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    Blindness

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    Dharmendra Khatri
    John Milton wrote the sonnet "On His Blindness" after losing his vision at age 43. In it, he questions why God made him blind and prevented him from writing his masterwork earlier. The poem is written in the form of an Italian sonnet with the rhyme scheme abbaabbacdecde. Patience, which is personified, answers Milton's complaints by saying those who accept God's will serve him best. The poem expresses Milton's religious ideal that accepting one's fate is the highest form of service to God.

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    Blindness

    Uploaded by

    Dharmendra Khatri
    169 views2 pages
    John Milton wrote the sonnet "On His Blindness" after losing his vision at age 43. In it, he questions why God made him blind and prevented him from writing his masterwork earlier. The poem is written in the form of an Italian sonnet with the rhyme scheme abbaabbacdecde. Patience, which is personified, answers Milton's complaints by saying those who accept God's will serve him best. The poem expresses Milton's religious ideal that accepting one's fate is the highest form of service to God.

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    John Milton wrote the sonnet "On His Blindness" after losing his vision at age 43. In it, he questions why God made him blind and prevented him from writing his masterwork earlier. The poem is written in the form of an Italian sonnet with the rhyme scheme abbaabbacdecde. Patience, which is personified, answers Milton's complaints by saying those who accept God's will serve him best. The poem expresses Milton's religious ideal that accepting one's fate is the highest form of service to God.

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    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
    169 views2 pages

    Blindness

    Uploaded by

    Dharmendra Khatri
    John Milton wrote the sonnet "On His Blindness" after losing his vision at age 43. In it, he questions why God made him blind and prevented him from writing his masterwork earlier. The poem is written in the form of an Italian sonnet with the rhyme scheme abbaabbacdecde. Patience, which is personified, answers Milton's complaints by saying those who accept God's will serve him best. The poem expresses Milton's religious ideal that accepting one's fate is the highest form of service to God.

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    On His Blindness by John Milton

    On His Blindess is an Italian sonnet by John Milton, one of the greatest


    poets of English literature. It was written after he had become totally blind at the age
    of forty three. It anticipates the theme of his masterpiece, Paradise Lost, to justify
    the ways of God to men.
    Milton, a puritan, views his blindness as a deliberate design of God and
    considers it Gods way to prove Miltons greatness. Yet, when isolated and embittered
    by his blindness, he is disturbed by some intriguing questions such as why God made
    him blind; why God did not make him feel the urge to write his masterpiece when he
    had vision and when he was in the prime of his youth; and why God exacted daylabour, light denied. He humbly murmurs these complaints, not against, but to God.
    Patience, personified in the sonnet, answers all his questions. God never needs
    mans work or his own gifts to please himself. Who best / Bear His mild yoke,
    they serve Him best. Thousands are at his disposal in his kingly state to serve him
    and run errands over land and ocean without rest. But people, who accept the mild
    yoke of God without any murmur of complaints and wait for His favour, serve Him
    best.
    Miltons preference of the Italian sonnet to the English and Spenserian sonnet
    is remarkable. Its dual structure best serves to deal with the theme of the sonnet. He
    describes his life before and after losing his vision and raises his questions in the first
    eight lines of the sonnet, which form the octave of the sonnet. He personifies
    patience and lets it answer all his questions in the next and last six lines, which form
    the sestet of the sonnet. Moreover, his conviction in classicism is very vibrant in his
    preference of the Italian sonnet, the variant of which is best exemplified in the sonnet
    with the rhyme pattern: abbaabbacdecde.
    The poem thus presents a cosmic theme of lofty religious idealism in the form
    of solution to deal with the inscrutable ways of God: Acceptance is the best service
    to God.
    Yet, there is one more possible way of looking at this sonnet. During the two
    Civil Wars (1642-1646 and 1648-1651), Milton supported the parliamentarians led by
    Lord Cromwell. In 1649 he was appointed foreign secretary by the Puritan
    Government (1649-1660). Even after he had become blind, he continued his
    government service till 1660 with the help of Andrew Marvell, a metaphysical poet.
    He remained in the favour of Cromwell. If this political situation (Cromwells speech
    In the name of God, go) is considered, it can be argued that Milton viewed
    Cromwell as God in the sonnet and he presents himself as a servant waiting on him.
    Thus the sonnets flavour makes up the finest synthesis of the personal, the
    theological, the philosophical and the political.

    Q-As:
    1. John Milton is known as
    Ans: a puritan poet
    2. What is the masterpiece of Milton?
    Ans: Paradise Lost ( 1667)
    3. What kind of poem is Miltons On His Blindness?
    Ans: A sonnet
    4. What kind of sonnet is Miltons On His Blindness?
    Ans: An Italian or Petrarchan sonnet
    5. What is the rhyme pattern of Miltons On His Blindness?
    Ans: abbaabbacdecde
    6. What is personified in the poem?
    Ans: Patience
    7. What is the complaint of the poet?
    Ans: Doth God exact day-labour, light denied?
    (or) The poet is embittered by his blindness and questions why God made him
    blind and kindle his creative spirit to write his masterpiece.
    8. Who answers the questions of Milton in the sonnet?
    Ans: Patience, which is personified.
    9. What is Patiences answer to the questions of Milton?
    Ans: Who best / Bear His mild yoke, they serve Him best.
    10. What is the theme of the sonnet?
    Ans: The cosmic religious idealism acceptance is the best service to God.
    11. Exemplify Miltons classicism.
    Ans: Miltons adoption of the Italian sonnet to deal with the cosmic religious theme.
    12. State the period of two civil wars fought during the 17 century in England.
    Ans: Civil War I 1642-1646; Civil War II 1648-1651

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