[Milton-L] L'Allegro and Il Penseroso

[Evan Jacobs]

Reading a few of the replies i have received, i have changed my view of the
poems from being a debate as I previously thought, to what i believe
Hannibal thinks. Which is the poems are two conflicting sides of his
personality or character. Although not a good thing, my computer crashed
last night and my senior project was lost with it, and it is due this
Friday. But reading these replies gave me a lot of ideas to restart and
change my prompt and thesis. I'd like to thank yall for helping me out
there.
gamefreak727
On Wed, Mar 25, 2009 at 10:54 AM, Hannibal Hamlin <hamlin.hannibal at gmail.com
> wrote:

> I understand the point that we needn't necessarily decide, and the fact
> that the poems always appear in tandem (and, when set by Handel, with Il
> Moderato as well) supports this. At the same time, the point of any debate,
> surely, is in fact to decide a question. Debating exercises, like this one,
> or at least the college practice these poems may be based on, do require
> students to take both sides. But this is not because the questions are
> unanswerable, rather because in order to answer them one must be able to
> pursue arguments on both sides as fully as possible. We could debate this of
> course -- :) -- but doesn't the presentation of these two poems side by side
> demand of the reader a comparison of the arguments and at least some
> assessment of their relative merits?
>
> Hannibal
>
>
>
> On 3/25/09, Tony Demarest <tonydemarest at hotmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> I agree that we see two sides of Milton the poet and man struggling for
>> poetic identity; and I think we see both sides reconciled in Lycidas- but I
>> teach Milton every other year and this is my off-year. I tend to forget much
>> in the interval.
>>
>> Tony
>>
>> > From: lschwart at richmond.edu
>> > To: milton-l at lists.richmond.edu
>> > Date: Wed, 25 Mar 2009 12:04:57 -0400
>> > Subject: RE: [Milton-L] L'Allegro and Il Penseroso
>> >
>> > An even more important question, from my perspective, would be why you
>> assume he'd take sides at all. What, if anything, in the poems suggests that
>> the debate is in any sense clearly decidable?
>> >
>> > Louis
>> >
>> > ===========================
>> > Louis Schwartz
>> > Associate Professor of English
>> > University of Richmond
>> > Richmond, VA 23173
>> > (804) 289-8315
>> > lschwart at richmond.edu
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> > -----Original Message-----
>> > From: milton-l-bounces at lists.richmond.edu [mailto:
>> milton-l-bounces at lists.richmond.edu] On Behalf Of James Rovira
>> > Sent: Wednesday, March 25, 2009 10:26 AM
>> > To: John Milton Discussion List
>> > Subject: Re: [Milton-L] L'Allegro and Il Penseroso
>> >
>> > More important than the answer is how you come to it. Why do you
>> > think Milton would be on the side of Il Penseroso? Can you list the
>> > reasons?
>> >
>> > Jim R
>> >
>> > 2009/3/24 <gamefreak727 at gmail.com>:
>> >> Hey, i am just a high school student writing about John Milton's poem's
>> >> "L'Allegro" and "Il Penseroso." My prompt i made for my senior project
>> was,
>> >> If the two poems above were considered a debate, an argument, or two
>> sides
>> >> of an issue or debate, or two people, which side or person would Milton
>> most
>> >> prefer or like? My answer was "Il Penseroso." Would any of you agree
>> with
>> >> me?
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>
>
>
>  --
> Hannibal Hamlin
> Associate Professor of English
> The Ohio State University
> Burkhardt Fellow,
> The Folger Shakespeare Library
> 201 East Capitol Street SE
> Washington, DC 20003
> hamlin.22 at osu.edu/
> hamlin.hannibal at gmail.com
>
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