The state of innocence

THE STATE OF INNOCENCE AND FALL OF MAN

JOHN DRYDEN

Until then, the sales of ‘Paradise Lost’ were good, but more reduced than Dryden’s adaptation ‘The State of

Innocence and Fall of Man’ (1677). This adaptation entered into the Stationer’s Register. It was the first-

ever adaptation of ‘Paradise Lost’, as an unacted libretto with a great success and nine editions between

1677 and 1701. It outsold Milton’s poem. Tonson tried to get the copyright of ‘The State of Innocence’, but

because he did not manage to do it, he published ‘Paradise Lost’. The Author’s Apology states: ‘I was

induced to print it many hundred copies of it being dispes’d abroad without my knowledge or consent: so

that everyone gathering new faults, it became at length a libel against me’.

The editions of ‘Paradise Lost’ and ‘The State of Innocence’ have similar fonts, even if it is clear that one is a

poem and the other one is an opera. In their works, Milton put only its initials J. M., while Dryden put his

full name. Milton was a Republican, while Dryden states that he was ‘servant to His Majesty’ even in the

title page of its work. Dryden dedicated his opera to the Duchess, while Milton stated that his book has

been ‘licensed and entred according to the order’. The epigraph of Dryden’s work is taken from Ovid’s

‘Metamorphosis’ (referring to the goddess Ceres): ‘I wish I could sing songs worthy of goddess, surely she is

a goddess worthy of song’.

The Duchess, to whom ‘The State of Innocence’ is dedicated, was Maria Beatrice d’Este, the wife of the

Duke of York, brother of James II. James II was a Catholic and King Charles II had no legitimate heirs. They

were convinced that there were many Catholics against the monarchy and trying to blow up the House of

Parliament, a phenomenon called the Popish plot. There was the Exclusion Crisis which led to the division

between Tories and Whigs, and then to the Glorious Revolution of 1688, when James II was deposed in

favour of Mary II, his Anglican-raised daughter married to William III of Orange. Mary II will not have

legitimate heirs, so at her death, her sister Anne would go to the throne. She was the last Stuart monarch.

24.11.2022

JOHN DRYDEN – John Dryden (1631-1600) was the most important author in England in the second half of

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the 17 century, or the Restoration period (as the monarchy was restored). Because

of this, the Restoration literature is also known as the Age of Dryden. He was the

first official poet laureate of England (1668): he was the official poet whose voice

should express approval of the current government. This position required the poet

to produce poems in honour of his country. He was active during the Republic,

because during the Commonwealth, Dryden had been Milton’s colleague. Then he

was employed by the Secretary of State. When monarchy was restored, he wrote

the poem ‘Astraea Redux’ in praise of the restoration of Charles II and the

monarchy. It was a poem directly referring to Charles II: Dryden was speaking to the King himself, saying

that that age was a happy one and that England would become a military power again. The whole world

was waiting for the return of Charles II. Dryden did the same thing with the Republic: when Cromwell died,

he wrote a poem praising what he had done. But at this point, he was a convinced Royalist.

Dryden invented a new genre for drama, called heroic drama. It can be defined as tragic drama, but it is

exaggerated: a great hero had to decide between love and honour, and at the end of the tragedy there is a

happy ending. Until Dryden, the main meter for drama was blank verse; Dryden instead introduced the

heroic couplet, which consisted in two rhyming couplets of iambic pentameter.

The Restoration period was the last period in England where drama was politically important. The

aristocracy was really involved in it and aristocrats thought that it could serve political purposes. Because

everyone was involved in the drama, it became dangerous: it underwent censorship and its importance

decreased. The theatre have been closed during the Republic by the Puritans, but now there was a new

development, for example with female actresses. Nevertheless, the aristocracy wanted to control theatrical

plays, so only the King’s Company and the Duke’s Company could perform. Dryden, because of his close

relation with the King, was involved with the King’s Company, who performed in the Drury Lane Theatre.

This type of Theatre was new in England: it was influenced from France, with artificial lightning, complex

sceneries and machines, and special effects. It was big, but the distance between the stage and the

audience was little, so it was also very intimate.

Dryden wrote comedies, tragicomedies, poems, heroic tragedies and dramas and he adapted

Shakespeare’s plays. His best play is ‘All for Love’, an adaptation of the play of Shakespeare. He was the first

serious literary critic in England and he wrote various critical essays. He was object of satire because

everyone knew him. He converted to Catholicism in 1687, probably for convenience, but he could not be

poet laureate anymore. Dryden admired Milton, even if they had different political views. Dryden asked

Milton’s permission to adapt ‘Paradise Lost’ to a theatrical play, and Milton agreed to put them in heroic

couplets. It is something surprising, because Milton valued blank verse in association with freedom. In this

way, Dryden wrote ‘The State of Innocence’. Dryden wrote librettos very carefully: for example, he wrote a

libretto on Henry Purcell’s semi-opera ‘King Arthur’ for the Cold Scene.

‘The State of Innocence’ has been called an ‘opera against opera’: Dryden never wrote a libretto for an

opera before. The opera became popular after the Restoration because of the new tastes of the monarchy.

Some scholars think that ‘The State of Innocence’ was never performed because Dryden never thought of it

as a performance, but only as a text to read.

Dryden, in the Author’s Apology of ‘The State of Innocence’, wrote: ‘I cannot without injury to the deceas'd

Author of Paradise Lost, but acknowledge that this poem has receiv'd its entire Foundation, part of the

Design, and many of the Ornaments, from him. What I have borrow'd, will be so easily discern'd from my

mean Productions, that I shall not need to point the Reader to the places: And, truly, I should be sorry, for

my own sake, that any one should take the pains to compare them together: The Original being

undoubtedly, one of the greatest, most noble, and most sublime poems, which either this Age or Nation has

produc'd’. The readers should not compare ‘The State of Innocence’ with ‘Paradise Lost’, because Milton’s

work was way better. Dryden was one of the first authors to affirm that Satan was the hero of ‘Paradise

Lost’: he dis not like ‘Paradise Lost’ because it gave too many space to Satan and because of the too many

supernatural characters. According to him, the protagonists should have been only Adam and Eve. He

admired Milton’s poetry but he also underlined his structural problems.

Nathaniel Lee, an important playwright, was a friend of Dryden and he wrote a poem, found at the

beginning of ‘The State of Innocence’, praising Dryden over Milton. Milton has died, but Lee thought that

Dryden owes a little of his popularity to him. Milton was like a painter who drew Chaos, but now Dryden

made this world shine. Lee personified the poem, saying that Milton’s poem was like a beautiful country

maid who was rough and vulgar; instead Dryden brought this girl to court and taught her the sweetest

manners. His text was more noble than those of Homer and Virgil. Lee said that Dryden had used sense,

whereas Milton was associated with mystic reason. Milton was old-fashioned and obsolete, because he

thought that he was a prophet; instead Dryden used his common sense, creating a new world which was

like Eden. People thought that mysticism and imagination caused the war in the world, and now they

needed reason and common sense. Lee concluded by saying that even Dryden’s enemies should recognize

the fact that he wrote a masterpiece which was way better than Milton’s poem.

After the dedication, there is the Author’s Apology, where Dryden wrote how an heroic poem should have

been. The dedicatee was Mary of Modena. The dedication is written in an extremely exaggerated style:

Mary was compared to a goddess and to the Virgin Mary. Samuel Jonson wrote the first modern and

scientific English dictionary, he was in charge of dominating literary criticism and he wrote a biography of

Dryden. He said that ‘The State of Innocence’ was more like a tragedy rather than an opera, like Dryden

stated, because the play should have naked people performing. Andrew Marvell predicted what Dryden

was writing and he was scared that someone who was not as good as Milton could change in scenes

‘Paradise Lost’ and show them in a play. Dryden took only a month to write ‘The State of Innocence’. ‘The

State of Innocence’ has a dedication, while ‘Paradise Lost’ has not any: Milton felt himself free from the

restraints of patronage. Dryden’s dedication was full of Marian associations and he had to praise the

Duchess.

When Dryden decided to adapt ‘Paradise Lost’, the task was huge: the poem was very long and it had to be

condensed into five acts. He had a problem concerning the Aristotelian unities of time, action, place and

action. One of the problems was that Milton developed his narration through flashbacks which occurred in

more days. The unity of place was also a problem, because there were Hell, Chaos, Heaven, and Earth.

Dryden decided to not follow this unity: the action started in Hell, but the rest took place in Paradise.

Another problem was that there were laws that did not permit to represent God on a public stage: Dryden

made only Angels appear. Another difficulty was the happening of a lot of supernatural actions, so many

complex machines and special effects were required. The problem was that the King’s Company was just

been born and they did not have enough money. This was probably the reason why ‘The State of Innocence’

was never performed. Dryden changed the role of Satan, making him less important than Adam and Eve.

Dryden decided to distribute the characters for the sake of dramatic dialogue. In Dryden, Satan is not an

epic hero, but he is a ‘desperate gambler’. Some scholars said that this adaptation of ‘Paradise Lost’ was

good, others disagreed. Dryden thought that Milton’s poem was obsolete right from the moment it was

published and that it should have been modernized. In Dryden, Eve is more emancipated yet more

superficial and playful. In 1688 Dryden converted to Ca