In this book some of the most eminent critics of seventeenth-century literature and some of the liveliest younger scholars explore the interconnections between Milton's politics, poetics and prose writings. While the essays focus on Milton's prose, they open up interesting perspectives on his major poems and on seventeenth-century ideologies, theologies and interpretative practices. Their aim is to bridge the gap between a history-of-ideas approach and literary/textual analysis, showing how key ideas - such as authority, divorce, martyrdom or iconoclasm - stimulate and trouble the imagination of a great writer. These essays challenge the notion of Milton's prose as an 'achievement of the left hand', and propose a complex relation between text and context, the aesthetic and the sociopolitical, issues of representation and the politics of gender.

In this book some of the most eminent critics of seventeenth-century literature and some of the liveliest younger scholars explore the interconnections between Milton's politics, poetics and prose writings. While the essays focus on Milton's prose, they open up interesting perspectives on his major poems and on seventeenth-century ideologies, theologies and interpretative practices. Their aim is to bridge the gap between a history-of-ideas approach and literary/textual analysis, showing how key ideas - such as authority, divorce, martyrdom or iconoclasm - stimulate and trouble the imagination of a great writer. These essays challenge the notion of Milton's prose as an 'achievement of the left hand', and propose a complex relation between text and context, the aesthetic and the sociopolitical, issues of representation and the politics of gender.