John Milton

John Milton (December 9, 1608 – November 8, 1674) was an English poet, most famous for his blank verse epic Paradise Lost. He is also remembered for authoring the brief epic Paradise Regained, the closet drama Samson Agonistes, the monody Lycidas, and Areopagitica, a prose work that condemns pre-publishing censorship.

Family life and early influences

John Milton?s father, John Milton Sr. (1562? – 1647), moved to London around 1583 having just been disinherited for concealing his Protestantism (and an English Bible) by his devout Catholic father, Richard Milton, who was a wealthy landowner in Oxfordshire. In 1600, John Milton Sr. was admitted to the Company of Scriveners (notaries), and probably married Sara Jeffrey (1572 – 1637), the poet?s mother, around the same time. John Milton Sr?s relative prosperity, later described by his grandson, Edward Phillips, as "a competent Estate, whereby he was enabled to make a handsom Provision for the Education and Maintenance of his Children," {{fn|1}} financed the young poet?s various private tutors (though only Thomas Young, a Scots Presbyterian is known), a place at St Paul's School in London, and study at Christ's College, Cambridge.

Related Topics:
1562 - 1647 - English Bible - Oxfordshire - 1572 - 1637 - St Paul's School - London - Christ's College, Cambridge

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John Milton Sr. is also noteworthy for his musical and creative talent, contributing to a collection of madrigals in honor of Elizabeth I. Indeed, Barbara Lewalski, in a recent biography of John Milton?s life, argues that "Milton Senior?s considerable ability and reputation as a composer of madrigals and psalm settings contributed greatly to his son?s enduring passion for music and to his development as a poet." {{fn|2}} In addition, Lewalski has also pointed to the social circles the young poet?s father moved in, particularly in terms of the various music publishers and composers such as John Tomkins and Henry Lawes (the future publisher of Milton?s 1645 volume of poems), as further evidence of the young Milton?s early exposure to creative art. {{fn|3}}

Related Topics:
Madrigals - Elizabeth I

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Yet the young poet was also willing to improve upon his creative efforts by intensive study. "When he was young," Christopher, his younger brother, recalled to an early biographer after John's death, "he studied very hard and sat up very late, commonly till twelve or one o'clock at night."

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