The Life of John Milton: A Critical Biography by Barbara K. Lewalski (PDF)

Description

Providing a close examination of Milton’s wide-ranging prose and poetry at each stage of his life, Barbara Lewalski reveals a rather different Milton from that in earlier accounts. Provides a close analysis of each of Milton’s prose and poetry works. Reveals how Milton was the first writer to self consciously construct himself as an ‘author’. Focuses on the development of Milton’s ideas and his art.

User’s Reviews

Opiniones editoriales Review “Lewalski’s is easily the best single-volume life of Milton to date, and it is hard to imagine its being significantly bettered. Every reader will benefit from its insight and compression, and it will be the biography to which I direct my students.” Times Higher Education Supplement “Arguably the most readable of modern Milton biographies, it reshapes our understanding of Milton the man, the thinker, political and religious activist, husband, parent, friend …it is certain to be a classic among Milton studies” Reference Reviews “The Life of John Milton . . . combines lucidity with its formidable erudition.” Terry Eagleton, The Observer Books of the Year, 2001 “A rigorous, up-to-date, yet surprisingly readable account of Milton’s life and work… anyone concerned with the poet or the period will have to possess this book.” The Independent “[Lewalski] has produced an outstanding biography, one that is reliable and readable. […] It will be vaulable, not only to Milton specialists and students of English literature but to anyone who wants to learn about Milton’s life and work.” Virginia Quarterly Review “Lewalski’s volume is immensely useful. In the process of discussing Milton’s life and works, she gives the reader a believable figure facing major events and also the everyday business of moving through life. Such an appealing and readbale portrayal is welcome.” Renaissance Quarterly “As a biography of Milton, Lewalski’s Life is likely to remain the definitive work for decades to come.” Church Times “The Life of John Milton is the magnum opus of Barbara K Lewalski, one of the leading Miltonists of the past half-century. […] As an introduction to Milton’s life and work it is likely to remain unequalled for years to come – that rare thing, a work of reference to be read with profit and pleasure from cover to cover.” MLR “Her achievements scarcely need endorsement. Unsurprising, she once more surefootedly picks her way through the polemical prose while writing richly about the major poetry.” Milton Quarterly Book Description In her detailed account of Milton’s life and career, Barbara Lewalski provides a close analysis of his prose and poetry, focusing on the development of his ideas and his art. From the Inside Flap John Milton’s many and various works include magnificent poems, polemics, history, theology, and treatises on political, ecclesiastical, educational, and social issues. No writer before Milton defined himself so self-consciously as an author – both in prose and in poetry – as his God-given vocation. In her detailed account of Milton’s life and career, Barbara Lewalski provides a close analysis of his prose and poetry, focusing on the development of his ideas and his art. She shows how Milton, even as a young poet, constructed himself as a new kind of author, commanding astonishing resources of learning and artistry to develop a radical politics, reformist poetics, and an inherently revolutionary prophetic voice. This insightful portrayal of Milton’s life, thought, and writing, as well as his contribution to public life, is an important, stimulating, and timely contribution to Milton scholarship. From the Back Cover John Milton’s many and various works include magnificent poems, polemics, history, theology, and treatises on political, ecclesiastical, educational, and social issues. No writer before Milton defined himself so self-consciously as an author – both in prose and in poetry – as his God-given vocation. In her detailed account of Milton’s life and career, Barbara Lewalski provides a close analysis of his prose and poetry, focusing on the development of his ideas and his art. She shows how Milton, even as a young poet, constructed himself as a new kind of author, commanding astonishing resources of learning and artistry to develop a radical politics, reformist poetics, and an inherently revolutionary prophetic voice. This insightful portrayal of Milton’s life, thought, and writing, as well as his contribution to public life, is an important, stimulating, and timely contribution to Milton scholarship. About the Author Barbara Lewalski is William R. Kenan, Jr. Professor of English Literature and of History and Literature, and Director of Graduate Studies in English at Harvard University. She has been named honored scholar by the Milton Society of America, and has served as President of that organization and of the Society for the Study of Early Modern Women. Her numerous publications include Milton’s Brief Epic: The Genre, Meaning and Art of “Paradise Regained” (1966), Protestant Poetics and the Seventeenth Century Religious Lyric (1979, winner of the James Russell Lowell Prize of the Modern Language Association), Paradise Lost and the Rhetoric of Literary Forms (1985), Writing Women in Jacobean England (1993), and The Polemics and Poems of Rachel Speght (editor, 1996). Leer más

Reviews from Amazon users which were colected at the time this book was published on the website:

⭐I liked that the book was in very good condition even better than advertised. I will add it to my library and enjoy its content.This is truly a work of great erudition and scholarship. Well-written and much researched, I have found this the most interesting and most complete biography about the inestimable John Milton written heretofore. I highly, highly recommend this text to anyone who wishes to gain a keen understanding not only of John Milton’s life, but the author gives a pertinent description of the times in which Milton lived–arcane details and customs without knowledge of which, Milton’s genius and his prolific output would seem incomprehensible.I am extremely grateful that I found this book and I would recommend it to anyone who is interested in John Milton, the English Civil War, Cromwell’s Protectorate, the Stuart Restoration, proto-Libertarianism, etc. This book stands out as a cynosure among many books written about this enigmatic but extremely important historical figure. The author is a distinguished authority on the subject and employs her wit and sagacity in analyzing and explaining the facts, insights, and settings of John Milton’s genius.I originally purchased David Hawkes’biography about John Milton and found it utterly wanting: little actual biographical account, much speculation, and many pages of criticism of capitalistic society. Hawkes spends many a page condemning the charging of interest rates, and the entire structure of finance and modern industry. No matter where one stands on those points, I believe it may be agreed that a biography ostensibly about the great John Milton is not the proper venue thereof.Professor Lewalski has done a superb job of blending biographical details and literary works. “Thorough” would be an appropriate adjective to describe professor Lewalski’s achievement as would the words “readable” and “enjoyable.” Professor Lewalki is a gifted scholar.A really lovely book: one third biography, one third history, and one third critical analysis of his works. The author writes beautifully and sympathetically, and is clearly an enthusiastic expert on Milton’s poems, prose, and polemics. If you’re looking for a single work to get a running start on “Paradise Lost,” this is it.Terrific! Fast, and exactly as advertised.Incredibly interesting and really a good, hard look at the life of John Milton and what inspired him and what aroused his wrath. His poems are eternal and deal with things secular and spiritual. His words have come down to us through many centuries and they are still as powerful as the day he wrote them. What a true genius! What a stunningly beautiful biography…I couldn’t put it down.This is, indeed, the most exhaustive modern biography of John Milton. The renowned critic Barbara Lewalski, as usual, offers the students and scholars of Milton an enchanting biographical masterpiece that both narrates and captures Milton’s story and history from his early childhood “The childhood Strews the Man” to his last breath “Teach the every Soul”. Mocking Samuel Johnson’s theory on writing a biography, Lewalski, without eating, drinking, or living in social intercourse with Milton, has succeed in writing an impressive biography of Milton through, as she mockingly asserts, living in intellectual and artistic intercourse with Milton. Reading this book, to the surprise of Johnson, one will find him/herself eating, drinking, and living social intercourse with john Milton thanks to the scholarly talent of Barbara Lewlaski.The Blackwell Publishers book Lewalski’s Milton shows great and over-arching scholarship, careful and painstaking. I am not qualified to make such a statement, and I blush to make it. The scholars who read this must forgive me. The deep learning of Barbara Lewalski for Milton and his works and what seems a thorough knowledge of the times through which Milton struggled are so apparent and obvious on every page, along with the voluminous notes, that I feel I can let the statement loose without me being called a charlatan, assuming a knowledge I don’t possess. It is not for me to question the rigorous work of such a noted scholar; not a word of denial can escape me regarding the textual matter of the book.As for the biographies of Milton… I was brought up on Riley Parker and snatches of Masson in my early days, although I have devoured the whole of Masson of late, and with relish too, but as the years go by, new things come to light and we accrue knowledge of things we thought to be lost in time, things Masson or Parker couldn’t have known.Some have said that this present book of Lewalski’s is difficult to read. I agree up to a point, but for physical reasons rather than any difficulty in understanding the matter expressed. I am no scholar… I must firmly declare that I am no scholar. I am just a simple reader and lover of the Paradise Lost, and the twins Allegro and Penseroso, and I swear by the Areopagitica, (I actually own a Dove’s Press Areopagitica, which I hope will show me to be a lover of fine printing, at least), and I have loved Lycidas these fifty years and more. It is natural for such as myself to want to know of Milton and his life, his likes, his dislikes and the times he lived through and the things which stirred him, and I myself am in sympathy with many of his views; I myself more than incline towards, say, republicanism, but alas, (I suppose), I am an unbeliever when it comes to religion. These remarks are to show and repeat that I am a mere reader not a scholar.And as to fine books… I simply purr with satisfaction when I look at a page of, say, Cobden-Sanderson’s type in my Areopagitica, that same type which was, romantically, flung into the Hammersmith Thames, or when I pass my hand over one of my fine morocco-bound volumes, and so on… But fine bindings and hand-made papers are not the be all and end all, that is not expected or demanded, no, but I can live with a neat and sturdy buckram, bound as books used to be bound…And therein lies the problem for me with this, Lewalski’s Milton! The thoughts, scholarship, analysis and careful gathering of facts are to be admired, without question, although I must here admit that I am not fond of the written style.The book is expensive. The design, in my view, is poor. The volume is heavy. When sat in a chair reading it for any length of time, (and the chapters are long), the very elbows need some support. It should have been made into three volumes. The margins are lean and miserly, and this affects the appearance of the whole printed page. The paper is an unpleasant, stark white with a very faint gleam, which tires my eyes. The ink is greyish rather than a rich full black. The letters do not stand out. Please don’t snort with indignation! These things are important to some folks! I am getting on, as they say; I am not a young student, able energetically to swallow whole draughts at a sitting of such a work.There is no need for extravagance! I love the dark navy of the Clarenden Press volumes, the Oxford University Press with the fawn dust-jackets, for an example… I think the modern Everyman volumes from Knopf are superb, the Borzois, the fine paper just warmed to a friendly palish cream, and so on… If this present book appeared as a three volume set bound and jacketed like the Knopf Everyman… what a treasure it would be! How it would age like wine… I can imagine reaching down a volume in its dust-jacket from the shelves… it can be done!I open a page of Riley Parker and a page of Lewalski to compare. Whatever the matter of the text, the image received by the eye is infinitely better, kinder, more readily legible in the Parker. I note that the Lewalski was first sent into the world in the year 2000, but in what form I know not. These present few lines of criticism apply to the Blackwell Critical Biographies book which now lies open before me. For my own tastes, a book looks best printed a good rich black on a slightly warmed cream paper, and that paper would have what is known as “tooth,” that is, the slight feel between finger and thumb of a just-discernable roughness, certainly not enough to allow the ink to spread and the letters to become spidery, but there, definitely there… and better for the paper to be “laid” rather than “wove.” But this may be the counsel of perfection, not to be looked for nowadays. Nevertheless, some effort ought to be made to make books attractive. Anyone who applauds fine design in books of any sort, even technical collections of facts, which I suppose in some sense this volume is, must feel some slight dismay at the book’s appearance.Books were once stitched through the folds of signatures to hempen cords and then later to tapes, both of which were firmly attached to the boards. A nicely convex curve was given to the spine. This present book has a flat spine, and I cannot myself tell whether the signatures, or sections are folded and sewn in, but they look to my eye to be single pages glued down the spine to a thin card, like a cheap paperback which soon falls to pieces. I might be wrong. I dare not delve too deeply, the spine and its appearance is best left alone. After opening the book a few times the spine starts to assume a concave shape, a very ugly shape. The book has all the appearance of a paperback, glued to a couple of stiff boards carrying Milton’s portrait, rather than any dust jacket. The externals have that modern, shiny, plastic finish to them, wipeable with a damp rag, if you know what I mean, the sort that the true book-lover cannot abide. It would be an ideal finish for a cookery book in a kitchen, so that sticky marks may be removed more easily.As to the text… there are so many words jostling on the page that, when reading the work I have to stop now and then to rest my eyes. The font-size is too small for my comfort. Every now and then I seem to detect a full line where all the text is slightly smaller, as though to make room, to save space, but the chapters end with plenty of blank space… What is the point, if this practice was intentional? I find these small details annoying and distracting. Some whole lines seem, I say seem to be slightly flattened, slightly distorted, or at least to give that appearance. How or why I don’t know. I have come across one page where there are printing faults, sections where ink to form the letters is missing, miniscule and hardly to be noticed, but there all the same. The book is heavy, and should an accident occur—well! If dropped I would imagine permanent damage might result, especially if the spine is glue-lined card as I suspect.Large folios and other heavy books used to be read at a table, propped up or on a slightly sloping lectern. We need not return to those conditions with a modern book, but for comfort’s sake, if this single heavy volume had been separated into three volumes, so much the easier to read the work sat in a comfortable chair, and away from a table. If the font was larger, and the margins wider and more generous, more elegant, and enhancing the look of the page… how different and enhanced would be the pleasure in the reading of it!With these improvements the book would be choc-a-bloc full in three volumes and may even demand a separate index volume, like Riley Parker’s work and David Masson’s, and how much better to read the notes in a separate book, rather than turn to the back of the book whilst it is being read, continually to read the notes. I suppose the notes occupy too much space to allow them as footnotes handily at the bottom of the page, so they are all placed at the rear of the volume, a modern detestable practice, and tiresome if the notes are to be read! The headers in the notes section omit the relevant chapters, so the pertinent notes are hard to find—a foolish mistake! I must admit I soon tired of reading the notes and so to me they remain for the most part unread.For the general reader and for the pleasure of reading of Milton’s life and his times, nothing equals Masson, and I suppose nothing ever will, his great work is never approached. Riley Parker is next, and I find him more pleasant to read than Lewalski, but if absolute scholarship is demanded with all the newly-discovered facts included, then of course Lewalski’s is, as far as a non-scholar like me can tell, a great biography. I have nary a word to say against it in that respect. I forgive the very few jarring Americanisms.Ah! But I haven’t mentioned the pictures! The pictures are quite simply abysmal and appalling! A disgrace! Who was the wretch who approved them for this book? They are seen through a clouded window… they are all soft greys without any white or black… Any school-pupil with an ink-jet machine could have produced infinitely better pictures… I do not exaggerate!I wish heartily that the book had been submitted to some book-designer who knew and could distinguish and value a beautifully printed page from just a page of accurate information, who knew and could distinguish a fine volume, or rather, volumes from just a container of cold facts, a work of evidence-for-reference. Much better that designer to set forth into the world a book intended for pleasure in the reading, pleasure in the ownership, a designer who knew how well fine volumes can look sat on the shelves, it may well be for the next couple of hundred years. This book does not, in my opinion, sit well on the shelves.I would give four stars and perhaps more for the scholarship and the content of the work itself, but only one star for the design. I have no idea what the other volumes in this series of the Blackwell Critical Biographies are like, I haven’t seen any. If they are uniform with this present volume, then I suppose them to be valuable repositories of thorough and very careful scholarship… yes! But UGLY.An additional note:I am sorry to say that I’ve made a mistake: Masson puts the notes where they should be, at the bottom of the page, the last volume is the index. Riley Parker has both notes and index in an equally sized volume. A slip of the memory, but I repeat, nobody, I say NOBODY comes near Masson. If you can spare a couple of hours read the first two chapters as a tester! The scenes come of the young Milton in the streets where Ben Jonson and Shakespeare walked, and the Mermaid tavern… and so on…The Blackwell Publishers book Lewalski’s Milton shows great and over-arching scholarship, careful and painstaking. I am not qualified to make such a statement, and I blush to make it. The scholars who read this must forgive me. The deep learning of Barbara Lewalski for Milton and his works and what seems a thorough knowledge of the times through which Milton struggled are so apparent and obvious on every page, along with the voluminous notes, that I feel I can let the statement loose without me being called a charlatan, assuming a knowledge I don’t possess. It is not for me to question the rigorous work of such a noted scholar; not a word of denial can escape me regarding the textual matter of the book.As for the biographies of Milton… I was brought up on Riley Parker and snatches of Masson in my early days, although I have devoured the whole of Masson of late, and with relish too, but as the years go by, new things come to light and we accrue knowledge of things we thought to be lost in time, things Masson or Parker couldn’t have known.Some have said that this present book of Lewalski’s is difficult to read. I agree up to a point, but for physical reasons rather than any difficulty in understanding the matter expressed. I am no scholar… I must firmly declare that I am no scholar. I am just a simple reader and lover of the Paradise Lost, and the twins Allegro and Penseroso, and I swear by the Areopagitica, (I actually own a Dove’s Press Areopagitica, which I hope will show me to be a lover of fine printing, at least), and I have loved Lycidas these fifty years and more. It is natural for such as myself to want to know of Milton and his life, his likes, his dislikes and the times he lived through and the things which stirred him, and I myself am in sympathy with many of his views; I myself more than incline towards, say, republicanism, but alas, (I suppose), I am an unbeliever when it comes to religion. These remarks are to show and repeat that I am a mere reader not a scholar.And as to fine books… I simply purr with satisfaction when I look at a page of, say, Cobden-Sanderson’s type in my Areopagitica, that same type which was, romantically, flung into the Hammersmith Thames, or when I pass my hand over one of my fine morocco-bound volumes, and so on… But fine bindings and hand-made papers are not the be all and end all, that is not expected or demanded, no, but I can live with a neat and sturdy buckram, bound as books used to be bound…And therein lies the problem for me with this, Lewalski’s Milton! The thoughts, scholarship, analysis and careful gathering of facts are to be admired, without question, although I must here admit that I am not fond of the written style.The book is expensive. The design, in my view, is poor. The vol-ume is heavy. When sat in a chair reading it for any length of time, (and the chapters are long), the very elbows need some support. It should have been made into three volumes. The margins are lean and miserly, and this affects the appearance of the whole printed page. The paper is an unpleasant, stark white with a very faint gleam, which tires my eyes. The ink is greyish rather than a rich full black. The letters do not stand out. Please don’t snort with indignation! These things are important to some folks! I am getting on, as they say; I am not a young student, able energetically to swallow whole draughts at a sitting of such a work.There is no need for extravagance! I love the dark navy of the Clarenden Press volumes, the Oxford University Press with the fawn dust-jackets, for an example… I think the modern Everyman volumes from Knopf are superb, the Borzois, the fine paper just warmed to a friendly palish cream, and so on… If this present book appeared as a three volume set bound and jacketed like the Knopf Everyman… what a treasure it would be! How it would age like wine… I can imagine reaching down a volume in its dust-jacket from the shelves… it can be done!I open a page of Riley Parker and a page of Lewalski to compare. Whatever the matter of the text, the image received by the eye is infinitely better, kinder, more readily legible in the Parker. I note that the Lewalski was first sent into the world in the year 2000, but in what form I know not. These present few lines of criticism apply to the Blackwell Critical Biographies book which now lies open before me. For my own tastes, a book looks best printed a good rich black on a slightly warmed cream paper, and that paper would have what is known as “tooth,” that is, the slight feel between finger and thumb of a just-discernable roughness, certainly not enough to allow the ink to spread and the letters to become spidery, but there, definitely there… and better for the paper to be “laid” rather than “wove.” But this may be the counsel of perfection, not to be looked for nowadays. Nevertheless, some effort ought to be made to make books attractive. Anyone who applauds fine design in books of any sort, even technical collections of facts, which I suppose in some sense this volume is, must feel some slight dismay at the book’s appearance.Books were once stitched through the folds of signatures to hempen cords and then later to tapes, both of which were firmly attached to the boards. A nicely convex curve was given to the spine. This present book has a flat spine, and I cannot myself tell whether the signatures, or sections are folded and sewn in, but they look to my eye to be single pages glued down the spine to a thin card, like a cheap paperback which soon falls to pieces. I might be wrong. I dare not delve too deeply, the spine and its appearance is best left alone. After opening the book a few times the spine starts to assume a concave shape, a very ugly shape. The book has all the appearance of a paperback, glued to a couple of stiff boards carrying Milton’s portrait, rather than any dust jacket. The externals have that modern, shiny, plastic finish to them, wipeable with a damp rag, if you know what I mean, the sort that the true book-lover cannot abide. It would be an ideal finish for a cookery book in a kitchen, so that sticky marks may be removed more easily.As to the text… there are so many words jostling on the page that, when reading the work I have to stop now and then to rest my eyes. The font-size is too small for my comfort. Every now and then I seem to detect a full line where all the text is slightly smaller, as though to make room, to save space, but the chapters end with plenty of blank space… What is the point, if this practice was intentional? I find these small details annoying and distracting. Some whole lines seem, I say seem to be slightly flattened, slightly distorted, or at least to give that appearance. How or why I don’t know. I have come across one page where there are printing faults, sections where ink to form the letters is missing, miniscule and hardly to be noticed, but there all the same. The book is heavy, and should an accident occur—well! If dropped I would imagine permanent damage might result, especially if the spine is glue-lined card as I suspect.Large folios and other heavy books used to be read at a table, propped up or on a slightly sloping lectern. We need not return to those conditions with a modern book, but for comfort’s sake, if this single heavy volume had been separated into three volumes, so much the easier to read the work sat in a comfortable chair, and away from a table. If the font was larger, and the margins wider and more generous, more elegant, and enhancing the look of the page… how different and enhanced would be the pleasure in the reading of it!With these improvements the book would be choc-a-bloc full in three volumes and may even demand a separate index volume, like Riley Parker’s work and David Masson’s, and how much better to read the notes in a separate book, rather than turn to the back of the book whilst it is being read, continually to read the notes. I suppose the notes occupy too much space to allow them as footnotes handily at the bottom of the page, so they are all placed at the rear of the volume, a modern detestable practice, and tiresome if the notes are to be read! The headers in the notes section omit the relevant chapters, so the pertinent notes are hard to find—a foolish mistake! I must admit I soon tired of reading the notes and so to me they remain for the most part unread.For the general reader and for the pleasure of reading of Milton’s life and his times, nothing equals Masson, and I suppose nothing ever will, his great work is never approached. Riley Parker is next, and I find him more pleasant to read than Lewalski, but if absolute scholarship is demanded with all the newly-discovered facts included, then of course Lewalski’s is, as far as a non-scholar like me can tell, a great biography. I have nary a word to say against it in that respect. I forgive the very few jarring Americanisms.Ah! But I haven’t mentioned the pictures! The pictures are quite simply abysmal and appalling! A disgrace! Who was the wretch who approved them for this book? They are seen through a clouded window… they are all soft greys without any white or black… Any school-pupil with an ink-jet machine could have produced infinitely better pictures… I do not exaggerate!I wish heartily that the book had been submitted to some book-designer who knew and could distinguish and value a beautifully printed page from just a page of accurate information, who knew and could distinguish a fine volume, or rather, volumes from just a container of cold facts, a work of evidence-for-reference. Much better that designer to set forth into the world a book intended for pleasure in the reading, pleasure in the ownership, a designer who knew how well fine volumes can look sat on the shelves, it may well be for the next couple of hundred years. This book does not, in my opinion, sit well on the shelves.I would give four stars and perhaps more for the scholarship and the content of the work itself, but only one star for the design. I have no idea what the other volumes in this series of the Blackwell Critical Biographies are like, I haven’t seen any. If they are uniform with this present volume, then I suppose them to be valuable repositories of thorough and very careful scholarship… yes! But UGLY.An additional note:I am sorry to say that I’ve made a mistake: Masson puts the notes where they should be, at the bottom of the page, the last volume is the index. Riley Parker has both notes and index in an equally sized volume. A slip of the memory, but I repeat, nobody, I say NOBODY comes near Masson. If you can spare a couple of hours read the first two chapters as a tester! The scenes come of the young Milton in the streets where Ben Jonson and Shakespeare walked, and the Mermaid tavern… and so on…Excellente biographie, détaillée et précise dont le commentaire est très utile pour une meilleure connaissance de ce génie de la langue anglaise! (cela suppose, cependant, une très bonne pratique de l’anglais).

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