
The Sound and the Story: Exploring the World of Paradise Lost - tintinnabula
https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/the-sound-and-the-story-exploring-the-world-of-paradise-lost
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acabal
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Thorentis
A facinating review. Having never read the book/poem, I now want to. Though I
suspect I will come to a differnt interpretation than the reviewer, it was
interesting to read his take on it.

> I don't think that the version created by Milton, blind and ageing, out of
> political favour, dictating it day by day to his daughter, will ever be
> surpassed.

He is clearly in awe of this work, but I don't like it when reviewers make
remarks not previously commented on at the very end of their review. "Our of
political favour". Perhaps to others it is obvious what he means by this? But
he doesn't discuss it at all in the review, and it seems almost like a subtle
jab left right till the end. Is it simply because it is a religious work? Or
is the idea of sin politically incorrect now? It seems like a rather silly
remark to make by somebody that is clearly so well read and open minded about
literature.

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ggm
Milton and politics:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Milton%27s_politics](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Milton%27s_politics)

Milton was active during the time of the English revolution which was
transformative in regard to the divine right of kings, and the role of the
state, and representative parliament. It is not a jab: Sin was a central
concept to religious wars. Catholicism could annul sin, the purchase of
indulgences led directly to the religious wars of the reformation which
proceeded the English Revolution by only a few generations, and continued to
echo down the years: Puritanism, and the establishment was an ongoing battle.

Milton's works were suppressed at times. He lived under sufferance of the
potential for harmful consequence for his writing.

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Thorentis
Ah, I interpreted his statement as meaning it was out of political favour
_right now_ , rather than being out of political favour at the times it was
written or published.

