Abstract
This chapter attempts to look at young Milton’s formative negotiation of Pauline theology, idiom, and authorial self-representation in his early poetry and anti-prelatical political writings. Specifically, the chapter argues that the classical-Christian tension so often commented on in Milton’s early poetry and prose is not an abstract productive tension between classical humanism and Protestant theology but instead a specific authorial tension between Milton’s competing admiration above all for his two favourite writers—Ovid and Paul. In channelling and synthesizing the erotic creativity of the former with the spiritual teachings on sin and redemption of the latter, Milton slowly developed a unique poetic-spiritual stance that in time formed the basis of his future mature work, as an exploration of ‘peculiar grace’ always struggling in the world for poetically creative inward liberty.
Original language | English |
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Title of host publication | Making Milton |
Subtitle of host publication | Print, Authorship, Afterlives |
Publisher | Oxford University Press |
Pages | 65-75 |
Number of pages | 11 |
ISBN (Electronic) | 9780198821892 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - 1 Jan 2021 |
Keywords
- Bible
- Ovid
- Paul
- Pauline Epistles
- Protestant
- humanism
- theology