Epic Ambitions in Modern Times

Writing for a broad audience, this veteran college teacher provides attractive introductory accounts of, among multiple other works, Richardson’s novel Clarissa (1748), Gibbon’s history Decline and Fall (completed in 1789), Wagner’s massive operatic Ring (1876), Abel Gance’s film Napoleon (1927), Tony Kushner’s celebrated drama Angels in America (1991), and Frederick Turner’s futuristic science fiction verse epics. Particularly effective is the illustrated chapter devoted to Jacob Lawrence’s 60 small panel paintings The Migration Series (half of which are in the Phillips Collection [DC], the other half in New York City's Museum of Modern Art). This fine chapter (among others) will reward nonspecialists and teachers seeking new ways of satisfying impulses once served by the classical form. --CHOICE

Gracefully written and always interesting, it is a pleasure to read for its own sake as well as for its contributions to our understanding of the many diverse ways in which the desire for epic, “the oldest literary genre,” has been expressed by Milton and his artistic descendants. This book is a gift - Extrapolation

“A brilliant re-thinking and re-engagement with the epic and its transformations, Epic Ambitions in Modern Times: From Paradise Lost to the New Millennium is rich and capacious. Bursting with marvelous surprises and witty analyses, it is theoretically informed and historically adept. Questioning the death of the epic after Milton, Robert Crossley embarks on a lively literary odyssey across centuries, continents, and genres to trace an ever-transforming tradition of epic making in poetry, prose, visual art, and popular culture. He makes visible, luminous, and inevitable the ambitions of a panoply of writers and artists to craft and create forms of epics, but he rewards the reader by maintaining a persuasive focus on tangible, carefully-honed illustrations in modern formats and incarnations, such as Tony Kushner’s Angels in America, Jacob Lawrence’s The Great Migration, and Ursula Le Guin’s Lavinia. .” - Thadious M. Davis, Professor Emerita of English, University of Pennsylvania, USA.

"Since literary theory declared the end of ‘grand narratives’ a generation ago, a major gap has opened up in our critical understanding of epic, and in our ability to recognize and appreciate the extraordinary return of the epic sensibility in the popular imagination. Robert Crossley’s erudite but genial and accessible criticism splendidly repairs the deficiency and in the process promises a new opening and a new audience for literary studies in general.”– Frederick Turner, Professor Emeritus – Literature and Creative Writing, University of Texas , USA.

“Paradise Lost is the crucial text for the narrative undertaken here, it is reinforced by numerous references to Milton’s vow to pursue‘Things unattempted yet in Prose or Rhyme’ (Paradise Lost I.16), but the fascination with epic continues in ways that Milton could not have imagined. This book is exemplary, and quite impressive.“– Patrick A. McCarthy, Professor of English, University of Miami, USA.

“This book presents genuinely new insights about Paradise Lost. I have no doubt that the readers will profit both in terms of knowledge and the sheer enjoyment of acquiring it. Excellent work, all around—a book that presents a strongly individual perspective grounded in deep reading and wide experience of literature and the world.”– Michael Bryson, Professor of English, California State University, USA.