SHAKESPEARE AND MILTON IN POLITICAL INTERPRETATION: LITERARY TEXTS, POLITICAL RECEPTION, AND THE RECONTEXTUALIZATION OF POWER
Shakespeare and Milton in Political Interpretation SHAKESPEARE AND MILTON IN POLITICAL INTERPRETATION ABSTRACT This dissertation examines how Shakespeare and Milton function as technologies of political intelligibility for American political readers and actors. It proposes that literary texts supply repertoires of narrative, rhetorical, and interpretive structures that readers select, reactivate, and recontextualize in political argument and crisis. The dissertation does not claim that literature causes political belief; it traces the mediated processes by which literary structures become available for political interpretation. Through case studies of John Adams, Abigail Adams, Thomas Jefferson, and Abraham Lincoln, the dissertation develops a four-part analytical framework—representation, reception, retrospective interpretation, and reactivation—and a six-stage heuristic for tracing retrospective political interpretation. It argues that literary texts enable political un...