[Milton-L] RE: Dennis Danielson's quiet voice

[John Rumrich]

Milton is deeply indebted to Homer and he knew it: not only  
generically but also for plot devices (Eve as Patrokles) and  
especially for his handling of the theme of theodicy.  God's speeches  
in Book 3 echo the sentiments of Zeus as expressed in the Odyssey.   
For Homer's Zeus as for Milton, the emphasis in theodicy was not in  
developing a theological argument about the divine character so much  
as it to give determinist humanity a bracing slap across the face:  
stand up and take responsibility for your own behavior.  Stop whining  
and finger-pointing as if God or the devil made you do it.  From  
Milton's point of view, JFK was right: God's work on Earth must truly  
be our own.  I don't think you need to be a believer, certainly not a  
traditional believer, to believe that.

According to his daughter, Milton had Homer by heart.

John Rumrich


On Oct 9, 2008, at 3:54 PM, Carrol Cox wrote:

>
>
> "Watt, James" wrote:
>>
>> Milton's critics will be read when Homer has been forgotten.
>
> That reading and admiring Milton can lead to such incredibly ignorant
> statements as this is the strongest possible negative judgment of
> Milton. But Milton stands above such petty critics with their utter
> inability to grasp Homer. The Iliad, in particular the last two books,
> even in translation, tower over anything else ever written in the  
> west.
>
> In that poem, humanity discovers its humanity, snd the tragic  
> meaning of
> that humanity. Paradise Lost, as wonderful as it is, stands deep in  
> the
> shadow of Homer.
>
> Carrol
>
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