Through a Glass Darkly: Milton's Reinvention of the Mythological TraditionIn this wide-ranging and ambitious study, John Mulryan contributes significantly to our knowledge of the mythological underpinnings of John Milton's works. Perhaps our most Christian poet, Milton chose to communicate his vision of reality in the language of ancient Greek and Roman mythology. As Mulryan points out, Milton as no other poet before him mastered the texts of classical mythology in their original languages and seldom wrote a line that did not betray their influence. Here, we are reintroduced to the Renaissance millieu that was not only intimately familiar to Milton but that helped to shape his thinking about fundamental matters that he addresses in his poetry, particularly Paradise Lost. Mulryan's study first establishes the incredible richness of the mythological tradition that was available to Milton, including many sources that have either been ignored or depreciated in current scholarship. Milton's own view of classical myth is then explored, and Mulryan provides insight into how this view had to deal with the problem of reconciling pagan learning and Christian thought. Finally, this study demonstrates how Milton drew upon and assimilated the mythological traditions in his poetry as a reflection of the receptiveness to such acts of "creative mythologizing" during his own time. "Through a Glass Darkly" is primarily historical in its methodological approach, but it is relevant also for scholars using structuralist, deconstructionist, feminist, new historicist, psychoanalytic, or postmodernist approaches to Literary Studies. Myth is itself a kind of language that Milton, in a sense, "deconstructs." As this study shows, Milton decodes the mythological tradition, only to encode it in another way. |
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Page 122
... hand and take what she has to offer will be doomed to suffer regret ( the Metanoeia of Boissard ) . But Corrozet also has an image of Fortune ( F7 ° -F8 ) , displaying the broken mast and with one foot on a revolving , unstable ball and ...
... hand and take what she has to offer will be doomed to suffer regret ( the Metanoeia of Boissard ) . But Corrozet also has an image of Fortune ( F7 ° -F8 ) , displaying the broken mast and with one foot on a revolving , unstable ball and ...
Page 278
... hand . ) As noted in chapter five , Satan has his own cornucopia , full of wealth and riches , which he carries in his hand , and which he rewards to whomever he favors : Get Riches first , get Wealth , and Treasure heap , Not difficult ...
... hand . ) As noted in chapter five , Satan has his own cornucopia , full of wealth and riches , which he carries in his hand , and which he rewards to whomever he favors : Get Riches first , get Wealth , and Treasure heap , Not difficult ...
Page 282
... hand of his image , and Ausonius gives Penitence to his image as a companion . The very noble sculptor Callistratus ... hands ready to pick up things when Occasion shows them to us ; for she twists herself around rapidly , turns her bare ...
... hand of his image , and Ausonius gives Penitence to his image as a companion . The very noble sculptor Callistratus ... hands ready to pick up things when Occasion shows them to us ; for she twists herself around rapidly , turns her bare ...
Contents
ONE Milton and the Classics | 14 |
Two Milton and the Church Fathers | 54 |
THREE Milton Martianus Capella Bernard | 67 |
Copyright | |
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