Milton and the Natural World: Science and Poetry in Paradise Lost by Karen L. Edwards

This monograph contends that Milton was fully attuned to the new scientific possibilities of the seventeenth century. Edwards debunks theories that Milton was stuck, backwards-looking, in old science, and instead contends that the very moments that seem the most to show that Milton was using an old system of knowledge actually indicate Milton's prowess: he's wryly commenting on the old way of understanding things. In Paradise Lost, he presents a world that needs to be read experimentally (as God's other book), the way that the Bible itself should be read. I found this argument persuasive: Edwards gives clear readings of Milton's masterpiece (and its use of plants and animals) and lucid descriptions of how science was changing at that time. The monograph is beautifully illustrated.