The female sublime from Milton to Swinburne

Focusing on the interplay between vision and gender in poetry, this study examines how Milton influences later male poets like Shelley, Tennyson, Browning, and Swinburne. It argues that achieving poetic vision often entails a form of symbolic blindness and a feminization of the male poet. The exploration encompasses themes such as myth, the gendered nature of the sublime, the lyric fragment, and the connection between pain and creativity, offering a significant re-evaluation of male poets and their role in shaping the English poetic tradition.