This book is a comprehensive account of Milton's two aristocratic entertainments, Arcades and Comus in the context of their original occasions and in the light of Milton's developing sense of vocation as a poet in the earlier part of his career. The book is especially original in the amount of socio-historical information it offers about the relationship between the independent and pastorly poet and his aristocratic patrons, and about the degree to which Milton was prepared to work within the constraints and decorum of the Caroline masque and country-house entertainment. A particular feature of the book is the analysis of changes in the texts of the two entertainments, from the earliest version in the Trinity College manuscript through to the first printings, considering Milton's changing manner of address to the different occasions of performance and publication. A degree of tension is discovered between the poet and the organisers of the Ludlow masque, and an explanation is given for a kind of censorship in the Bridgewater manuscript of Comus.

English Lyric Poetry is a comprehensive reassessment of lyric poetry of the early seventeenth century. The study is directed at both beginning and more advanced students of literature, and responds to more specialised scholarly inquiries pursued of late in relation to specific poets. This extremely lucid and elegantly written book avoids the limitations of much recent criticism. Donne, Jonson, the Spenserians, Herbert, Milton, Marvell, Vaughan, as well as many non-canonical and women poets, all receive sustained, fresh, and detailed analysis. Jonathan Post seeks to assimilate many of the post-New Critical theoretical concerns with readings of the major and minor, male and female, authors of the period.

John Milton is, next to William Shakespeare, the most influential English poet, a writer whose work spans an incredible breadth of forms and subject matter. The Complete Poetry and Essential Prose of John Milton celebrates this author’s genius in a thoughtfully assembled book that provides new modern-spelling versions of Milton’s texts, expert commentary, and a wealth of other features that will please even the most dedicated students of Milton’s canon. Edited by a trio of esteemed scholars, this volume is the definitive Milton for our time. In these pages you will find all of Milton’s verse, from masterpieces such as Paradise Lost–widely viewed as the finest epic poem in the English language–to shorter works such as the Nativity Ode, Lycidas,, A Masque and Samson Agonistes. Milton’s non-English language sonnets, verses, and elegies are accompanied by fresh translations by Gordon Braden. Among the newly edited and authoritatively annotated prose selections are letters, pamphlets, political tracts, essays such as Of Education and Areopagitica, and a generous portion of his heretical Christian Doctrine. These works reveal Milton’s passionate advocacy of controversial positions during the English Civil War and the Commonwealth and Restoration periods. With his deep learning and the sensual immediacy of his language, Milton creates for us a unique bridge to the cultures of classical antiquity and medieval and Renaissance Christianity. With this in mind, the editors give careful attention to preserving the vibrant energy of Milton’s verse and prose, while making the relatively unfamiliar aspects of his writing accessible to modern readers. Notes identify the old meanings and roots of English words, illuminate historical contexts–including classical and biblical allusions–and offer concise accounts of the author’s philosophical and political assumptions. This edition is a consummate work of modern literary scholarship.

This major new study of Elizabethan and Jacobean royal entertainments, including country house entertainments, tiltyard speeches, and court masques, is the first to look in detail at the evidence provided by the surviving material texts. Drafts, royal presentation manuscripts, widely-circulating scribal copies, and printed pamphlets are all carefully placed in their cultural context, and the medium of manuscript is shown to have been at least as important as print for these texts' circulation. From the close collaboration between commissioning host and hired writer, to the varied interpretations imposed by copyists and publishers, entertainments were written and read within a complex social nexus: far from being royal propaganda, they reflected the distinct and sometimes competing agendas of monarchs, commissioning hosts, authors, publishers, scribal intermediaries, and readers. Writing and Reading Royal Entertainments explores this interpretative community through a range of texts. The first part of the book looks at Elizabethan entertainments: the Woodstock entertainment of 1575 (Chapter I); tiltyard speeches (Chapter II); and the distinctive features of printed pamphlets and scribal copies, notably of the 1602 Harefield entertainment (Chapter III). The second part of the book is mostly concerned with Ben Jonson's work for the Jacobean court, with chapters on the Merchant Taylors' entertainment (Chapter IV) and the Theobalds' entertainment (Chapter V). The final chapter looks at the texts of court masques, especially in the light of Jonson's understanding of the poet's elevated role. The book's conclusion takes the story of these material texts beyond the early modern period and looks at how they have been collected, bought, and sold over the centuries.

Throughout his writings, Milton, deeply engaged in political and theological controversy, sought to clear a space for human freedom in a world ruled by an omniscient and omnipotent deity. Paradise Lost and Samson Agonistes, as well as other works by Milton in verse and prose, explore the problematical aspects of a universe ruled by an Old Testament God of wrath, demanding obedience, who allows his creatures the freedom to be 'authors' of their own fate. Milton and the Burden of Freedom examines the contradictions inherent in Milton's religious, political, and ethical beliefs as expressed in his poems, prose writings, and the treatise De Doctrina Christiana. Milton, whose writings are rooted in the Reformed tradition while challenging Calvinist orthodoxy, is both radical and conservative. In this book, Warren Chernaik traces the evolution of Milton's attitude towards freedom, servitude and virtue during a century of political upheaval and disappointed hopes.

For the first time in an approachable, affordable volume this study treats the whole literary career of England's most distinguished protestant-republican poet and writer, considering the miscellaneous output in the light of contexts and political functions. It highlights self-presentational and persuasive characteristics, pays attention to the sense of vocation and also describes Milton's distinctive achievement in social genres. Milton's competitive humanist training is seen to accomodate uneasily to the specific demands of some public works. The book features unfamiliar texts, whilst canonical texts are set in the story of his long endeavours during a turbulent period in English history.

This volume consists of fourteen original essays that showcase the latest thinking about John Milton's emergence as a popular and canonical author. Contributors consider how Milton positioned himself in relation to the book trade, contemporaneous thinkers, and intellectual movements, as well as how his works have been positioned since their first publication. The individual chapters assess Milton's reception by exploring how his authorial persona was shaped by the modes of writing in which he chose to express himself, the material forms in which his works circulated, and the ways in which his texts were re-appropriated by later writers. The Milton that emerges is one who actively fashioned his reputation by carefully selecting his modes of writing, his language of composition, and the stationers with whom he collaborated. Throughout the volume, contributors also demonstrate the profound impact Milton and his works have had on the careers of a variety of agents, from publishers, booksellers, and fellow writers to colonizers in Mexico and South America.