Poetic Form in Blake's MILTON - Princeton Legacy Library

Marc Notes: Blake's two finished epics have been widely regarded as combinations of brilliant set pieces which yield to no systematic rhetorical criticism. Susan Fox contests this view, discovering in Milton an elaborate verbal structure that is fully congruent with the poem's philosophy. She has made the first full exposition of the formal principles of a late Blake poem, and it suggests that the late prophecies are as profound in their artistic structures as they are in their thematic ones. Publisher Marketing: Blake's two finished epics have been widely regarded as combinations of brilliant set pieces which yield to no systematic rhetorical criticism. Susan Fox contests this view, discovering in "Milton" an elaborate verbal structure that is fully congruent with the poem's philosophy. She has made the first full exposition of the formal principles of a late Blake poem, and it suggests that the late prophecies are as profound in their artistic structures as they are in their thematic ones. The author begins by tracing throughout Blake's poetry the development of the techniques found in "Milton." She then provides an analysis in two chapters organized, as she perceives the poem to be, in parallel three-part units. Her examination reveals the exhaustive parallelism of the poem's books, as well as more local devices such as paired stanzas and circular rhetoric. The rhetorical pattern which emerges raises several major thematic issues which are treated in the concluding chapter. In demonstrating the coherence and control of the intricate formal patterns of "Milton," this study provides a new measure of Blake's late verbal art. Originally published in 1976. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These paperback editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

Contributor Bio:  Fox, Susan Susan Fox is a bookaholic and movie fan who loves cowboys, rodeos, and the American West, past and present. She has an intense interest in storytelling of all kinds and in politics, and she claims the two are often interchangeable. Susan loves writing complex characters in emotionally intense situations, and hopes her readers enjoy her ranch stories and are uplifted by their happy endings. You can visit her website at: www.susanfox.org