Tuesday, December 09, 2008

Happy Birthday, Mr. Milton

Today marks the 400th anniversary of the birth of John Milton. On the occasion, The Guardian offers a Milton quiz and a video of Philip Pullman reading a small portion of Milton's most famous work, Paradise Lost.

NPR ran a segment this weekend noting some of the other Milton celebrations, including a 12-hour live reading of Paradise Lost by the faculty of Cambridge University's English department. You can listen to podcasts of that here, and Christ's College also has mounted a Milton 400 webpage with other lectures, added materials and Darkness Visible, a digital companion to Paradise Lost.

In Forbes, two Milton biographers write on the poet's financial status. And the Chronicle of Higher Ed recommends a visit to Dartmouth's Milton Reading Room, which includes annotated digital versions of many Milton works.