Paradise Lost:
A Biography by Alan Jacobs Princeton University Press 2025
Talking to some of my poetry reading friends on how they feel about Milton they all said he is greatly admired but unloved: especially when tackling his epic (700 lines) poem, Paradise Lost.
Even though Alan Jacobs has taught the poem for over 35 years he says that “Paradise Lost is, surely, the greatest poem in English but it is not lovable.” Even T.S.Eliot and Virginia Woolf were unsympathetic to what Paradise Lost had to say but applauded the musical grandeur of its language, even when it appeared to be cold, irascible and emanate from a lofty viewpoint.
Alan Jacobs asks us to see the poem as a series of musical movements: Books 1- 11: Hell and Heaven (Andante, Presto) Books 1V-V111: The New World and the Old (Allegro) Books 1X: The great Tragedy (Largo maestoso) Books X-X11: Aftermath (Andante). This idea is correct and fascinating as the poet John Dryden wrote an opera based on Paradise Lost and in the 20th century Polish composer Krysztof Penderecki, with the poet / dramatist Christopher Fry, also adapted it for an opera.
Although surrendering to Milton’s music is a way to approach Paradise Lost reading it out to yourself out loud or listening to an audio book, for me, proved to be quite exhausting. So much of Paradise Lost feels declamatory to the point of shouting or roaring out Satan’s dispute with God. You can’t read too much at one sitting: large gulps of Milton need to be followed by rest and absorption. It’s a relief to relax in the softer more lyrical parts of the Adam and Eve story.
Paradise Lost is magnificent blank verse on par with Shakespeare. But today we have problems deciding if it works better for believers or non-believers. Milton treats Eve as a subordinate female and adopts a frequent chillingly objective tone – to discover the emphatic human voice in Paradise Lost is a challenge, but persevere and it does intermittently break through.
Alan Jacobs’s book is called a biography of Paradise Lost. And in only 203 pages he makes his biographical case very well indeed. Clearly written, insightful, informative (I enjoyed the critical exchanges / differences between non-believer William Empson and the Christian C.S.Lewis) concise and scrupulously balanced, Jacobs has delivered an excellent book. I will often refer to it when I next attempt to read Milton’s great but forbidding epic.
Alan Price©2025.
Paradise Lost:
A Biography by Alan Jacobs Princeton University Press 2025
Talking to some of my poetry reading friends on how they feel about Milton they all said he is greatly admired but unloved: especially when tackling his epic (700 lines) poem, Paradise Lost.
Even though Alan Jacobs has taught the poem for over 35 years he says that “Paradise Lost is, surely, the greatest poem in English but it is not lovable.” Even T.S.Eliot and Virginia Woolf were unsympathetic to what Paradise Lost had to say but applauded the musical grandeur of its language, even when it appeared to be cold, irascible and emanate from a lofty viewpoint.
Alan Jacobs asks us to see the poem as a series of musical movements: Books 1- 11: Hell and Heaven (Andante, Presto) Books 1V-V111: The New World and the Old (Allegro) Books 1X: The great Tragedy (Largo maestoso) Books X-X11: Aftermath (Andante). This idea is correct and fascinating as the poet John Dryden wrote an opera based on Paradise Lost and in the 20th century Polish composer Krysztof Penderecki, with the poet / dramatist Christopher Fry, also adapted it for an opera.
Although surrendering to Milton’s music is a way to approach Paradise Lost reading it out to yourself out loud or listening to an audio book, for me, proved to be quite exhausting. So much of Paradise Lost feels declamatory to the point of shouting or roaring out Satan’s dispute with God. You can’t read too much at one sitting: large gulps of Milton need to be followed by rest and absorption. It’s a relief to relax in the softer more lyrical parts of the Adam and Eve story.
Paradise Lost is magnificent blank verse on par with Shakespeare. But today we have problems deciding if it works better for believers or non-believers. Milton treats Eve as a subordinate female and adopts a frequent chillingly objective tone – to discover the emphatic human voice in Paradise Lost is a challenge, but persevere and it does intermittently break through.
Alan Jacobs’s book is called a biography of Paradise Lost. And in only 203 pages he makes his biographical case very well indeed. Clearly written, insightful, informative (I enjoyed the critical exchanges / differences between non-believer William Empson and the Christian C.S.Lewis) concise and scrupulously balanced, Jacobs has delivered an excellent book. I will often refer to it when I next attempt to read Milton’s great but forbidding epic.
Alan Price©2025.
By Alan Price • books, poetry, year 2025 • Tags: Alan Price, books, poetry