Inside Paradise Lost: Reading the Designs of Milton's Epic

by David Quint

Overview

Inside "Paradise Lost" opens up new readings and ways of reading Milton's epic poem by mapping out the intricacies of its narrative and symbolic designs and by revealing and exploring the deeply allusive texture of its verse. David Quint’s comprehensive study demonstrates how systematic patterns of allusion and keywords give structure and coherence both to individual books of Paradise Lost and to the overarching relationship among its books and episodes. Looking at poems within the poem, Quint provides new interpretations as he takes readers through the major subjects of Paradise Lost—its relationship to epic tradition and the Bible, its cosmology and politics, and its dramas of human choice.

Quint shows how Milton radically revises the epic tradition and the Genesis story itself by arguing that it is better to create than destroy, by telling the reader to make love, not war, and by appearing to ratify Adam’s decision to fall and die with his wife. The Milton of this Paradise Lost is a Christian humanist who believes in the power and freedom of human moral agency. As this indispensable guide and reference takes us inside the poetry of Milton’s masterpiece, Paradise Lost reveals itself in new formal configurations and unsuspected levels of meaning and design.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781400850488
Publisher:	Princeton University Press
Publication date:	02/02/2014
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	344
File size:	2 MB

About the Author

David Quint is Sterling Professor of Comparative Literature at Yale University. His books include Epic and Empire, Cervantes's Novel of Modern Times, and Montaigne and the Quality of Mercy (all Princeton).

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments ix
Introduction 1
1.MILTON'S BOOK OF NUMBERS: BOOK 1 AND ITS CATALOG 15
The Shape of the Catalog 17
Moloch and Belial 1 18
Moloch and Saturn 1 19
Moloch and Saturn 2: A Miniature Aeneid 20
Moloch and Belial 2: Libya and Sodom 22
Egypt 23
The Catalog and Pandaemonium 24
The Logic of the Similes in Book 1 26
Raising Devils 29
Appendix: Demonic Swashbucklers 35
2.ULYSSES AND THE DEVILS: THE UNITY OF BOOK 2 38
The Council 41
Moloch and Belial Again: Ajax and Ulysses 42
Mammon and Beelzebub: A Thersites Is Rebuked 48
Satan and the Doloneia 50
Meanwhile, Back in Hell . . . 52
Milton's Telegony 55
Satan's Odyssey 58
Whose Odyssey? 59
3.FEAR OF FALLING: ICARUS, PHAETHON, AND LUCRETIUS 63
Icarus and Satan's Fall Through Chaos 64
Virgil and Lucretius 64
Dante, Tasso, Ovid 67
Satan Voyager 71
Phaethon, the Son, and the War in Heaven 75
Flight and Fall 85
A Poetry Against Falling 88
4.LIGHT, VISION, AND THE UNITY OF BOOK 3 93
Structure and Design 96
Universal Blank 99
Vision 106
The Sun 109
The Paradise of Fools 111
Sun Worshippers 114
Poetry and Science 118
5.THE POLITICS OF ENVY 122
Envy and the New Dispensation 124
Angels and Courtiers 132
Brotherhood versus Kingship in Books 11-12 144
6.GETTING WHAT YOU WISH FOR: A READING OF THE FALL153
The Seduction of Eve 156
The Second Adam as Second Eve 169
Adam's Choice: "One flesh" 176
"Not vastly disproportionall" 185
Changing Places 188
Appendix: A Note on the Separation Scene 195
7.REVERSING THE FALL IN BOOK 10 197
Virgilian Coordinates and the End of Satan 200
Creation and Anti-creation 202
Anti-triumphs 203
The Triumphs of the Son 206
Satan's Triumph 208
Adam and the Winds 211
The Recovery of Human Choice 212
Cherishing Eve 218
Dido and Armida; Creusa 219
Pandora 223
The Exposed Matron 229
8.LEAVING EDEN 234
Deconsecrated Earth 236
Good-bye 245
Notes 249
Bibliography 285
Index 301

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

"This magisterial study combines massive erudition with great interpretive subtlety. Written with lucidity and wit, Inside 'Paradise Lost' provides an indispensable revisionary account of the Miltonic epic's relation to its epic predecessors and to literary tradition more generally."—Joshua Scodel, University of Chicago

"This is a comprehensive, freshly researched, and fully articulated reading of Paradise Lost as a whole. The results are revelatory. Astonishingly, some of Milton's unmistakable imitations of major predecessors are being cited here apparently for the first time. Quint's book is essential reading not only for Miltonists but also for scholars of comparative epic, the Renaissance's relation to the classics, and the classical tradition more generally. At the same time, the book's clear prose and careful analysis make it accessible to students."—Gordon Braden, University of Virginia

Editorial Reviews

"This learned, groundbreaking study illuminates the intricate narrative patterns that are woven into the fabric of Paradise Lost and demonstrates the poem's deeply allusive relationship to prior epic. . . . This book is necessary reading for Miltonists and scholars interested in the epic tradition. And the clear prose and carefully articulated arguments make it fully accessible and helpful to less experienced readers."

Choice

"Winner of the 2015 James Holly Hanford Award, The Milton Society of America"

One of Choice's Outstanding Academic Titles for 2014

Shortlisted for the 2015 Christian Gauss Award, Phi Beta Kappa Society

From the Publisher