He almost was. After all, he'd been a Cabinet member under Cromwell, and one of the Protectorate's most tireless ideologists and propagandists. He spent a year in the Tower, and only escaped through the intervention of highly-placed friends.
So: say he doesn't. By the summer of 1661 Milton's severed head is adorning a spike over one of the gates of London.
Now what?
Well, we've lost the last dozen years of Milton's life. No Samson Agonistes, no Paradise Found... and most of all, no Paradise Lost.
In the short term, Milton is remembered more as a political theorist (the Areopagitica) and pamphlet-writer than as a poet. In the long term... well, no Paradise Lost. That's like losing two or three plays of Shakespeare at once. The knock-on effects will be pretty huge.
Thoughts?
Doug M.
So: say he doesn't. By the summer of 1661 Milton's severed head is adorning a spike over one of the gates of London.
Now what?
Well, we've lost the last dozen years of Milton's life. No Samson Agonistes, no Paradise Found... and most of all, no Paradise Lost.
In the short term, Milton is remembered more as a political theorist (the Areopagitica) and pamphlet-writer than as a poet. In the long term... well, no Paradise Lost. That's like losing two or three plays of Shakespeare at once. The knock-on effects will be pretty huge.
Thoughts?
Doug M.
