Mammon's Music: Literature and Economics in the Age of Milton by Blair Hoxby (review)

Abstract

MLR, 100.3, 2??5 783 available to readers an impressive amount of new material, much of it the result of Smith's tireless researches. It is far superior to all previous editions of Marvell in several respects: its annotation of linguistic detail, the puns and verbal ambiguities so abundant in Marvell; its notes identifying possible sources and analogues, classical and biblical; its citation of parallel passages from the poet's contemporaries; and its consistent attempts to situate Marvell's writings in their historical context. Marvell's critical reputation has undergone marked changes in the last few years, with a new emphasis on his involvement in politics and on locating his poems in specific historical moments. Much of the most interesting recent work on Marvell? Smith's own writings and those of David Norbrook, Annabel Patterson, Thomas Corns, Blair Worden, Derek Hirst, and others?has been historicist in its emphasis. Readers wanting guidance in reading the 'Horatian Ode', 'The First Anniversary', or such relatively obscure poems as 'The Character of Holland' or 'The Loyal Scot' have exactly the book here that will suit their needs. For some poems, including 'The First Anniversary' and Marvell's poem on the death of Cromwell, Smith's introduction and notes provide the best critical and historical introduction available. But forall its considerable merits, Smith's edition suffersfrom a certain imbalance. Anyone interested in Marvell as wit, lyric poet, ironist, the Marvell celebrated by T. S. Eliot for 'a tough reasonableness behind the slight lyric grace', may at times feel disappointed. Smith's introductions and notes are at their best when they treat the poems by Marvell which fithis own particular interests, and are less helpful in treating such poems as 'The Nymph Complaining forthe Death of her Fawn' or the four 'Mower' poems. Here as elsewhere, Smith's introductions and notes excel in pointing out parallel passages in classical and Renaissance authors. But 'The Nymph Complaining' is a difficult, enigmatic poem, and readers may need more help in coming to terms with its 'interpretative difficulties' (p. 64) than is afforded by a bare list giving bibliographical references to eighteen critical studies. The canon of Marvell's verse satires is uncertain, and Smith's edition treats the problematical elements with great assurance. He makes a strong case for Marvell's authorship of two satires of the 1660s, 'Second Advice' and 'Third Advice', as well as for the much earlier elegy on the death of Lord Francis Villiers. 'Blake's Victory', another poem whose authenticity has been doubted by Marvell scholars, is relegated to an appendix of doubtful poems. I would have preferred that A Dialogue between Thyrsis and Dorinda' had similarly been classed as doubtful, though Smith in his introduction states arguments forand against its authenticity. Ofthe poems 'of uncer? tain attribution' excluded from the edition but listed in a further appendix, I would have liked to see texts of 'The Kings Vowes' and 'Upon his Majesties being made free of the City' included among 'doubtful poems', since the case for their being wholly or partly by Marvell is at least as strong as with 'Blake's Victory' and 'Thyrsis and Dorinda'. For all these minor reservations, Nigel Smith's edition of Marvell is a triumphant achievement, invaluable for the student of Marvell and seventeenth-century poetry. In its full and informative introductions and notes, it is a great advance over the previous editions of Margoliouth, Legouis, Lord, Donno, and Walker. King's College London Warren Chernaik Mammon's Music: Literature and Economics in the Age of Milton. By Blair Hoxby. New Haven and London: Yale University Press. 2003. xii + 320 pp. ?30. ISBN 0-300-09378-0. Mammon's Music is a work ofconsiderable originality,which casts new light on Milton and some of his contemporaries by juxtaposing literary texts with economic treatises 784 Reviews and pamphlets of the seventeenth century. The title suggests a certain ambivalence. To the Puritan moralist Milton, the siren song ofmaterial gain represents a temptation to be resolutely resisted. And yet, as Blair Hoxby shows convincingly, images of trade and its circulation resonate throughout Milton's writings, associated both with ideas of empire and with freedom of thought. Mammon...