CRITICAL NOTES ABOUT
MILTON
Milton, the greatest
writer of his age, lives the turbulence of his era being involved in the English
Civil War, supporting Cromwell and devoting his entire work to the cause of Puritans.
His greatest work, Paradise Lost, is the result of the meditations on the Bible
of Milton, Renaissance scholar and Puritan poet. The subject matter is
biblical: man loses the joys of Paradise
through eating the forbidden fruit. Paradise
is lost and sin and death become part of the human condition. Paradise Lost is
also a great classical epic and his inspiration came from Gerusalemme Liberata,
Aeneid and Ilyad. In Paradise Lost many elements drawn from the epic can be
found: the invocation to the Muse, the description of a war, the heroes, the supernatural
elements and the highly refined language. Other elements contribute to the
grandness of his style, like the use of many Latinate forms. A feature of his
style is inversion: he writes the adjective after the noun. He often repeats a
phrase or word to link these long sentences. Milton chooses words, not just for their
meaning, but also for the beauty of their sound.
Satan is taken to be
one of the most attractive characters of Paradise Lost. At the start, he is an
epic hero, the incarnation of beauty fallen from grace and of great courage.
But, later, the ure of Satan becomes less evident and, from being a great
leader, he becomes a vile creature, the essence of evil.
A ison between
Milton and Dante comes automatically to mind. Both describe hell and are caught
up in their religious ideas. But differences exist: in Divina Commedia the hero
is the poet, while in Paradise Lost Satan is the hero. Dante gives up a picture
of the society of his time, Milton
talks mainly of the original sin. Dante's hell is ned and organized; Milton's hell is in a
state of chaos. Dante attacks political ures; Milton's poem is not concerned with politics.
Dante writes using a language meant to be understood by all, while Milton's language
excludes all but the best educated because of the high style.
