Duquesne University Press

“Paradise Lost: A Poem Written in Ten Books”

An Authoritative Text of the 1667 First Edition

Edited by John T. Shawcross and Michael Lieb

Published in 2007
$68.00  cloth
Short discount available
ISBN: 978-0-8207-0392-3

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         “Paradise Lost: A Poem Written in Ten Books” - paper
         “Paradise Lost: A Poem Written in Ten Books" - cloth

Book Information

“Paradise Lost: A Poem Written in Ten Books”: An Authoritative Text of the 1667 First Edition is the first such presentation of the first edition of this major epic of English literature. Constructed as a 10-book version, the 1667 edition is a finished piece that is architecturally and numerically balanced, significantly differing from the now-standard 1674 version that appeared in 12 books.

This edition of the 1667 text also provides the opportunity to view the second edition of 1674 from a fresh perspective. Although the 1674 edition has customarily been adopted as the basis for modern publications of the poem, the availability now of this authoritative text of the 1667 edition invites a reconsideration of Milton’s original intentions in light of the changes made evident in the revised text. Full discussions include information about the alterations made in states of the text, errors that persisted, and the rationale of the edition presented here.

Author Information

JOHN T. SHAWCROSS is professor emeritus of English at the University of Kentucky. He is the author of numerous books, including With Mortal Voice: The Creation of Paradise Lost. He is coeditor of Milton and the Grounds of Contention, and is a two-time winner of the James Holly Hanford Award for the most distinguished book on Milton.

MICHAEL LIEB is professor of English and Research Professor of Humanities at the University of Illinois at Chicago and is coeditor of The Miltonic Samson, which won the 1996 Irene Samuel Award of the Milton Society of America.

Book Reviews

“The great value of this edition is that it makes available to Milton scholars and their students a very different Paradise Lost in all its valiant glory, than the one we conventionally read. One plunges right into the poem (presented in original spelling), with neither prefatory material nor, more unusually, intervening dedication or prefatory letter from the publisher. The poem as presented is stark, unadorned, and unrelenting, like the character of God in book 3. This edition will significantly affect both the scholarship and the pedagogy of Paradise Lost, and we owe Shawcross and Lieb a great debt for their labors.” — Renaissance Quarterly