Born over fifty years apart, Edmund Spenser and John Milton wrote similarly inspired epic poems based on religion. Separated by a period of time, Spenser and Milton both wrote works inspired by their Protestant Christian religion and attempted to explain a specific aspect of holiness to their readers. As Thomas E. Maresca notes, “the epic poem is always the product of its cultural matrix” (Maresca 1). While Spenser and Milton’s backgrounds have some differences, The Faerie Queene and Paradise Lost are both epic poems that address religion, which was a significant area of the respective authors’ culture, in unique approaches.
“The Faerie Queene was a new departure in the history of English poetry, being a combination of Italian romance, classical epic, and native English styles” (“Spencer, Edmund” 923). Spenser was thirty-eight years old at the time of the first publication of The Faerie Queene in “early 1590” (923) which was twenty-one years younger than Milton was when his work, Paradise Lost, was first published in 1667. “The Restoration interrupted Milton’s composition of Paradise Lost, which assumed its final form in the years 1658-63…the politically opportune …show more content…
While Book 1 pushes the reader to believe that Satan may be the hero of the story, the reader knows better because Milton explicitly tells the reader that his purpose is to “justifie the ways of God to men” (Paradise Lost 1.26). As Balachandra Rajan stated in his essay, Paradise Lost: The Uncertain Epic, “If Satan is the hero, he is the hero within an antiquest that invites us to view Paradise Lost as an anti-epic” (Rajan 271). If Satan were the hero, God’s actions would be interpreted as invalid and so Satan cannot be the hero of Milton’s epic
“The Faerie Queene was a new departure in the history of English poetry, being a combination of Italian romance, classical epic, and native English styles” (“Spencer, Edmund” 923). Spenser was thirty-eight years old at the time of the first publication of The Faerie Queene in “early 1590” (923) which was twenty-one years younger than Milton was when his work, Paradise Lost, was first published in 1667. “The Restoration interrupted Milton’s composition of Paradise Lost, which assumed its final form in the years 1658-63…the politically opportune …show more content…
While Book 1 pushes the reader to believe that Satan may be the hero of the story, the reader knows better because Milton explicitly tells the reader that his purpose is to “justifie the ways of God to men” (Paradise Lost 1.26). As Balachandra Rajan stated in his essay, Paradise Lost: The Uncertain Epic, “If Satan is the hero, he is the hero within an antiquest that invites us to view Paradise Lost as an anti-epic” (Rajan 271). If Satan were the hero, God’s actions would be interpreted as invalid and so Satan cannot be the hero of Milton’s epic