In this book the pre-eminent historian of Cromwellian England takes a fresh approach to the literary biography of the two great poets of the Puritan Revolution, John Milton and Andrew Marvell. Blair Worden reconstructs the political contexts within which Milton and Marvell wrote, and reassesses their writings against the background of volatile and dramatic changes of public mood and circumstance. Two figures are shown to have been prominent in their minds. First there is Oliver Cromwell, on whose character and decisions the future of the Puritan Revolution and of the nation rested, and whose ascent the two writers traced and assessed, in both cases with an acute ambivalence. The second is Marchamont Nedham, the pioneering journalist of the civil wars, a close friend of Milton and a man whose writings prove to be intimately linked to Marvell's. The high achievements of Milton and Marvell are shown to belong to world of pressing political debate which Nedham's ephemeral publications helped to shape. The book follows Marvell's transition from royalism to Cromwellianism. In Milton's case we explore the profound effect on his outlook brought by the execution of King Charles I in 1649; his difficult and disillusioning relationship with the successive regimes of the Interregnum; and his attempt to come to terms, in his immortal poetry of the Restoration, with the failure of Puritan rule.
Reviews
...a work of immense richness and its implications will be debated for many years to come...what this book does, it does superbly well, and it will send scholars back to the sources with new questions and new answers. * David Norbrook The Library *
Worden steers an intricate and assured course through these complex areas, guided by his remarkable knowledge... what emerges from the close analysis of Nedham's, Milton's and Marvell's political manoeuvrings is something quite radical. * Colin Burrow, London Review of Books *
Literature and Politics in Cromwellian England is a marvellous contribution to the field. It will play a central role in all future discussions of Milton, Nedham and Marvell, and will be of fundamental importance to all those interested in the relationship between literature and politics in seventeenth-century England. * Matthew Adams, Review of English Studies *
Our understanding of Milton, Marvell and Nedham is quite simply transformed by Worden's brilliance as a reader of their texts and by his extraordinary ability to use their connections and divergences one with another and with a wider group of kindred spirits. * John Morrill, BBC History Magazine *



Book Information
ISBN 9780199230815
Author Blair Worden
Format Hardback
Page Count 476
Imprint Oxford University Press
Publisher Oxford University Press
Weight(grams) 1g
Dimensions(mm) 240mm * 163mm * 30mm