Characteristics of Milton's Poetry: Merits and Demerits
MERITS
1. Literary Position
Shakespeare and Milton are two poets of England who are head and shoulders above the rest of the age to which they belong to the age of Elizabeth or the age of the first Romantic movement in English literature.
Shakespeare was the dramatist and the poet of universal humanity; and Milton, was the epic poet and the poet of Puritan England. Milton however suffers a great deal from needless comparison with Shakespeare. People usually praise Shakespeare and so they hope to find in the latter's poetry the same gaiety and variety, the same breadth of view and depth of insight that they get from Shakespeare. Though nobody can call in question the greatness of Milton, yet it is not possible for him to satisfy the very highest demand made upon him.
2. Milton's Scholarship
Possessed of a daring and sublime imagination, he is one of the most learned poets of England. He studied all the literary masterpieces of ancient Greece and Rome. He was equally acquainted with the contemporary literatures of Italy, England, and Spain. He appropriated the thoughts of his predecessors more than any other poet. His poems are exquisitely rich in beautiful classical allusions. He illustrated and decorated his ideas by borrowing from the Bible to an extent which it is difficult to measure.
3. Milton's Sublimity
Sublimity is the only word that can truly characterise Milton's poetry. Even in his early poems, such as the Ode on the Morning of Christ's Nativity, there is an unmistakable touch of the sublime. The constitutional sublimity of Paradise Lost is the greatest feature of the poem. Here Immensity communes with Infinity. It overwhelms us by the vastness of its conception. It transcends our imagination and experience. The subject-matter of this superhuman drama is the fate of Man. The time is Eternity; the space is Infinity, and the actors are God, the Angels and the primitive man. Milton's poetry has the roaring of the ocean in it. Other poets have given us more beauty, more philosophy and more romance, but none has given us such sublime things as Milton.
4. Milton's Imagination
The next aspect of Milton's poetry is revealed in the quality of his imagination. It ranges freely over heaven and earth; it makes the invisible concrete and visible.
5. Milton's Love of Beauty
Milton was possessed of a keen sense of beauty. He loved beauty in all its forms. He was deeply sensitive to the beauties of external nature; the two poems L'Allegro, II Penseroso testify to his love of nature. He was a lover of art and music. "Nowhere is Milton's love of beauty better displayed than in the early poems, L’Allegro, II Penseroso, Comus and Lycidas. They have all the freshness and charm of youth, and exhibit the lighter and more fanciful side of Milton's genius."
6. Milton's Classicism
Closely wrought in Puritanism, there is in Milton's nature a strong bent for classicism, which is pagan and sensuous. He was a keen student of the ancient classics, and drank deep at the springs of the classical learning. He wrote Latin prose as freely as he wrote English. He chose classical forms of poetry to express himself-epic (Paradise Lost), the Greek tragedy (Samson Agonistes) the pastoral elegy (Lycidas) and the ode (Ode on the Nativity of Christ). His style was built, conscious or unconsciously on the classical models.
7. Milton's Seriousness
Milton from his very boyhood was a man of a very serious bent of mind. He always thought his life to be a dedicated one. He lived with the consciousness of being ever in the awful presence of God. Every thought and every act of his life was influenced by such consciousness. To him life was real and earnest, and not "a dream by an idiot." It is for this reason that Milton's poetry has always a touch of seriousness in it.
8. Milton's Spiritual Import
The distinctive feature of Milton's poetry is its spiritual quality. His intense godliness found its expression through his poetry. Like the needle of the mariner's compass which always points to the north pole, Milton's thoughts and actions always pointed to God. He always felt that he was living under the eye of his loving Taskmaster. All his writings have a deep religious undertone. To spend an hour with Milton is to feel the living presence of God. Paradise Lost was written to justify the ways of God to man.
9. Blend of Ancient and Modern Art
Like Milton the man, Milton the poet also is a meeting point of contradictory elements. He was a Puritan, but had the polish and chivalry of a Cavalier. He was a great hater of tyranny, but had all the ornamental qualities of a Royalist. His opinions were democratic, but his tastes were those of an aristocrat. Similarly, in his poetry, we find the simplicity and romantic richness of modern art. His Adam, Eve and Satan are simple and majestic epic characters, but the dress, style and illustrations have the splendour, complexity and subtlety of modern art.
10. Milton's Picturesqueness
Milton has an extraordinary power of drawing wonderful and vivid pen pictures. His descriptions of scenes and events are so impressive that it is difficult to forget them. He seldom goes into details; but with a few strokes of his mighty and magic pen draws a vast impressionistic picture.
11. The grand style of Milton
Milton's style has been called the 'grand style' because it has always an unmistakable stamp of majesty in it. It has not 'the voice of the sea' as Wordsworth says, but it has an elevating effect on the reader. The subject of Milton's poetry is always lofty; even when he speaks of common things, he elevates them to lofty heights. Coleridge defines poetic style as 'the best words in the best order.' Milton's style, more than that of any other poet, fully justifies this definition. Matthew Arnold says: "In the sure and flawless perfection of his rhythm and diction, he is as admirable as Virgil or Dante, and in this respect he is unique amongst us. None else in English literature possesses the like distinction."
DEMERITS
1. Want of Human Interest
The most glaring defect which strikes even a careless reader of Milton's poetry is its want of human interest. We do not find in his poetry any sweet and homely picture of this ordinary work-a-day world where we live and move, love and hate, quarrel and struggle. The greatness of an art lies in its nearness to human life; but in this respect, Milton's poetry is hopelessly deficient.
2. Want of Humour
This is another conspicuous defect of Milton's poetry. The intense seriousness of his mind did not allow him to indulge in humour of any kind. Moreover, in breadth of views, in sympathy for man which are essential conditions of true humour, Milton was sadly deficient.
3. Want of the Element of Love
Another serious defect of Milton's poetry is the absence from it of the element of love. His Puritanism is largely at the root of it. Though there has been scarcely any son of Adam who has not been at some time or the other tempted by a daughter of Eve, their parents in Milton's poem do not indulge in love-making.
4. Involved Diction and Complex Construction
Milton's love of digressions, ellipses, inversions, Latinism, involutions, etc., make his sentences often gnarled in structure and their meaning often obscure. His long drawn similes, profusion of allusion, proneness to unnecessary elaboration sometimes torture his readers and make the reading of his poetry a laborious intellectual exercise.
Thursday, December 16, 2010
Show that the 'Preface to the Lyrical Ballads' is a plea for simplicity in theme and treatment.
Wordsworth was writing a new kind of poetry which was more to deal with Nature than with man, was to treat higher, rather supernatural things, in a natural manner. This could be done by using a simple and natural language selected from the language of the common people. This meant a revolt against the Pseudo-Classical theory of poetic diction which recommended the use of a very much refined, accurate and exact kind of language, the artificial language of the people of the town. Wordsworth condemned the artificial language, such as that of the school of Pope as a "masquerade of tricks, quaintnesses, heiroglyphics and enigmas."
In Wordsworth's opinion, the language of poetry must not be separated from the language of men in real life. Figures, metaphors and similies, and other such decorations must not be used unnecessarily, as was the case with the artificial 18th century poetic diction. In a state of emotional excitement men naturally uses a metaphorical language to express themselves forcefully. The earliest poets used only such metaphors and images as result naturally from powerful emotion. Later on, poets used a figurative language which was not the result of genuine passion. They merely imitated the manner of the earlier poets, and thus arose the artificial language and diction of the pseudo-classics. A stereo-typed and mechanical phraseology thus became current. The poets must avoid the use of artificial diction both when he speaks in his own person and when he speaks through his characters. He must not use it when he speaks in his own person for it is not real language of men, and he is a man speaking to men. He must not use it when he speaks through his characters, for in that case he must vary it according to the nature, rank and status, thought and emotions, of the character who speaks it.
Main Tenets of the Theory
After a study of his Prefaces to the 1798 and 1800 editions of the Lyrical Ballads, we can say that the following are the main recommendations of Wordsworth :
1. The language of poetry should be the language really used by men, especially by simple rustic people who live close to Nature. But it should be a selection of such language. All the words used by the people cannot be employed in poetry. Only selected and chosen words used in common parlance can serve the purpose of poetry.
2. It should be the language of men in a state of vivid sensation. It means that language used by people in a state of animation can form the language of poetry. In other words, it should be alively language expressing living emotions of real, life-like men.
3. It should have a certain colouring of the imagination.
4. There is no essential difference between the words used in prose and in a metrical composition.
A Critique of Wordsworth's Theory of Diction
Samual Taylor Coleridge was the first critic to pounce upon Wordsworth's theory of language and to expose its many weaknesses. In fact, it was on the weak places of Wordsworth's theory that Coleridge fastened, and he put the case for cultivating a special diction for poetry. Coleridge argues:
(1) That a language so selected and purified, as Wordsworth recommends, would differ in no way from the language of any other men of commonsense. After such a selection, there would be no difference between the rustic language and the language used by men in other walks
of life.
(2) Wordsworth permits the use of metre, and this implies a particular order and arrangement of words. It does so differ in the poetry of Wordsworth himself. Metre medicates the whole atmosphere, and the language of poetry is bound to differ from that of prose. So Coleridge concludes that there is and there ought to be, an essential difference between the language of prose and metrical composition.
(3) The use of metre is as artificial as the use of poetic diction and if one is allowed, it is absurd to forbid the use of the other. Both are equally good sources of poetic pleasure.
(4) Coleridge objects to the use of the word real : "Every man's language varies, according to the extent of his knowledge, the activity of his feeling. Every man's language has, first, its individualities; secondly, the common properties of the class to which he belongs; and thirdly, words
and phrases of universal use." The word real, therefore should be substituted by ordinary.
(5) It is not correct that the best parts of our language are derived from Nature. The best words are abstract nouns and concepts. These are derived from the reflective acts of the mind; and reflection grows as man advances from the so-called primitive state. As man has advanced in thought, he has acquired new ideas and concepts which cannot be
expressed through the use of rustic language which is Primitive and undeveloped. If the poet wants to use the rustic language, he must also ink like the rustics. The language of rustics is curiously inexpressive. It would be putting the clock back. Instead of progression it would be retrogression.
T. S. Eliot criticized Wordsworth for not practising his theory in all his poems. For example, poems such as Intimations, Tintern Abbey, Ode to Duty, Laodamia, do not follow Wordsworth's prescription about the language, and language in these poems is richer and more sophisticated than those of the rustic people. They are not written in a selection of language really used by men.'
Although Wordsworth's theory of diction has its weaknesses, yet it has its significance too. He put an end to the use of false poetic diction "the worst of all the diseases which have afflicted English poetry." He relieved poetry of an artificial and unnatural diction through which it had lived its unnatural life of hot-houses for over a hundred years. He certainly did much to bring the language of poetry tajis natural beauty and simplicity. To quote Wyatt, he 'did poetry a valuable service; he took stock of the language of poetry, cleared out a lot of old rubbish which had long ceased to have any but a conventional poetic value, and made available for poetic use many words that had long been falsely regarded as unpoetic."
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