The New Lifetime Reading Plan

It is hard to like John Milton. Suffering the penalty of charmlessness, of humorlessness, he has been less read than admired, less admired than merely accepted. The "God-gifted organ voice of England," as Tennyson called it, is a pretty intimidating voice as well. Milton was a man of the utmost courage; but it is not the kind of courage that kindles the imag­ination because it is not married to much humanity, and distills the smell of stubbornness. His pride was too magnificent for any alloy of mere conceit; yet we are made uncomfortable by his "elaborate assumption of the singing-robe," by his flat state- ment that he will pursue "things unattempted yet in prose or rhyme." He is a hard man to live with. Shakespeare [39], even Dante [30], had not only the uncommon but also the common touch. Milton lacked it. Making due allowance for Samuel Johnson's [59] Toryism, it is hard not to agree with his view of Milton: "an acrimonious and surly republican."

And the style is suited to the man. It has, as Milton proudly states, "no middle flight." It can be grand; it can be windy; it can be sublime; it can be pompous. It is never charming, rest- ful, or easy, except in the minor poems and even then infre- quently. It is difficult, odd in syntax and vocabulary, uncom- promising in its elevation.

Perhaps I have persuaded you to skip Milton. That was not my intention. For ali the mustiness of his theology and moral- ity, for ali his mannerism (though it was no mannerism to him), for ali the negative magnetism of his personality, he remains a great artist in both verse and prose. With rocklike—he would say adamantine—grandeur he continues to impose himself even on our age, which laughs at grandeur, at the noble style, and at erudition.

It is worthwhile to make a special, even a painful effort of adjustment to read Milton. If he is a museum piece, he is a rare, precious one. If you cannot stomach his message in

Paradise Lost, at least read it for the gorgeous sound, the elab- orate imagery, the portrait of Satan, that fallen god with whom Milton himself had so much in common. No one will ever again write like this. No one will ever again conceive such per­fect, rolling periods as are to be found in his most eloquent prose.

When we step inside our first great Gothic cathedral, our feelings are mixed. It seems alien, it seems too complicated, it does not seem quite human. But gradually we accustom our- selves to what the builders had in mind. Little by little the structure and sweep and decoration and color become familiar. Soon two clear emotions begin to arise in us, different in nature, yet capable of blending: awe and esthetic pleasure. Milton is a little like that. He cannot inspire these emotions ali the time, nor should one be too obstinate in seeking them con- tinually. But they are there for you, if you read him in small doses, skipping when he is too wearisome or too exalted for our commoner clay.

C.F.

46

MOLIИRE

January 15, 1622 [baptized]-i673 Selected Plays

Moliиre's real name was Jean-Baptiste Poquelin. The son of a prosperous Parisian upholsterer, he received a good Jesuit education, read for the law, and at twenty-one renounced security and upholstery for the chancy and unrespectable life of the stage. His company failed in Paris. He spent many years, perhaps thirteen, knocking about in provincial inn-yards, mounting farces, learning from the ground up the business both of the theater and of human nature. In 1658 his company reestablished itself in Paris under the patronage of the brother of Louis XIV. It was successful and so was Moliиre, operating as actor, manager, and writer of whatever seemed called for: farces, court entertainments, comedies.

In his personal life he was less fortunate. At forty he mar- ried Armande Bйjart, who may have been the illegitimate daughter of his former mistress, and, some said, his own daughter, though there is little evidence for this contention. Half his age, Armande doubled his troubles, which were com- plicated by overwork, illness, and the many controversies brought on by Moliиre's satires on affectation, religious hypocrisy, and conventional prejudices. One night, while play- ing the title role in his own comedy The Imaginary Invalid he hemorrhaged on-stage, dying soon after.

There are at least two Moliиres. Unhappily they are often found in the same play. The first is the play-it-for-laughs com- mercial hack who knows ali the tricks. Moliиre the gagman and knockabout farce-confector would have no trouble in Hollywood today. Indeed Hollywood, though it does not know it, is still using switches on comedy situations developed or, less often, invented by Moliиre.