Milton and the Metamorphosis of Ovid PDF
Preview Milton and the Metamorphosis of Ovid
CLASSICAL PRESENCES GeneralEditors LORNA HARDWICK JAMES I. PORTER CLASSICAL PRESENCES The texts, ideas, images, and material culture of ancient Greece and Rome have always been crucial to attempts to appropriate the past in order to authenticate the present. They underlie the mapping of change and the assertion and challenging of values and identities, old and new. Classical Presencesbringsthe latestscholarship tobear onthe contexts, theory,and practiceofsuchuse,andabuse,oftheclassicalpast. Milton and the Metamorphosis of Ovid MAGGIE KILGOUR 1 3 GreatClarendonStreet,Oxfordox26dp OxfordUniversityPressisadepartmentoftheUniversityofOxford. ItfurtherstheUniversity’sobjectiveofexcellenceinresearch,scholarship, andeducationbypublishingworldwidein Oxford NewYork Auckland CapeTown DaresSalaam HongKong Karachi KualaLumpur Madrid Melbourne MexicoCity Nairobi NewDelhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto Withofficesin Argentina Austria Brazil Chile CzechRepublic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore SouthKorea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam OxfordisaregisteredtrademarkofOxfordUniversityPress intheUKandincertainothercountries PublishedintheUnitedStates byOxfordUniversityPressInc.,NewYork #MaggieKilgour2012 Themoralrightsoftheauthorhavebeenasserted DatabaserightOxfordUniversityPress(maker) Firstpublished2012 Allrightsreserved.Nopartofthispublicationmaybereproduced, storedinaretrievalsystem,ortransmitted,inanyformorbyanymeans, withoutthepriorpermissioninwritingofOxfordUniversityPress, orasexpresslypermittedbylaw,orundertermsagreedwiththeappropriate reprographicsrightsorganization.Enquiriesconcerningreproduction outsidethescopeoftheaboveshouldbesenttotheRightsDepartment, OxfordUniversityPress,attheaddressabove Youmustnotcirculatethisbookinanyotherbindingorcover andyoumustimposethesameconditiononanyacquirer BritishLibraryCataloguinginPublicationData Dataavailable LibraryofCongressCataloginginPublicationData Dataavailable TypesetbySPIPublisherServices,Pondicherry,India PrintedinGreatBritain onacid-freepaperby MPGBooksGroup,BodminandKing’sLynn ISBN 978–0–19–958943–2 1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2 For Brian, Sole partner and sole part of all these joyes and Nell, musa iocosa mea This page intentionally left blank Contents Preface ix Acknowledgements xxi NoteonEditions xxii Introduction:MiltonandtheRenaissanceOvids 1 Milton’sOvidianart 1 SomeotherRenaissanceOvids 13 OvidandVirgil 19 BeyondtheMetamorphoses 28 Portraitoftheartistasayoungdevil 35 1. ChoosingOvids(1) 49 Masteringtheartsofallusion 49 Firstflowers 54 ComusandtheTranslatioOvidii 74 2. ChoosingOvids(2) 97 MoreOvids 97 RereadingOvid’srapes 111 Poetoftheyear 115 It’sabouttime 126 Miltonandthepassingoftime 139 Masquingrevolution 149 3. ReflectionsofNarcissus 165 Formsofchange 165 Ovid’soriginal 175 RenaissanceNarcissi 184 Milton’soriginalcopy 196 Falling,inlove 213 4. Self-ConsumingArtists 229 MiltonNarcissus 229 Envyandemulation 231 viii Contents Ovidianinvidia 242 Miltonandtheartsofenvy 251 Fallingpoets 264 Sinandheroriginals 272 Conclusion:LastWords 285 TheonceandfutureMilton 285 Ovid’sbadreaders 287 Theauthorasreader 292 Theanxietyofreception 297 ReadingSamsonAgonistes 298 Aphoenixtoofrequent 306 ‘ThelastofmeornoIcannotwarrant’ 315 GoLittleBook 319 Bibliography 329 Index 365 Preface Every thing must have a beginning...and that beginning must be linked to something thatwent before. TheHindoos give theworld an elephanttosupportit,buttheymaketheelephantstanduponatortoise. Invention,itmustbehumblyadmitted,doesnotconsistincreatingout of void, but out of chaos; the materials must, in the first place, be afforded: it can give form to dark, shapeless substances, but cannot bringintobeingthesubstanceitself...Inventionconsistsinthecapa- city of seizing on the capabilities of a subject, and in the power of mouldingandfashioningideassuggestedtoit.1 Given the fact that Paradise Lost tells the story of the origins of all things, it is not surprising that readers have often been interested in tracingitssources.Asprefacestocriticalstudiesalsooftenprovidea narrative of their origins, I feel that I should begin with something about my own beginnings. This book has been a protean project, whichhastakendifferentshapesbeforesettlingintoitsfinalform.It started with a rather simple love of both Milton and Ovid, and a desiretogetthetwoofthemtogetherasmuchaspossible.Onebasic problemIfacedfromthestart,however,wasthatoftryingtounder- stand how Milton read Ovid. The range of reading practices during the Renaissance means that this is not self-evident. Increasingly, moreover, I found myself thinking about a larger question: why does figuring out how Milton reads Ovid matter? What does it tell usaboutMilton?Ovid?Evenourselves? ScholarsoftheRenaissance haveofcoursealwaysbeenfascinated by the role that classical culture played in the astonishing outburst of creative energy in this period. In literature especially, studies of imitationandallusionhavereturnedustothinkingaboutindividual artists’ relations to their models. Thomas Greene’s influential work argued that these relations were deeply ambivalent, a complex mix- ture of admiring emulation and envious rivalry.2 For ambitious 1 Mary Shelley, ‘Introduction [1831]’, in Frankenstein; or, The Modern Pro- metheus,ed.D.L.MaconaldandKathleenScherf(Plymouth,1999),356. 2 ThomasM.Greene,TheLightinTroy:ImitationandDiscoveryinRenaissance Poetry(NewHaven,1982).
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