Milton’s sonnets : an annotated bibliography, 1900-1992

164 Pages·1994·6.83 MB·English

by  Jones, Edward

Milton's Sonnets :
An Annotated Bibliography, 1900-1992
WEbl€VAL & R€EIAlSSAEIC€
TEXTS & STU bicS
VOLUME 1 2 2
Milton's Sonnets :
An Annotated Bibliography, 1900-1992
Edward Jones
medieval & Renaissance texts & studies
Binghamton, New York
1994
© Copyright 1994
Center for Medieval and Early Renaissance Studies
State University of New York at Binghamton
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Jones, Edward, 1950-
Milton's sonnets: an annotated bibliography, 1900-1992 / EdwardJones.
p. cm. - (Medieval & Renaissance texts & studies; v. 122)
Includes index.
ISBN 0-86698-127-6
1. Milton, John, 1608-1674. Sonnets-Bibliography 2. Sonnets,
English-History and criticism-Bibliography. I. Title. II. Series.
Z8578.J68 1994
[PR3567]
821 '.4-dc20 94-20238
CIP
8
This book is made to last.
It is set in Goudy, smythe-sewn
and printed on acid-free paper
to library specifications
Printed in the United States of America
Table of Contents
Preface vii
Acknowledgements xi
I. General Criticism of Milton's Sonnets
Entries 1-190 1
The Italian Sonnets
Entries 191-220 50
Translations of Milton's Sonnets
Entries 221-68 57
II. The English Sonnets
Sonnet 1: Entries 269-74 65
Sonnet 7: Entries 275-303 66
Sonnet 8: Entries 304-12 73
Sonnet 9: Entries 313-14 75
Sonnet 11: Entries 315-20 75
Sonnet 12: Entries 321-28 77
Sonnet 13: Entries 329-39 79
Sonnet 14: Entries 340-42 81
Sonnet 15: Entries 343-48 82
Sonnet 16: Entries 349-56 83
Sonnet 18: Entries 357-88 85
Sonnet 19: Entries 389-453 93
vi Table of Contents
Sonnet 20: Entries 454-68 110
Sonnet 22: Entries 469-70 113
Sonnet 23: Entries 471-509 114
New Forcers: Entries 510-16 125
Author Index 129
Sonnet Index 135
Subject Index 143
Preface
Two doctoral candidates writing twelve years apart note what critics have
and have not said about Milton's sonnets. For Carmela Perri, commentators
have paid little attention to the sonnets because of Milton's decision to concen-
trate on the epic rather than the lyric poem.' For Patricia Steenland, critics
have spent too much time focusing on the sonnets as a sequence of personal
poems to the exclusion of many of their most exciting and important features, in
particular, their engagement with history.' In different ways, both assessments
are right. Undoubtedly, if compared to the number of books and articles pub-
lished each year on Paradise Lost, critical commentary on the sonnets is far less,
as it is for most of Milton's other works . However, as the length of this bibliogra-
phy suggests, commentary, even if limited in focus, has not been lacking . Sur-
prisingly, an observation first uttered in 1926 by Hanford still holds true:
"volumes have been written in discussion of Milton's sonnets" 3 (though the
number of extensive studies remains remarkably small).
While never entirely losing favor with readers and critics since the Roman-
tic period, Milton's sonnets had to wait a century and a half to find an
appreciative audience.4 Since 1900, their standing among Milton's works and
"The Poetics of Dew: A Study of Milton's Sonnets" (Ph.D. diss., City University of New
York, 1977), 230.
z "Milton's Sonnets and the Lyric Response to History" (Ph.D. disc., Brown University, 1989), 19.
' A Milton Handbook (New York: F. S. Crofts, 1926), 136.
a William R. Parker, Milton's Contemporary Reputation: An Essay, Together with a Tentative List
of Printed Allusions to Milton, 1641-1674, and Facsimile Reproductions of Five Contemporary Pamphlets
Written in Answer to Milton (Columbus: Ohio State Univ. Press, 1940), 4.
viii Preface
A
among sonnets in general has actually increased in proportion to the critical
attention accorded them, and room for growth remains . Excluding editions, only
one book-length examination of the sonnets has been done, and articles have yet
to appear on Sonnets 10, 17, and 21. While it is fair to say that they have not
been ignored, it is also clear that only four (Sonnets 7, 18, 19, and 23) have
received much in the way of critical attention.
The following bibliography compiles, describes, and reports what twentieth-
century critics have said about Milton's eighteen English sonnets, six Italian
poems, and hissonetto caudato, "On the New Forcers of Conscience." It intends,
through sometimes generous annotation, to supply enough information for
readers to make decisions about a critical work's content, merit, or usefulness ;
consequently, it summarizes rather than evaluates.
Establishing guidelines for a bibliography is never easy or, once done, total-
ly satisfying, but I have allowed simplicity to govern my decisions whenever pos-
sible. I have two broad categories. The first, General Criticism of the Sonnets,
includes two subsections, one for commentary concerning the Italian sonnets,
and another for translations of the sonnets. The second category, The English
Sonnets, is arranged by individual poem. The listing follows the commonly ac-
cepted chronological order (with "On the New Forcers of Conscience" coming
after Sonnet 23), although this order is by no means definitively settled . All en-
tries are listed once, and lists for all sections are arranged chronologically . En-
tries falling within the same year appear in alphabetical order except in three in-
stances where I report, in order of their appearance, a series of responses over
controversies involving the authorship of the anonymous biography of Milton
(entries 74-76), the meaning of talent in Sonnet 19 (entries 431-36), and
Milton's use of Cato in Sonnet 20 (entries 457-60) . In each case, chronology
avoids the confusion that results from reading a response to an article that has
yet to appear in the list.
In the case of Sonnets 11 and 12, there are special problems . Critics have
either followed the manuscript order-"I did but prompt" as Sonnet 11, "A
Book was writ" as Sonnet 12-or the 1673 order, with "A Book was writ" as 11
and "Another on the Same" as 12. 1 have followed the 1673 edition, a seeming-
ly easy solution except for titles in which an author refers to "I did but prompt"
as Sonnet 11 and the Tetrachordon sonnet as number 12. My partial solution is
to use brackets indicating which work is under discussion if the context requires
it. Otherwise I use the titles so as to avoid the numbering problem altogether .
For items in languages other than English, I identify the original language
in brackets after my annotation, and whenever possible, I include transliterated
titles and English titles for Japanese scholarship in parentheses . Cross-references
to other items in the bibliography (indicated by "see entry" or "see entries" and
the number or numbers) also appear within parentheses. All first-line quotations
from the sonnets found in the English Sonnets Section and the Sonnet Index are
based upon the texts of the Columbia Edition of Milton's works .
Preface ix
A
The General Criticism category contains any discussion of more than two
sonnets whether they be individual essays, chapters in books, or brief notes . Dis-
sertations, editions, and book-length studies usually appear in this category, but
I have excluded most editions of Milton's complete poetical works as well as
most selected editions of the minor poems unless they contain extensive com-
mentary on the sonnets. Because the editions of Smart and Honigmann and Nar-
do's Milton's Sonnets and the Ideal Community deal exclusively with the sonnets,
I include as many reviews of them as I was able to locate.
The two subsections of the General Criticism category pose few difficulties .
Since the Italian poems are most often treated as a group, entries are not separa-
ted by poem but kept in one chronologically arranged list. The same is true for
the translation entries which are annotated lightly because of their self-evident
content.
The English Sonnets section differs from the others in order to allow quick
access to the critical work done on a specific poem . When possible, each sonnet
has a separate bibliographical listing. In instances where an article discusses two
sonnets, I list the annotated entry under the sonnet which comes numerically
first but refer to the other in the annotation .
Also promoting ease of use and immediate access are three indexes . The
first lists the names of the authors who have written about or edited Milton's
sonnets; the second provides separate topic indexes for the English and Italian
sonnets, identifies the most significant criticism on a given sonnet in bold-face
type, and records all references to individual sonnets in the annotations; the
third supplies an overall subject index, whether that subject be a theme, a con-
temporary of Milton, a classical, biblical, medieval, or Renaissance source, or a
literary critic. I hope that what may not be found in one index may be offset
through recourse to the remaining two.
As anyone familiar with Milton bibliography knows, the attempt to be com-
prehensive is the most one can strive for; to presume all-inclusiveness is naive.
Without making any bold claims, I do believe the most noteworthy editions,
translations, and critical books and articles on the sonnets since 1900 are listed
here. (I do include reprints of the nineteenth-century editions of Masson, Verity,
and Pattison because their editions have the most significant commentary on the
sonnets which influenced critics at the beginning of this century.)
In compiling my original list, I consulted all of the standard Milton bibliog-
raphies: Stevens's A Reference Guide to Milton from 1800 to the Present Day;
Fletcher's Contributions toa Milton Bibliography, 1800-1930; Huckabay'sJohn Mil-
ton: An Annotated Bibliography, 1929-1968; and Hanford and McQueen's Milton
for the Goldentree Bibliography Series. I supplemented my findings with items
appearing in the annual listings in MLA and ABELL; the more recent Milton
bibliographies by Klemp (The Essential Milton: An Annotated Bibliography of Major
Modern Studies) and Patrides (An Annotated Critical Bibliography of John Milton);
Herbert Donow's The Sonnet in England and America; the Year's Work in English;
x Preface
the Literary Criticism Register; Renaissance Monographs; and the Milton holdings
at the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign. For Milton work in other
languages I found the Index Translationum especially helpful and Mitsuo Miyani-
shi's Milton in Japan (1975) indispensable for the large body of Milton scholarship
written in that country. I am particularly indebted to Professor Hiroko Tsuji,
who sent me a large parcel of items from the Milton Center of Japan, most of
which are unavailable in this country.
Milton bibliography being what it is -enormous and ever-increasing- this
bibliography has the modest goals of updating the critical commentary on the
sonnets since the Variorum and filling in the necessarily selective nature of that
edition. Because of its limited scope, then, if this study borders on the compre-
hensive, I will be content. And if one wishing to write on Sonnet 1 uses this
work to discover how much has been said about Milton's nightingale, or a
teacher consults the commentary on the poet's relationship with the taskmaster
in Sonnet 7 to strengthen a lecture intended for members of a Milton seminar,
this study will have realized two of the concerns underlying its creation .