Historians and literary critics offer a comprehensive thematic assessment of Milton's political and literary career.

John Milton was not only the greatest English Renaissance poet but also devoted twenty years to prose writing in the advancement of religious, civil and political liberties. The height of his public career was as chief propagandist to the Commonwealth regime which came into being following the execution of King Charles I in 1649. The first of the two complete texts in this volume, The Tenure of Kings and Magistrates, was easily the most radical justification of the regicide at the time. In the second, A Defence of the People of England, Milton undertook to vindicate the Commonwealth's cause to Europe as a whole.This book, first published in 1991, was the first time that fully annotated versions were published together in one volume, and incorporated a new translation of the Defence. The introduction outlines the complexity of the ideological landscape which Milton had to negotiate, and in particular the points at which he departed radically from his sixteenth-century predecessors.

Although Milton wrote several poems and sonnets in his earlier career, he became known as a revolutionary and passionate political activist, beginning his political career with the pamphlets that he wrote on the current politics of his time, defending antimonarchical rule and republicanism, giving particular attention to the religious and civil liberties of the people and the necessity of a free commonwealth. However, following the restoration of monarchy, he had to stop writing political pamphlets because, as a republican and defender of regicide, Milton was in danger, and the new regime made it impossible for him to express his political thoughts safely. He embarked on a literary project which included his major poetical works, Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained and Samson Agonistes. Considering his earlier reputation as an ardent republican, leading an active political life, it can be stated that Milton could not detach himself from the political controversies of his time. Hence, he wrote Paradise Lost as a political poem in which he reflected and inserted his political views in an allegorical manner. This book re-reads Milton’s Paradise Lost in the light of his political views as reflected in his earlier political pamphlets. It argues that, using literature as a medium of expression, Milton intentionally wrote Paradise Lost as a political poem, in which, by re-writing the Biblical story of the Creation, the fall of Satan and the fall of Adam and Eve, he created a political subtext which reflected the social and political panorama of England of his time.

Some of the world's foremost historians of ideas consider Machiavelli's political thought in the larger context of the republican tradition.

Using Hannah Arendt’s account of the Greek polis to explain Milton’s fascination with the idea of public speech, this book reveals what is distinctive about his conception of a godly, republican oratory and poetics. Setting Milton’s poetry and prose in the context of Civil War polemic; classical political theory and its early modern reinterpretations; and Renaissance writing on rhetoric and poetic language, the volume culminates in an Arendtian reading of his ‘Greek’ drama Samson Agonistes.

Samuel Johnson is often represented as primarily antagonistic or antipathetic to Milton. Yet his imaginative and intellectual engagement with Milton's life and writing extended across the entire span of his own varied writing career. As essayist, poet, lexicographer, critic and biographer - above all as reader - Johnson developed a controversial, fascinating and productive literary relationship with his powerful predecessor. To understand how Johnson creatively appropriates Milton's texts, how he critically challenges yet also confirms Milton's status, and how he constructs him as a biographical subject, is to deepen the modern reader's understanding of both writers in the context of historical continuity and change. Christine Rees's insightful study will be of interest not only to Milton and Johnson specialists, but to all scholars of early modern literary history and biography.

A groundbreaking biography of Milton’s formative years that provides a new account of the poet’s political radicalization John Milton (1608–1674) has a unique claim on literary and intellectual history as the author of both Paradise Lost, the greatest narrative poem in English, and prose defences of the execution of Charles I that influenced the French and American revolutions. Tracing Milton’s literary, intellectual, and political development with unprecedented depth and understanding, Poet of Revolution is an unmatched biographical account of the formation of the mind that would go on to create Paradise Lost—but would first justify the killing of a king. Biographers of Milton have always struggled to explain how the young poet became a notorious defender of regicide and other radical ideas such as freedom of the press, religious toleration, and republicanism. In this groundbreaking intellectual biography of Milton’s formative years, Nicholas McDowell draws on recent archival discoveries to reconcile at last the poet and polemicist. He charts Milton’s development from his earliest days as a London schoolboy, through his university life and travels in Italy, to his emergence as a public writer during the English Civil War. At the same time, McDowell presents fresh, richly contextual readings of Milton’s best-known works from this period, including the “Nativity Ode,” “L’Allegro” and “Il Penseroso,” Comus, and “Lycidas.” Challenging biographers who claim that Milton was always a secret radical, Poet of Revolution shows how the events that provoked civil war in England combined with Milton’s astonishing programme of self-education to instil the beliefs that would shape not only his political prose but also his later epic masterpiece.

In analyzing how Milton reads and appropriates different biblical texts to give shape to his republican vision, this book also assesses his significance to the development of early modern English political thought, his conception of the English nation, and finally, his response to pressures exerted by a secular modernity grounded on international commercial activities."--Jacket.

Examines the relationship between the manuscript evidence of Milton's thinking and its representation in his printed works

Republicanism is a centuries-old political tradition, yet its precise meaning has long been contested. The term has been used to refer to government in the public interest, to regimes administered by a collective body or an elected president, and even just to systems embodying the values of liberty and civic virtue. But what do we really mean when we talk about republicanism? In this new book, leading scholar Rachel Hammersley expertly and accessibly introduces this complex but important topic. Beginning in the ancient world, she traces the history of republican government in theory and practice across the centuries in Europe and North America, concluding with an analysis of republicanism in our contemporary politics. She argues that republicanism is a dynamic political language, with each new generation of thinkers building on the ideas of their predecessors and adapting them in response to their own circumstances, concerns, and crises. This compelling account of the origins, history, and potential future of one of the world’s most enduring political ideas will be essential reading for anyone with an interest in republicanism, from historians and political theorists to politicians and ordinary citizens.