (1667) as the end of one world and the beginning of another. The "Satanic" trope introduces the contingency of transgression and displacement in regard to authentic self-definition. With the birth of the modern epoch, I argue that the collapse of the epic totality instigated the liberation of self through the process of individuation, yet the corresponding loss of "place" in the social order evoked existential angst. In the second chapter I argue that Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe (1719) is an apposite inclusion in the tradition of St. Augustine's and Jean-Jacques Rousseau's Confessions. Through analysis of the "island" trope I assert that, even given the most perfect conditions of solipsism, the individual remains an inherently social being that retains a primordial compulsion for dialogical inscription of the self. In chapter 3, an analysis of the trope of "voice" as a metonym for ideology in Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness (1902) portrays Kurtz and Marlow as opposing sides of the authenticity struggle against the ideological allure of collective and absolute power. Chapter 4 associates Henry Miller's Tropic of Cancer (1934) with the anarchic egocentrism and intense individualism of Max Stirner's philosophy as a means of rebelling against the demands of social collectivism. In this chapter I analyse the "dream" trope in terms of Miller's trademark use of surreal metaphor which, I argue, provides a means of escape from the influence of collective identities. Finally, the fifth chapter will discuss the trope of "image terrorism" in reference to Glamorama (1998). This trope addresses the problemata of the globally destabilising influences of celebrity and terrorism, the tyranny of consumerism, and the Debordian Society of the Spectacle. The chapter raises the question of how, indeed if, in a globalized postmodern world with ever reducing horizons of differentiation, travel remains the last viable option in the pursuit of the authentic self.
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Hamel, Christopher. "Le Républicanisme des droits : vertu civique et droits naturels dans la pensée de John Milton et Algernon Sidney." Paris 1, 2009. http://www.theses.fr/2009PA010524.
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Cette thèse répond à une question qui est au centre des débats qui animent l'histoire de la pensée politique républicaine du XVIIe siècle: les concepts de droits naturels et de vertu civique sont-ils mutuellement exclusifs? La reconstruction détaillée de la pensée politique de John Milton et Algernon Sidney permet de soutenir que les droits naturels et la vertu civique sont deux éléments indissociables d'une conception cohérente de la liberté, celle-ci étant posée comme le bien suprême de l'homme. Ce résultat conduit à redéfinir les concepts en jeu dans les paradigmes historiographiques disponibles (Pocock, Sullivan, Rahe, Skinner). Milton et Sidney ne conçoivent pas les droits naturels comme des intérêts amoraux et subjectifs d'un individu égoïste, ni comme le simple souci de préservation de soi juridicisé d'un centre de désirs. Ces droits sont plutôt les fondements moraux d'une société juste qui protège la liberté d'un agent moral, libre et rationnel. Corrélativement, Milton et Sidney ne font pas de la vertu civique la finalité première de la société politique, comme dans le modèle de l'humanisme civique, où l'homme est appelé à réaliser son humanité par la participation politique. La vertu civique est à leurs yeux la disposition des citoyens nécessaire au maintien de la liberté. Inscrite dans ce raisonnement instrumental, la vertu n'est pour autant pas réduite à l'intérêt bien compris, car la liberté qu'elle a pour objet de soutenir est identifiée au bien suprême de l'homme. Son statut de moyen ne lui ôte donc pas sa valeur morale: être vertueux, c'est contribuer à conserver ou rétablir les conditions d'une existence digne de la nature libre et rationnelle de l'homme.
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Poulin, René. ""Advise him of his happy state" : a study of Raphael's instruction of man in Milton's Eden." Thesis, McGill University, 1985. http://digitool.Library.McGill.CA:80/R/?func=dbin-jump-full&object_id=63386.
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Caland, Fabienne Claire. "Seuils, passages, parole : Les lieux initiatiques dans "The lord of the rings" (Tolkien), "Paradise lost" (Milton) et "Inferno" (Dante)." Limoges, 1999. http://www.theses.fr/1999LIMOA015.
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Le voyage que ce soit dans l'espace, le temps ou la hierarchie sociale, est l'un des themes fondamentaux de la litterature. Pour mettre en evidence la relation intime entre l'etre et sa traversee, trois types de voyage ont retenu notre attention : proposes par tolkien, milton et dante, les voyages litteraires issus de la culture judeo-chretienne nous entrainent du xiveme siecle pour le poeme de dante au xxeme siecle pour le roman de tolkien. Ils ne peuvent toutefois se resumer en une lutte entre le bien et le mal ; ils sont davantage une peregrination, le parcours personnel et universel de neophytes sur la voie de l'initiation. Or, le fait d'etudier le caractere initiatique de the lord of the rings, paradise lost et inferno permet de delimiter des sequences precises en etapes evolutives pour l'individu en partance. Mais etudier ce qui se deroule entre les voyages, aller au coeur de l'espace liminal, de l'espace intermediaire, mene a une reflexion sur l'essence meme du voyage. En effet, c'est dans le lieu liminal, dans ces seuils, dans ces passages que l'essentiel se trouve : l'etre est confronte a la parole dangereuse, a celle qui dit tout, qui peut tout, qui pervertit et annihileles differences. Apprendre a dominer le verbe en maitrisant l'espace etrange et etranger, comprendre les etres qui l'habitent ou le traversent, savoir faire la distinction de la parole pernicieuse et la parole salvatrice, c'est l'enjeu du voyageur. C'est peut-etre la sa veritable quete.
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White, Michael 1971. "The relationship between the grotesque and revolutionary thought in Milton's Paradise lost and Shelley's Prometheus unbound /." Thesis, McGill University, 1997. http://digitool.Library.McGill.CA:80/R/?func=dbin-jump-full&object_id=20187.
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No substantial studies, at least to my knowledge, have yet been dedicated either to Milton's or to Shelley's extensive poetic use of the grotesque. This omission surprises me, especially given the voluminous critical attention both authors receive. Neither Milton nor Shelley's grotesquerie can be viewed as the basis of artistic method or artistic achievement as we might with, say, Rabelais, or Poe, or even Kafka. And neither Milton nor Shelley is self-consciously an artist of "the grotesque." In fact, Milton, from his seventeenth century perspective, would scarcely have regarded the term as being applicable to literary criticism at all. And as a late Romantic, Shelley defined himself rather as a poet of the imagination. Nonetheless I will show that both artists avail themselves of a grotesque aesthetic to achieve some of their most powerful and provocative poetry: we may here consider, for instance, Milton's memorable descriptions of the incongruities of Hell and the deformities of its fallen denizens in Paradise Lost, or Shelley's Gothic touches and his perplexing distortion of conventional linguistic and dramatic form in Prometheus Unbound.Aside from general considerations of the grotesque in these texts, I will especially focus on how Milton's and Shelley's uses of the grotesque mode provide us with unique, and often fascinating vantage points from which to appreciate their respective political concerns and revolutionary interests. While I expect this critical approach will elucidate Milton and Shelley in their own separate artistic and political spheres, I am especially interested to compare and contrast the poets, to show how the quite different uses made of the grotesque in Prometheus Unbound and Paradise Lost reflect the various ways in which Shelley responds to Milton in his role as a revolutionary forefather.
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Frey, Christopher Lorne. "Body marks in early modern English epic : Spenser's Faerie Queene and Milton's Paradise Lost." Thesis, McGill University, 2006. http://digitool.Library.McGill.CA:80/R/?func=dbin-jump-full&object_id=97835.
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As epic was considered a culturally comprehensive genre, so Spenser's Faerie Queene and Milton's Paradise Lost provide an effective locus for inquiry into literary representations of body marks in the Renaissance, and hence of the body itself. While grounded on central principles of Renaissance poetics such as delightful teaching, utpictura poesis, and catharsis, Spenser's and Milton's graphic accounts of wounds and diverse other types of body marks show corporeality can have positive import for the soul and heroic identity, just as they are shaped in part by bodily experienees. This dissertation thus reconsiders the widespread assumption that early moderns primarily viewed the body as a subservient yet sometimes threatening container for the soul....Une épopée fut culturellement considérée comme un vaste genre: The FaerieQueene, et Paradise Lost, de Spenser et Milton, sont pertinents pour l'étude desreprésentations littéraires des marques corporelles durant la Renaissance, et du corps.Basées sur les principes de la poésie de l'époque, comme l'enseignement délicieux, utpictura poesis, et la catharsis, les explications graphiques de blessures et autres cicatricesde Spenser et Milton montrent que la matérialité peut avoir une portée positive sur l'âmeet l'identité héroïque: elles sont formées par des expériences corporelles.
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Le, Roux Selene. "Poetry of revolution : the poetic representation of political conflict and transition in Milton’s Paradise Lost and Marvell’s Cromwell Poems." Thesis, Stellenbosch : University of Stellenbosch, 2007. http://hdl.handle.net/10019.1/2869.
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Thesis (MA (English Literature))--University of Stellenbosch, 2007.Seventeenth-century England witnessed a time of radical sociopolitical conflict and transition. This thesis aims to examine how two writers closely associated with this period and its controversies, John Milton and Andrew Marvell, represent events as they unfold. This thesis focuses specifically on Milton’s Paradise Lost and Marvell’s Cromwellian poems in order to show how these poets reinterpret established literary conventions and invoke traditional Puritan practices in order to explain and legitimise the precarious new dispensation of post-Civil War England. At the same time, their work produces ambiguities and tensions that threaten to undermine the very discourse that they attempt to endorse. Both poets’ work indicates an active involvement in the political embroilments of their time while retaining its aesthetic value. Therefore, these texts do not only function on an aesthetic level but also within the historical framework of political ideologies. The focus of this thesis is a discussion of the relationship between politics and poetry, with the emphasis on poetry of conflict and transition in civil society. In other words, it is not only considered how different poetic genres reflect social and political change in different ways but also how these genres in turn contribute to political rhetoric. During the English Revolution Milton and Marvell try to provide solutions for the political disturbance, even while remaining aware of the new conflicts produced in the attempt.
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Watson, Sara. "De Milton à Emerson : Trajectoires du dissent de l’époque coloniale à la période antebellum (1640-1860)." Thesis, Lyon, 2016. http://www.theses.fr/2016LYSEN046.
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John Milton, par son œuvre polémique en prose, a exercé une influence importante d’abord sur les colonies américaines, et ensuite aux Etats-Unis. C’est autour de l’interprétation de son statut de Dissenter que se met en place la construction d’une figure d’identification qui traverse les époques, pendant la Révolution et la campagne abolitionniste notamment. Cette thèse cherche à identifier les mécanismes et les moments fondamentaux de cette transmission culturelle, à travers le parcours de plusieurs auteurs américains : le Quaker John Woolman, l’abolitionniste William Garrison, et le Transcendantaliste Ralph Waldo Emerson. On analysera comment l’évolution de la définition du dissent a permis à l’œuvre de Milton d’accompagner différents mouvements intellectuels américains. On verra comment, à partir de racines anglaises, les problématiques soulevées par Milton dans les années 1640 à 1660, ont pu frapper ses lecteurs transatlantiques comme étant pertinentes pour leur époque, et comment l’œuvre en prose de Milton a pu participer à la définition de la désobéissance civile: John Milton in his prose works had a deep influence in North America, first in the colonies, and then in the United States. His status as a Dissenter, subject to many interpretations, enabled him to remain relevant throughout the different stages of American history, allowing actors from the American Revolution or the abolitionist campaign to identify with him and his works. This dissertation aims at identifying the mechanisms and stages of this form of cultural transmission, through the study of several American authors: the Quaker John Woolman, the abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison, and the Transcendentalist Ralph Waldo Emerson. Rooted in the English Civil War, the issues raised by Milton between 1640 and 1660 nonetheless strike a chord within his American readers as germane to their time. This work shall also investigate how Milton’s prose work, through the shifting definitions of Dissent, directly influenced the concept of civil disobedience
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Navarro, Aliste Daniela. "Miltonic influence in John Keats: creative process of reshaping myths in Hyperion and The fall of Hyperion: a dream." Tesis, Universidad de Chile, 2016. http://repositorio.uchile.cl/handle/2250/137777.
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Brooks, Scott A. "To move, to please, and to teach : the new poetry and the new music, and the works of Edmund Spenser and John Milton, 1579-1674." Thesis, University of St Andrews, 2014. http://hdl.handle.net/10023/5034.
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By examining Renaissance criticism both literary and musical, framed in the context of the contemporaneous obsession with the works of Plato, Aristotle, and Horace, among others, this thesis identifies the parallels in poetic and musical practices of the time that coalesce to form a unified idea about the poet-as-singer, and his role in society. Edmund Spenser and John Milton, who both, in various ways, lived in periods of upheaval, identified themselves as the poet-singer, and comprehending their poetry in the context of this idea is essential to a fuller appreciation thereof. The first chapter addresses the role that the study of rhetoric and the power of oratory played in shaping attitudes about poetry, and how the importance of sound, of an innate musicality to poetry, was pivotal in the turn from quantitative to accentual-syllabic verse. In addition, the philosophical idea of music, inherited from antiquity, is explained in order elucidate the significance of “artifice” and “proportion”. With this as a backdrop, the chapters following examine first the work of Spenser, and then of Milton, demonstrating the central role that music played in the composition of their verse. Also significant, in the case of Milton, is the revolution undertaken by the Florentine Camerata around the turn of the seventeenth century, which culminated in the birth of opera. The sources employed by this group of scholars and artists are identical to those which shaped the idea of the poet-as-singer, and analysing their works in tandem yields new insights into those poems which are considered among the finest achievements in English literature.
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McConomy, Erin Elizabeth. "Renaissance humanism in Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel and Milton's Paradise Lost." Thesis, National Library of Canada = Bibliothèque nationale du Canada, 1997. http://www.collectionscanada.ca/obj/s4/f2/dsk2/ftp01/MQ37223.pdf.
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Veto-Bougeard, Marie-Elisabeth. "Chateaubriand traducteur : de l'exil au Paradis perdu." Paris 4, 2000. http://www.theses.fr/2000PA040111.
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De ses essais fragmentaires de jeunesse à la traduction intégrale de Paradise lost en 1836, le fait traductif tient dans sa vie un rôle essentiel. Depuis l'exil en Angleterre, et ses traductions d'abord alimentaires, un cheminement le mène des extraits (Contes ossianiques, Beattle, etc. ) jusqu'à Milton qui a exercé sur lui une forte emprise littéraire, politique et religieuse : cette quête de soi qu'est la traduction a sur son œuvre propre des retentissements importants. Mais par sa revendication à provoquer une "révolution dans la manière de traduire", Chateaubriand pose son activité hors du seul domaine de l'expérience personnelle : les caractéristiques de son projet, les comptes, rendus de l'époque et les pratiques des traducteurs antérieurs et postérieurs révèlent de fait son caractère novateur, mais aussi les contradictions de sa position qui reste assez isolée dans cette période charnière pour le fait traductif. Une révolution se produit néanmoins dans sa pratique de traduction, entre le conformisme des débuts et la littéralité surprenante du paradis perdu, littéralité qui se permet aussi, grâce à une stratégie d'effet de calque, des libertés créatrices ; mais la clef de cette traduction réside sans doute dans l'humilité de l'ascèse verbale que s'impose Chateaubriand pour rendre ce texte qui lui est sacré, et qu'il faut relier à un héritage chrétien augustinien de réflexion sur l'esthétique et les pouvoirs de la parole.
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Mathews, Alice McWhirter. "The Path to Paradox: The Effects of the Falls in Milton's "Paradise Lost" and Conrad's "Lord Jim"." Thesis, North Texas State University, 1987. https://digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc332146/.
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This study arranges symptoms of polarity into a causal sequence# beginning with the origin of contrarieties and ending with the ultimate effect. The origin is considered as the fall of man, denoting both a mythic concept and a specific act of betrayal. This study argues that a sense of separateness precedes the fall or act of separation; the act of separation produces various kinds of fragmentation; and the fragments are reunited through paradox. Therefore, a causal relationship exists between the "fall" motif and the concept of paradox.
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Slaby, Frédéric. "Les Ecritures et leurs réécritures protestantes et romantiques dans l'oeuvre de Thomas De Quincey." Caen, 2009. http://www.theses.fr/2009CAEN1558.
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2009 marque le cent cinquantième anniversaire de la mort de Thomas De Quincey. L'auteur romantique resté célèbre pour ses Confessions of an English Opium-Eater se surnomme volontiers lui-même comme le « mangeur d’opium », ce qui oriente la critique vers une attention quasi-exclusive à sa pratique opiomane, les visions l'accompagnant et les conséquences créatrices et médicales. Ainsi que Frederick Burwick le déplore, il serait réducteur d'y voir l'essence de son œuvre, alors que sa contribution aux idées religieuses, pourtant importante, n'a jamais été étudiée dans sa globalité. La présente thèse se propose de combler cette lacune et ouvrir une perspective critique nouvelle en se penchant sur les rapports entre De Quincey, la Bible et ses réécritures protestantes et romantiques; c'est aussi le premier travail de ce genre à porter sur les 21 volumes de l'œuvre complète publiée par Grevel Lindop entre 2000 et 2004. Il montre que par son rapport aux Ecritures et leurs réécritures, Thomas De Quincey « paulinise » le romantisme en même temps qu'il romantise le protestantisme, offre une nouvelle interprétation de l'homme, construit une théodicée originale et propose une nouvelle définition de la littérature2009 marks the sesquicentennial of the death of Thomas De Quincey. The romantic writer’s enduring association with his Confessions of an English Opium Eater—fuelled by his own habit of referring to himself as such—has steered scholarly attention into the exclusive direction of his opium-eating practice, ensuing dreams and their creative and medical consequences. As Frederick Burwick deplores, it would be restrictive to see in this the quintessence of his work while his yet important contribution to religious ideas has never been studied overall. The present Doctoral dissertation proposes to remedy this lack and to open a new critical perspective by looking at the relationship between De Quincey, the Bible and its rewritings. It is also the first piece of work of this kind to draw on the 21 volumes of the complete works as published by Grevel Lindop between 2000 and 2004. It shows that through his relationship to the Bible and its rewritings, Thomas De Quincey “paulinises” romanticism while he romanticises Protestantism, offers a new interpretation of man, builds an original theodicy and renews the definition of literature
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Harris, Mitchell Munroe 1977. ""Rise to thought" : Augustinian ethics in Donne, Shakespeare, and Milton." 2008. http://hdl.handle.net/2152/17962.
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This dissertation considers the development of an ethics stemming from the Augustinian revival of early modern England, and the subsequent effect of this ethics on the literary culture of the period. The Preface claims that religious and textual communities operate according to a “cultural mobility” that eludes conventional neo-historicist approaches to literary culture, and Paul Ricoeur’s aphorism, “the symbol gives rise to thought,” serves as a model for thinking through this mobility. Augustinian ethics is a cultural phenomenon in the period, because people are thinking about Augustine, giving new life to his works through their own expressions of thought. After exploring the ways in which the Augustinian revival was brought about during the early modern period in the Introduction, one such expression of thought, John Donne’s relationship with early modern print culture, is examined in Chapter One. Following the theoretical outline of Augustine’s Christianization of Ciceronian rhetoric in his De Doctrina Christiana, it is suggested that though Donne’s aversion to the print publication of his poetry may have begun as a result of his “gentlemanly disdain” of the press, it ultimately found its sustenance in the form of an Augustinian ethic. Chapter Two examines the possibility of a metaphorical acquisition of Augustinian hermeneutics in the metadrama of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. This hermeneutics ultimately calls into question the epistemological framework of Theseus’s skeptical aesthetics, suggesting that a more inclusive aesthetics based on charity can elevate the stage to its proper dignity. The last chapter turns from the communal implications of Augustinian ethics to its subjective implications by examining Augustine’s inner light theology and the role it plays in John Milton’s late poetry. Instead of falling in line with criticism that sees the simultaneous publication of Paradise Regained and Samson Agonistes as a dialectical meditation on the virtues of pacifism and the evils of religious violence, this reading suggests that the late poetry asserts the ethical rights of those who attend to the inner light, whether they be peaceful or violent.text
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Bjork, Olin Robert 1970. "Interfacing Milton: the supplementation of Paradise lost." Thesis, 2008. http://hdl.handle.net/2152/3835.
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Jacques Derrida argued that a supplement "adds only to replace." Since the blind Milton dictated his epic to amanuenses, the text of Paradise Lost may be conceived as a supplement to an aural performance. This dissertation itself supplements another project, a digital "audiotext" or classroom edition of Paradise Lost on which I am collaborating with Professor John Rumrich and others. In the audiotext, we reassert the duality of the work as both a print text and an oral epic by integrating an audio recording with an electronic text of the poem. This pairing is informed by our own experiences teaching Paradise Lost as well as by cognitive research demonstrating that comprehension increases when students read and hear a text sequentially or simultaneously. As both a wellspring of the audiotext project and a meditation on its aims, this dissertation investigates the actual effects on readers of print and digital supplements putatively designed to enhance their appreciation or study of the work. The first two chapters examine the rationale and influence of the authorial and editorial matter added to early editions. The final two chapters explore the ways in which digital technology is changing how scholars and readers interact with Paradise Lost and other works of literature. I begin by examining why the first edition of Paradise Lost arrived in 1667 bearing no front matter other than a title page. In Chapter Two, I argue that critics have undervalued the interpretive significance of the prose summaries or Arguments that Milton appended to Paradise Lost and Samson Agonistes. Chapter Three relates the current emphasis on electronic textual encoding in editorial theory to the ideological dominance of Richard Bentley's conjectural approach in the early seventeenth century and of Fredson Bowers's copy-text approach in the 1960s and 70s. Chapter Four introduces the audiotext project and contrast its goals with those of other projects in the Digital Humanities. The audiotext's interface offers multiple viewing modes, enabling the user to display the reading text alone or in parallel with annotations and other supplements. Unlike prior editions and archives, therefore, it accommodates both immersive and analytical reading modes.text
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Dolloff, Matthew K. 1966. "Mediating the muse : Milton and the metamorphoses of Urania." Thesis, 2006. http://hdl.handle.net/2152/21916.
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In the grand invocation at the beginning of Book VII of his epic Paradise Lost, John Milton selects as his muse Urania, who is traditionally the Muse of Astronomy in classical texts. He immediately excludes that possible identification, however, when he writes that she is “Nor of the Muses nine.” By calling on her “meaning” rather than her “Name,” Milton relies on a multitude of precedents and traditions, repackaged for his own times and his own idiosyncratic purposes, that critics have consistently failed to recognize or investigate sufficiently. This dissertation looks diachronically at various occurrences of Uranian discourse in literature, historically both before and after Milton, to locate thematic similarities to his works and to help define his Urania accordingly. In spite of her explicit exclusion, the search begins with Urania as Muse of Astronomy because from her mythopoetic genesis in Ancient Greece, other myths are engrafted onto her, most notably Plato’s Uranian Aphrodite as defined in his Symposium. This transformed Urania appears in ancient and medieval cosmic journey and dream narratives and evolves by the Renaissance into an oddly Christianized muse. She becomes a vehicle for heavenly, divine truths that each devout Christian rightly senses in his conscience. In this capacity she promotes friendship and chastity, while she also opposes licentiousness, particularly the lusts of tyrants. In early myths, the Muses are victims of tyranny; but in later appearances, they often sell their patronage of the arts unscrupulously to wicked kings and the flattering poets who are paid by them. Urania’s patronage manages to distance itself from her sisters’ misallocations of inspiration, and parts of the Book VII invocation are clearly an indictment of royal excess. In conclusion, a small group of late-Victorian English poets, mainly from Oxford, call themselves the “Uranians.” Although they too draw from the same traditions as Milton and from Milton himself, they appropriate Urania to satisfy their own political and sexual agendas in a conscious and deliberate revision.text
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Spaulding, Bradley P. "The tree for the forest : eco-typology and the tree of life in John Milton's Paradise lost." 2013. http://liblink.bsu.edu/uhtbin/catkey/1720619.
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Access to abstract restricted until 07/2016.Eco-typology and the tree of life in Milton's Paradise lost -- The Matthew Bible, eco-typology and the tree of life in Milton's Eden -- The Geneva Bible, eco-typology and the fruit of the living word in Paradise lost -- Speed's 'Genealogies', the King James Bible and the seed of grace in the later books of Paradise lost.
Department of English
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Keim, Charles Andrew. "Milton’s God and the Sacred imagination." Thesis, 2004. http://hdl.handle.net/2429/15835.
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The poetic effectiveness of Milton's God is a fundamental critical issue in Paradise
Lost, and the thesis addresses this concern by first surveying the various representations of
God contained in the Hebrew scriptures. To speak of the biblical God, one must first
understand the tremendous diversity o f his portrayals: he meets with some people in human
form, and with others as a voice, a light, or an awesome presence. Milton's God shares less
with the God o f Genesis than he does with the God of the prophets; yet Milton's
representation demonstrates that though Eden will be lost, God will continue to manifest
himself to those who seek his face. The cosmology of the epic reveals both the immensity o f
creation and the intimacy o f its Creator, since the entire world is filled with the glory o f God,
and yet the garden where Adam and Eve live is an archetypal sanctuary and their bower a
type of Inner Temple. Milton's justification o f God's ways rests upon the timelessness of
God; events that appear anachronistic at first are used to establish a context that looks beyond
the strict limits of human time. On the one hand, the Incarnation, Resurrection, and
Apocalypse are separate events that have not yet come to pass; but on the other hand, Milton
shows how these events are simultaneously present and completed in God's presence. From
God's throne, we participate in a cosmic perspective where the categories of past, present,
and future are compressed into one time: we are before and beyond time. Such a transcendent
perspective engenders a powerful truth: before Adam and Eve have been tempted, God's
grace and mercy have found them out and they have been restored. Though Eden must be
lost, the paradise of God's presence will remain. Adam and Eve will fall and the legacy of
their rash act will be paradoxically for all time, but not forever. God will restore his people
and wipe away their tears, and, in the context of Milton's depiction of God, that time of
redemption is now.Arts, Faculty of
English, Department of
Graduate