[Milton-L] L'Allegro and Il Penseroso

Mon Mar 30 11:20:53 EDT 2009

What if we propose that M is showing two ways to lose, creatively and intellectually, rather than two ways to win?

Or, to ask that question in another way: are these poems teachable? JD Fleming

----- Original Message -----
From: "Warren Chernaik" <warren.chernaik at kcl.ac.uk>
To: "John Milton Discussion List" <milton-l at lists.richmond.edu>
Sent: Monday, March 30, 2009 2:42:18 AM GMT -08:00 US/Canada Pacific
Subject: RE: [Milton-L] L'Allegro and Il Penseroso

Since I was at the excellent Young MIlton conference and gave a paper on this topic, I thought I might add to the list of those worrying over Milton's stance in the companion poems. Neville Davies and I were the two people at the conference who discussed "L'Allegro" and "Il Penseroso", and we split evenly in arguing one or the other position. In John Carey's long introductory note in the Longman edition, he points out that critics are divided on the question of whether Milton expresses or implies a preference for "Il Penseroso", listing a series of references for both views, with more critics endorsing Neville's position than mine, but a respectable, long line for both. My view is more or less that of Tillyard, long ago, that Milton, in the tradition of arguing in utrumque partes,  taking one or another side of a debate, presents two complementary views, without having one win out over the other. To quote a sentence from my essay at the conference: Milton is not expressing h!

 is own preferences for contemplative melancholy over joy, so much as opposing two opposite and complementary perspectives, setting up a debate where neither participant can claim exclusive possession of truth. Harold Skulsky says in an interesting contribution to this discussion that a debate has to have a winner (or a vote of those listening), but that seems to me to define "debate" too narrowly. It's related to the idea of negative capability: a dramatist like Shakespeare will present opposite perspectives without overloading the scale on either side, and the same is true of paired poems--Marvell's Dialogue of the Soul and Body is another example of a poem in the form of a debate, where neither side can be said to come out a winner. Each one is valid from its own point of view, and Milton presents each case as effectively as he can.
Warren Chernaik

________________________________________
From: milton-l-bounces at lists.richmond.edu [milton-l-bounces at lists.richmond.edu] On Behalf Of srevard at siue.edu [srevard at siue.edu]
Sent: 28 March 2009 14:55
To: John Milton Discussion List
Subject: Re: [Milton-L] L'Allegro and Il Penseroso

At the recent Young Milton conference in Oxford Neville Davies
gave a paper on this very issue and came down strongly with
the view that Milton expects us to move on to Penseroso and
that the conclusion to the second ode sounds more positive than
that to the first.
However, there was not a consensus in the audience and a lot
of us defended Allegro and some even said we preferred it.

Stella Revard

Quoting gamefreak727 at gmail.com:

> One piece of my evidence is, the conditional "if" at the end of "L'Allegro,"
> it doesnt make it feel or seen to be as solid, there are possibilities. In
> "Il Penseroso" there is no conditional, it just is i guess you could say. I
> havent fully developed that yet of course... Another is, i dont know this
> for fact, but i am guessing Milton did not drink or was against it since he
> refers to Bacchus, the god of wine, a fallen angel in Paradise Lost. Since
> mentioning and connecting mirth and L'Allegro with Bacchus, it gives me the
> impression that he doesnt like L'Allegro for that reason. Lastly, in lines
> 31-41, he connects melancholy, or Il Penseroso with the divine, praying,
> Heaven. At first Milton wanted to become a anglican priest, so connecting
> melancholy with God, gives the feeling of Milton siding, or agreeing with
> melancholy/Il Penseroso.
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Schwartz, Louis" <lschwart at richmond.edu>
> To: "'John Milton Discussion List'" <milton-l at lists.richmond.edu>
> Sent: Wednesday, March 25, 2009 9:04 AM
> 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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