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Milton's work, especially Paradise Lost, is a central presence in much English Romantic writing, and several of the key texts - including Wordsworth's Prelude, Blake's Marriage of Heaven and Hell or Shelley's Prometheus Unbound - can be read as more or less direct engagements with Milton's influential epic. We will spend about one third of the semester reading Paradise Lost, familiarizing ourselves with central passages and key issues for a discussion of its Romantic reception. The majority of sessions will be dedicated to readings of major Romantic responses to Milton's epic, including pictorial and intermedial responses such as Blake's illustrations of Paradise Lost. We will also discuss some of the theoretical implications of Romantic engagements with Milton (theories of intertextuality and of poetic influence, adaptation theory, intermediality etc.).
Students are requested to purchase the following edition: John Milton, Paradise Lost. Ed. John Leonard. London: Penguin, 2000 (or later). A reader containing key Romantic texts as well as secondary material will be available in the copyshop in Reckhammerweg from early September onwards. Students who have read books I-III, VI and IX of Paradise Lost by the beginning of term are guaranteed a place in the seminar. |
