John Milton: The Inner Life""John Milton: The Inner Life" is the product of a mature scholar's lifelong reflection on Milton. The subject matter is thus significant and intelligent. The style is lively, straightforward, and lucid. Thorpe brings to the study of Milton a breadth of general literary knowledge which is never paraded but which is pervasive in ways which enrich his understanding and ours. There are many good things to savor throughout, and the fifth chapter in particular is the best I remember on Milton's treatment of the natural world. This is an idealistic book, in the best sense, emphasizing basic human values, rather than the minutiae of technical scholarship, but it will attract wide scholarly attention, and I should think also from the general public of intelligent readers."--Roland Mushat Frye, University of Pennsylvania "A truly elegant and engaging book. Thorpe is a marvelous stylist, his prose crisp and lucid. And the individual chapters mesh wonderfully: they provide a series of perspectives on Milton, an emerging profile of the poet, especially of his inner life. That profile is strongly and finely etched and while it fixes on Milton's inner life, it also takes stock of Milton's sense of others and of the world around him. Throughout, the book is marked by an impressive mastery of Milton's poetry and prose by an agile movement between the efforts of his right, and left, hand, by a sensitive understanding and grasp of a poet who thought that the poet himself would be a true poem. I can think of no book I've read in recent years that is a better introduction to the poet through his writings, of none that makes Milton so attractively accessible to a general reading public."--Joseph A. Wittreich, Jr., University of Maryland "This is a thoughtful and well-proportioned book, lucidly and gracefully written. It should be welcomed by teachers and students of Milton's poetry and also by non-specialists. It combines fresh insights with sound judgments, and explores with tact and sensitivity the complex problem of the relations between Milton's life and personality and the major themes of his poetry and prose."--John M. Steadman, University of California, Riverside |
From inside the book
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Page 70
... failed . Sometimes the failure may have been the result of his own act or omission ; sometimes the failure may have been thrust upon him . Mostly we don't know enough to explain the reasons for the failures . His marriage to Mary Powell ...
... failed . Sometimes the failure may have been the result of his own act or omission ; sometimes the failure may have been thrust upon him . Mostly we don't know enough to explain the reasons for the failures . His marriage to Mary Powell ...
Page 72
... failure . The key question is this . How did he cope with failure ? The answer may reveal a great deal about him . One thing that he did not do was to acknowledge failure . For example , in his writings he never made any explanatory ...
... failure . The key question is this . How did he cope with failure ? The answer may reveal a great deal about him . One thing that he did not do was to acknowledge failure . For example , in his writings he never made any explanatory ...
Page 149
... failure , the biggest chance to make the wrong decision , the threat of despair , and the easeful solution of giving up . His emphasis is less on striving for the glory of success than it is on gaining a triumph out of failure or coping ...
... failure , the biggest chance to make the wrong decision , the threat of despair , and the easeful solution of giving up . His emphasis is less on striving for the glory of success than it is on gaining a triumph out of failure or coping ...
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