Areopagitica: A speech for the Liberty of Unlicensed Printing to the Parliament of England

by John Milton

Overview

Areopagitica: A speech for the Liberty of Unlicensed Printing to the Parliament of England is John Milton's famous tract against censorship. Published in 1644, Areopagitica is named after a speech by Isocrates, a fifth century BC Athenian orator. The work is counted as one of the most influential and inspired defenses of the right to freedom of expression in history. It is also a personal issue for Milton who was submitted to censorship himself when he tried to publish his defenses of divorce, radical works for the time that gained no quarter with censors. Distributed as a pamphlet, Milton's powerful arguments against 1643's Licensing Order note that classical Greek and Roman society was never subjected to such censorship, and he uses many classical and biblical references to reinforce his argument.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781775414452
Publisher:	The Floating Press
Publication date:	01/01/2009
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
File size:	113 KB

About the Author

As a young student, John Milton (1608-1674) dreamed of bringing the poetic elocution of Homer and Virgil to the English language. Milton realized this dream with his graceful, sonorous Paradise Lost, now considered the most influential epic poem in English literature. In sublime poetry of extraordinary beauty, Paradise Lost has inspired generations of artists and their works, ranging from the Romantic poets to the books of J. R. R. Tolkien.