Samuel Johnson’s Literary Criticism in Life of Milton开题报告

 2022-08-01 20:37:44

1. 研究目的与意义

Samuel Johnson was anoutstanding figure in the Britain literature field in the 18th century. He oncesaid that John Milton would have been the greatest writer if he had been bornbefore Shakespeare. So these two writers are deserved studying.

While even Milton was sucha brilliant poet, his works still suffered a lot criticism from Johnson. In his Life of Milton, Johnson described Milton’s life, character and his worksfrom Johnson’s perspective but in a relatively objective way. Johnsonintroduced Milton from a full angle. And he also corrected what critics saidabout Milton before and showed us a more authentic Milton. However, in China,there are a few researches about Milton and Johnson, not to mention SamuelJohnson’s literary criticism about Milton. So this thesis will talk about thegreat poet in the 17th century, Milton, and find out how Johnson criticizedMilton’s works and illustrate the reasons from the perspective of Johnsonhimself, Milton, and the social background.

And the significance is introducingthese two great writers in the history of Britain to more people, especially tothe Chinese people, so that more individuals will get to have a betterunderstanding about Johnson and Milton. Besides, we will know more about Lifeof Milton, and the works of Milton. Lastly, we will be familiar with thestyle of literary criticism.

2. 研究内容和预期目标

Thisthesis will focus on the Life of Milton written by Samuel Johnson.Although there are some researches about this biography and even some of themtalk about the criticism Johnson had about Milton’s life or belief, but littleabout the literary criticism or the reasons. So in this thesis, the author willillustrate how Johnson criticized Milton’s works and then dig out the possiblereasons.

Andthe first part will introduce the significance of the research. The second partis mainly about the literature review and the current studies of the Life ofMilton. The third part is the main part of the thesis. It will be dividedinto two aspects. One is how Johnson criticized Milton’s works, and the otheris the reason. And last part is to make a summary of this thesis.

3. 国内外研究现状

Thereare a few researches about Samuel Johnson’s literary criticism, especially inhis Life of Milton domestically, but some analyses about Milton, whichmainly focus on his moral education, religious belief or his well-known poems,like Paradise Lost, and so on. While there are relatively moreresearches about Samuel Johnson’s literary criticism abroad, even though thesematerials are not so many anyway and nearly most of them were written in thelate of the 20th century.

StephenFix (1984) said that Samuel Johnson''''s Life of Milton was perhaps themost problematic of the Lives of the Poets, and certainly the mostdramatic. Because Johnson and Milton were two writers whose temperaments andhabits were so different. And some commentators argued that Johnson''''s criticaljudgment was affected by political prejudice or even by a religious sensibilitywhich caused him to react negatively to religious verse (Brink, 1980). ButJohnson tried to separate his opinion on Milton’s life from Milton’s arts.Boswell supported that Johnson''''s “just abhorrence of Milton''''s political notionswas ever strong. But this did not prevent his warm admiration of Milton''''s greatpoetical merit…” (Stephen Fix, 1984). However, Johnson still talked about(praised or criticized) Milton’s works based on his life. When it came toliterary criticism, Weinbrot(1975) compared John Clark with Samuel Johnson andpointed out that Johnson was excessively moralistic in his literary criticism.That’s because Samuel Johnson attached great importance to the moral educationfunction of biography (Sun Yongbin, 2017). And as Johnson said by himself that“My purpose was only to have allotted to every Poet an Advertisement . . .containing a few dates and a general character; but I have been led beyond myintention, I hope, by the honest desire of giving useful pleasure” (McCarthy,1977). Because his aim is to reach a wide audience with pleasing instruction,his style of utterance is more personal and deliberately provocative than whatwe find in modern literary biography (Eliot, 1921). Therefore, Johnsonunavoidably gave his literary criticism on Milton from the perspective of moresand tried to strike a chord in readers’ hearts. As for the specific poems ofMilton, Johnson called Paradise Lost a book “the reader admires and laysdown, and forgets to take up again. None ever wished it longer than it is. Itsperusal is a duty rather than a pleasure” (Johnson, Life of Milton). Andthat was, according to what Ye Lixian (2014) argued, the deficiency of Milton’sworks that his works lacked of kind of humanity. But Johnson responded toMilton’s poem whose moral and spiritual effects he finds “awful”, terrifying,and intimidating. He praised the great combination and distinct functions ofreason and imagination in the Paradise Lost (Rogers, 1973). But althoughJohnson admired the genius of Paradise Lost, he held the poem at suchdistance from himself that he was able only to appreciate its skill, not feelits power (Fix, 1985).

Andin this thesis, the author will focus on Johnson’s literary criticism in his Lifeof Milton. She is going to analyze that how Johnson criticized and praisedMilton’s work and then dig roots of the reasons.

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4. 计划与进度安排

1.Introduction

2.Literaturereview

3.Analysis

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5. 参考文献

Brink, J. (1980).Johnson and Milton. Studies in English Literature, 1500-1900, 20(3),493-503.

Eliot, T.S. (1921). The Sacred Wood: Essays on Poetry and Criticism. New York: Alfred A.Knopf.

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