Место издания:Cambridge Scholars publishng Cambridge (Mass.)
Первая страница:117
Последняя страница:125
Аннотация:The idea that John Milton writing his Paradise Lost was inspired by the Old English poetical piece on the Fall of Men (named conventionally Genesis B) has been discussed by scholars for nearly three hundred years, but these debates have not brought any definite results. The focal point of the controversy lays in the question whether Milton might have been acquainted with the Old English text and how he could have come to know it. In my paper I am going to approach the problem from another perspective, namely through analyzing and comparing the sets of theological ideas mirrored by (or forming the background of) the two masterpieces under discussion. I want to demonstrate that, notwithstanding certain essential similarities, the theological message of Milton’s poem differs dramatically from the views represented by Genesis B. If Milton really read the Old English text, or its translation, he surely might have been fascinated by the vivid pictures and the unusual narrative patterns created by the Anglo-Saxon poet, but his presumable use of them resembles the actions of a builder taking the stones of ancient ruins to put them in the walls of a new tower.