Divided Empire: Milton's Political ImageryIn Divided Empire, Robert T. Fallon examines the influence of John Milton's political experience on his great poems: Paradise Lost, Paradise Regained, and Samson Agonistes. This study is a natural sequel to Fallon's previous book, Milton in Government, which examined Milton's decade of service as Secretary for Foreign Languages to the English Republic. Milton's works are crowded with political figures—kings, counselors, senators, soldiers, and envoys—all engaged in a comparable variety of public acts—debate, decree, diplomacy, and warfare—in a manner similar to those who exercised power on the world stage during his time in public office. Traditionally, scholars have cited this imagery for two purposes: first, to support studies of the poet's political allegiances as reflected in his prose and his life; and, second, to demonstrate that his works are sympathetic to certain ideological positions popular in present times. Fallon argues that Paradise Lost is not a political testament, however, and to read its lines as a critique of allegiances and ideologies outside the work is limit the range and scope of critical inquiry and to miss the larger purpose of the political imagery within the poem. That imagery, the author proposes, like that of all Milton's later works, serves to illuminate the spiritual message, a vision of the human soul caught up in the struggle between vast metaphysical forces of good and evil. Fallon seeks to enlarge the range of critical inquiry by assessing the influence of personal and historical events upon art, asking, as he puts it, "not what the poetry says about the events, but what the events say about the poetry." Divided Empire probes, not Milton's judgment on his sources, but the use he made of them. |
From inside the book
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... tion to the distinctions between the two works , the one a “ systematic theology , " the other a " blank verse epic , " but he is so intent on showing them as professing the same body of belief that he is reluctant to pursue the ...
... tion was the French monarchy ; and a vivid instance of the relationship between the poet's political experience and the shape of his art may be seen in the parallels between the ruling body of France and the several govern- ments of his ...
... tion of marriage would have forced him to lay aside his cardinal's robes , however , and he never did . Not so lightly dismissed , however , is the evi- dence that there was a close emotional bond between them . On the basis of Anne's ...
... tion in the Divine Being , even to the imagined structures of cosmic governance . This impression of a single governing principle is confirmed by the hierarchical pattern of the cosmic courts . Although Milton's vision of the ruling ...
... tion of powers among the three branches of government defined in the U.S. Constitution , in fact , his settlement , as outlined in The Readie and Easie Way , was of an altogether different design ( MG 196-97 ) . Further , Milton's study ...
Contents
1 | |
25 | |
To Reign in Hell | 55 |
Heaven and Hell | 83 |
The Lords of the Earth | 97 |
Divided Empire | 119 |
The Final Things | 143 |
Embattled Humanity | 161 |
Works Cited | 180 |
Index | 186 |