The focus of this course is a close reading of Milton’s Paradise Lost. We will seek to understand the poem as an intervention in the political and theological controversies of its time, but special attention will be given to its participation in England’s Scientific Revolution. Thus this course will serve a secondary purpose as an introduction to the study of literature and science (as undertaken by historians of science, sociologists of science, and critical theorists). We will take brief detours into the works of other poets who similarly understand poetic language as a vehicle for the exploration of the cosmos (Lucretius, Guillaume de Salluste Du Bartas, Lucy Hutchinson). (Med/Ren)