jump to navigation

Milton, Byron, and Intertextuality. March 23, 2007

Posted by jophine in : Childe Harold, Dramatic Plays, Hilarious Things, Miscellany , comments closed

Just got back from a third of the Milton Read-a-thon, having wimped out after only four hours. I had to put something down, though:


I have not loved the world, nor the world me;

I have not flattered its rank breath, nor bow’d


To its idolatries a patient knee,–


nor coin’d my cheek to smiles,– nor cried aloud


In worship of an echo; in the crowd


They could not deem me one of such; I stood


Among them, but not of them; in a shroud


Of thoughts which were not their thoughts, and still could,


Had I not filed my mind, which thus itself subdued. (CHP, Canto III, stanza 113).

 

Versus:

This knows my punisher; therefore as farr
From granting hee, as I from begging peace:
All hope excluded thus, behold in stead
Of us out-cast, exil’d, his new delight,
Mankind created, and for him this World.
So farewel Hope, and with Hope farewel Fear,
Farewel Remorse: all Good to me is lost;
Evil be thou my Good; by thee at least
Divided Empire with Heav’ns King I hold
By thee, and more then half perhaps will reigne;
As Man ere long, and this new World shall know. (Paradise Lost, Book IV, lines 103-113).

This is so much cooler in my head. I have to reread Cain. Oh man, why didn’t I read Milton earlier?