Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-nmvwc Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-07-06T18:21:08.516Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

“Perplex't Paths”: Youth and Authority in Milton's Mask*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 November 2018

Blaine Greteman
Blaine Greteman*
Affiliation:
University of Iowa
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This essay argues that John Milton's A Mask Presented at Ludlow Castle (1634) is influenced by early modern concepts of childhood in a way that critics have not recognized. Childhood was a problematic concept in contemporary religious, pedagogical, and legal discourses. Children were depicted as models of submission, but prone to impetuous indiscretion, and their path to adult agency was strewn with pitfalls, especially in the liminal period of youth. A Mask engages with and transforms these discourses. It rejects the political quietism routinely associated with childhood and shows that the child's unique sensitivity may offer a route to a particularly powerful kind of voice.

Type
Research Article
Information
Renaissance Quarterly , Volume 62 , Issue 2 , Summer 2009 , pp. 410 - 443
Copyright
Copyright © 2009 Renaissance Society of America

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

*

I would like to thank James G. Turner, Victoria Kahn, Ann Coiro, and this journal's anonymous reader for their insights and suggestions.

References

Agrippa, Cornelius. Three Books of Occult Philosophy. Trans. , F, J. London, 1651.Google Scholar
Aristotle, . Aristotle's Poetics. Trans. , Hutton, James. New York, 1982.Google Scholar
Ascham, Roger. The Scholemaster . In The English Works of Roger Ascham, ed. , Wright, William Aldis, 170–302. Cambridge, 1904.Google Scholar
Barber, C. L. “A Mask Presented at Ludlow Castle: The Masque as a Masque.” In A Mask at Ludlow (1968), 188–206.Google Scholar
Belsey, Catherine. John Milton: Language, Gender, and Power. Oxford, 1988.Google Scholar
Blackstone, William. Commentaries on the Laws of England. Vol. 4. Oxford, 1769.Google Scholar
Bloom, Harold. A Map of Misreading. Oxford, 1980.Google Scholar
Boys, John. An Exposition of the Festivall Epistles and Gospels Used in our English Liturgie Together with a Reason Why the Church Did Chuse the Same. The First Part from the Feast of S. Andrew the Apostle, to the Purification of Blessed Mary the Virgin. London, 1615.Google Scholar
Breasted, Barbara. “Comus and the Castlehaven Scandal.” Milton Studies 3 (1971): 201–24.Google Scholar
Brinsley, John. A Consolation for our Grammar Schooles. London, 1622.Google Scholar
Brown, Cedric. John Milton's Aristocratic Entertainments. Cambridge, 1985.Google Scholar
Brown, Cedric. “Presidential Travels and Instructive Augury in Milton's Ludlow Masque.” Milton Quarterly 21 (1987): 13–27.10.1111/j.1094-348X.1987.tb00735.xCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Carew, Thomas. Poems By Thomas Carew Esquir. London, 1640.Google Scholar
Carey, John, ed. Milton: Complete Shorter Poems. 2nd ed. London, 1997.Google Scholar
Codrington, Robert. The Second Part of Youths Behaviour: Or Decency in Conversation Amongst Women. London, 1672.Google Scholar
Coiro, Anne Baynes. “Anonymous Milton or A Maske Masked.” English Literary History 71 (2004): 609–29.10.1353/elh.2004.0036CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Coke, Edward. The First Part of the Institutes of the Laws of England. 10th ed., London, 1703.Google Scholar
Cox, John D. “Poetry and History in Milton's Court Masque.” English Literary History 44 (1977): 622–40.10.2307/2872428CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Davidson, Clifford. “The Young Milton, Orpheus, and Poetry.” English Studies 59 (1978): 27–34.10.1080/00138387808597868CrossRefGoogle Scholar
DiSalvo, Jacqueline. “Fear of Flying: Milton on the Boundaries between Witchcraft and Inspiration.” English Literary Renaissance 18 (1988): 114–37.10.1111/j.1475-6757.1988.tb00949.xCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Erasmus, Desiderius. De Pueris Statim Ac Liberaliter Instituendis . In Desiderii Erasmi Roterdami Opera Omnia, ed. , Le Clerc, Jean, 1:485–516. 1703. Reprint, Hildesheim, 1961.Google Scholar
Fish, Stanley. How Milton Works. Cambridge, MA, 2001.Google Scholar
Fletcher, Angus. The Transcendental Masque: An Essay on Milton's Comus. Ithaca, 1972.Google Scholar
Foss, Hubert J., ed. “The Airs of the Songs by Henry Lawes with His Version of the Words.” In A Mask at Ludlow (1968), 241–50.Google Scholar
Fowler, Alastair, ed. Paradise Lost by John Milton. 2nd ed. London, 1998.Google Scholar
French, John Milton. The Life Records of John Milton. 5 vols. New Brunswick, 1949–58.Google Scholar
Fudge, Erica. Perceiving Animals: Humans and Beasts in Early Modern English Culture. Urbana, 2002.Google Scholar
Glanvill, Joseph. Essays on several important subjects in philosophy and religion. London, 1676.Google Scholar
Goldberg, Jonathan. Voice Terminal Echo: Postmodernism and English Renaissance Texts. New York, 1986.Google Scholar
Hale, Matthew. History of the Pleas of the Crown. Ed. , Emlyn, Sollom. 2 vols. London, 1736.Google Scholar
Halpern, Richard. “Puritanism and Maenadism in A Mask.” In Rewriting the Renaissance: the Discourses of Sexual Difference in Early Modern Europe, ed. , Ferguson, Margaret W., Quilligan, Maureen, and , Vickers, Nancy J., 88–105. Chicago, 1986.Google Scholar
Herbert, George. The Complete English Poems. Ed. , Tobin, John. London, 1991.Google Scholar
Herrup, Cynthia B. A House in Gross Disorder: Sex, Law, and the 2nd Earl of Castlehaven. Oxford, 2001.10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195139259.001.0001CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hollander, John. The Figure of Echo: A Mode of Allusion in Milton and After. Berkeley, 1981.Google Scholar
Hoxby, Blair. “The Wisdom of Their Feet: Meaningful Dance in Milton and the Stuart Masque.” English Literary Renaissance 37 (2007): 74–99.10.1111/j.1475-6757.2007.00094.xCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hubbell, J. Andrew. “Comus: Milton's Re-Formation of the Masque.” In Spokesperson Milton, ed. , Durham, Charles W., and , McColgan, Kristin Pruitt, 193–205. London, 1994.Google Scholar
Hunter, William. “The Liturgical Context of Comus.” English Language Notes 10 (1972): 11–15.Google Scholar
Jonson, Ben. Pan's Anniversary . In Ben Jonson, ed. , Herford, C. H.. , Simpson, Percy, and , Simpson, Evelyn, 7:527–39. Oxford, 1941a.Google Scholar
Jonson, Ben. Pleasure Reconcild to Vertue . In Ben Jonson, ed. , Herford, C. H.. , Simpson, Percy, and , Simpson, Evelyn, 7:475–91. Oxford, 1941b.Google Scholar
Judd, Cristle Collins. Reading Renaissance Music Theory: Hearing with the Eyes. Cambridge, 2000.Google Scholar
Kahn, Victoria. Machiavellian Rhetoric: From the Counter-Reformation to Milton. Princeton, 1994.10.1515/9781400821280CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Karmelich, Rosemary. “Dark Scandal and the Sun-Clad Power of Chastity: The Historical Milieu of Milton's Comus.” Studies in English Literature 15 (1975): 141–52.Google Scholar
Kerrigan, William. The Sacred Complex: On the Psychogenesis of Paradise Lost. Cambridge, MA, 1983.10.4159/harvard.9780674418851CrossRefGoogle Scholar
King, Margaret L. “Concepts of Childhood: What We Know and Where We Might Go.” Renaissance Quarterly 60,no. 2 (2007): 371–407.Google Scholar
Leasure, Ross. “Milton's Queer Choice: Comus at Castlehaven.” Milton Quarterly 36 (2002): 63–86.10.1111/1094-348X.00032CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lewalski, Barbara K. “Milton's Comus and the Politics of Masquing.” In The Politics of the Stuart Court Masque, ed. , Bevington, David and , Holbrook, Peter, 296–320. Cambridge, 1998.Google Scholar
Lieb, Michael. Milton and the Culture of Violence. Ithaca, 1994.Google Scholar
Lowinsky, Edward E. “Music in the Culture of the Renaissance.” Journal of the History of Ideas 15 (1954): 509–53.10.2307/2707674CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Major, John M. “Comus and The Tempest.” Shakespeare Quarterly 10 (1959): 177–83.10.2307/2866924CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Marcus, Leah Sinanoglou. Childhood and Cultural Despair: A Theme and Variations in Seventeenth-Century Literature. Pittsburgh, 1978.Google Scholar
Marcus, Leah Sinanoglou. “The Milieu of Milton's Comus: Judicial Reform at Ludlow and the Problem of Sexual Assault.” Criticism 25 (1983): 293–327.Google Scholar
Marcus, Leah Sinanoglou. The Politics of Mirth: Jonson, Herrick, Milton, Marvell, and the Defense of Old Holiday Pastimes. Chicago, 1986.Google Scholar
Marcus, Leah Sinanoglou. “The Earl of Bridgewater's Legal Life.” Milton Quarterly 21 (1987): 13–23.10.1111/j.1094-348X.1987.tb00736.xCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Marjara, Harinder S. “Milton's ‘Chromatick jarres’ and ‘Tuscan aire.’” Milton Quarterly 19 (1985): 11–13.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Martin, Catherine Gimelli. “The Non-Puritan Ethics, Metaphysics, and Aesthetics of Milton's Spenserian Masque.” Milton Quarterly 37 (2003): 215–44.10.1111/j.1094-348X.2003.00064.xCrossRefGoogle Scholar
A Mask at Ludlow: Essays on Milton's Comus. Ed. John S. Diekhoff. Cleveland, 1968.Google Scholar
Maxwell, J. C. “Comus, Line 37.” Notes and Queries 9 (1959): 364.10.1093/nq/6.9.364CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Miller, Leo. “Milton's Clash With Chappell: A Suggested Reconstruction.” Milton Quarterly 14 (1980): 77–87.10.1111/j.1094-348X.1980.tb00219.xCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Milton, John. Facsimile of the Manuscript of Milton's Minor Poems. Cambridge, 1899.Google Scholar
Milton, John. De Doctrina . In Works, ed. , Sumner, Charles R., vols. 14–17. New York, 1934.Google Scholar
Milton, John. Complete Prose Works of John Milton. 8 vols. Ed. , Wolfe, Don M.. New Haven, 1953–82.Google Scholar
Milton, John. “Bridgewater Comus: Text of a Maske.” In A Mask at Ludlow (1968), 207–40.Google Scholar
Milton, John. The Riverside Milton. Ed. , Flannagan, Roy. Boston, 1998.Google Scholar
Mulcaster, Richard. Positions Wherin those Primitive Circumstances Be Examined Which are Necessarie for the Training up of Children. Ed. , Quick, Robert Herbert. New York, 1888.Google Scholar
Norbrook, David. Poetry and Politics in the English Renaissance. Boston, 1984a.Google Scholar
Norbrook, David. “The Reformation of the Masque.” In The Court Masque, ed. , Lindley, David, 94–110. Manchester, 1984b.Google Scholar
Orgel, Stephen. “The Case for Comus.” Representations 81 (2003): 31–45.10.1525/rep.2003.81.1.31CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Orgel, Stephen, and , Goldberg, Jonathan, eds. John Milton. Oxford, 1990.Google Scholar
Oritz, Joseph. “The Reforming of Reformation: Theatrical, Ovidian, and Musical Figuration in Milton's Masque.” Milton Studies 44 (2005): 84–110.Google Scholar
Ovid. Metamorphoses. Ed. Tarrant, R. J.. Oxford, 2004.Google Scholar
Perkins, John. A Treatise of the Laws of England. Dublin, 1792.Google Scholar
Perkins, William. Christian Oeconomie. London, 1609.Google Scholar
Plato. The Republic. Ed. and trans. Bloom, Allan. 2nd ed., New York, 1991.Google Scholar
Platt, Anthony, and , Bernard, L. Diamond. “The Origins of the ‘Right and Wrong’ Test of Criminal Responsibility and Its Subsequent Development in the United States: An Historical Survey.” California Law Review 54 (1966): 1227–60.10.2307/3479281CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sandys, George. Ovid's Metamorphosis Englished, Mythologized and Represented in Figures. Oxford, 1632. Reprint, Whitefish, 2005.Google Scholar
Sensabaugh, G. F. “The Milieu of Comus.” In John Milton: Twentieh-Century Perspectives, ed. , Evans, J. Martin, 2:268–82. New York, 2003.Google Scholar
Shakespeare, William. The Riverside Shakespeare . Ed. , Evans, G. Blakemore. Boston, 1974.Google Scholar
Sherbo, Arthur. “More on Milton's Rustication.” Milton Quarterly 18 (1984): 22–24.10.1111/j.1094-348X.1984.tb00273.xCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shullenberger, William. “Into the Woods: The Lady's Soliloquy in Comus.” Milton Quarterly 35 (2001): 33–43.10.1111/1094-348X.00004CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shullenberger, William. “Girl, Interrupted: Spenserian Bondage and Release in Milton's Ludlow Mask.” Milton Quarterly 37 (2003a): 184–204.10.1111/j.1094-348X.2003.00062.xCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shullenberger, William. “Tragedy in Translation: The Lady's Echo Song.” English Literary Renaissance 33 (2003b): 402–23.10.1111/j.1475-6757.2003.00033.xCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Simons, Louise. “‘And Heaven Gates Ore My Head’: Death as Threshold in Milton's Mask.” Milton Studies 23 (1987): 53–96.Google Scholar
Smith, Hilda L. “Humanist Education and the Renaissance Concept of Woman.” In Women and Literature in Britain, 1500–1700, ed. , Wilcox, Helen, 9–29. Cambridge, 1999.Google Scholar
Statutes at large, from the first year of King Edward the Fourth to the end of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth. 14 vols. London, 1786.Google Scholar
Swan, Jesse G. “Imbodies and Imbrutes: Constructing Whiteness in Milton's A Mask Presented at Ludlow Castle.” Clio 44 (2004): 367–406.Google Scholar
Thomas, Catherine. “Chaste Bodies and Poisonous Desires in Milton's Masque.” Studies in English Literature 46 (2006): 435–59.Google Scholar
Turner, James G. “Milton among the Libertines.” In Milton, Rights and Liberties, ed. , Tournu, Christophe and , Forsyth, Neil, 447–60. Bern, 2007.Google Scholar
Vacari, Patricia. “The Triumph of Art, the Triumph of Death: Orpheus in Spenser and Milton.” In Orpheus: The Metamorphosis of a Myth, ed. , Warden, John, 207–30. Toronto, 1982.Google Scholar
Virgil, . Aeneid . In Opera, ed. , Mynors, R. A. B., 103–422. Oxford, 1969.Google Scholar
Wiseman, S. J. “Hairy on the Inside: Metamorphosis and Civility in English Werewolf Texts.” In Renaissance Beasts: Of Animals, Humans, and Other Wonderful Creatures, ed. , Fudge, Erica, 50–70. Urbana, 2004.Google Scholar
Witmore, Michael. Pretty Creatures: Children and the Agency of Fiction in the English Renaissance. Ithaca, 2007.Google Scholar
Woodhouse, A. S. P. “The Argument of Milton's Comus.” University of Toronto Quarterly 11 (1942): 46–71.10.3138/utq.11.1.46CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Year Books of the Reign of King Edward III. Ed. and trans. Alfred Horwood. London, 1883.Google Scholar