1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910162714203321

Autore

Chapman Alison A.

Titolo

The Legal Epic : "Paradise Lost" and the Early Modern Law / / Alison A. Chapman

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Chicago : , : University of Chicago Press, , [2017]

©2017

ISBN

0-226-43527-X

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource

Disciplina

821.4

Soggetti

Law in literature

Religion and law

Law and literature - England - History - 17th century

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

Previously issued in print: 2017.

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Nota di contenuto

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- On Texts -- 1. Introduction -- 2. Law and Religion in Milton's World -- 3. The Traitors of Heaven and Earth -- 4. The Arch-Felon -- 5. The Sole Propriety of Adam and Eve -- 6. Acts of Possession -- 7. The Mortal Sentence -- 8. Begging Pardon -- 9. Conclusion -- Bibliography -- Index

Sommario/riassunto

The seventeenth century saw some of the most important jurisprudential changes in England's history, yet the period has been largely overlooked in the rich field of literature and law. Helping to fill this gap, The Legal Epic is the first book to situate the great poet and polemicist John Milton at the center of late seventeenth-century legal history. Alison A. Chapman argues that Milton's Paradise Lost sits at the apex of the early modern period's long fascination with law and judicial processes. Milton's world saw law and religion as linked disciplines and thought therefore that in different ways, both law and religion should reflect the will of God. Throughout Paradise Lost, Milton invites his readers to judge actions using not only reason and conscience but also core principles of early modern jurisprudence. Law thus informs Milton's attempt to "justify the ways of God to men" and points readers toward the types of legal justice that should prevail on earth. Adding to the growing interest in the cultural history of law, The Legal Epic shows



that England's preeminent epic poem is also a sustained reflection on the role law plays in human society.