Welcome to the Canon Club - everything you wanted to know about western civilisation but were afraid to ask. We aim to provide fascinating talks on the key works of the Western canon, to fill in our missing knowledge on subjects that might once have been passed down as the foundation of a common culture. We're kicking off with Jaspreet Singh Boparai discussing John Milton's Paradise Lost and Dr Johnson's "Life of Milton".

Jaspreet Singh Boparai trained as a classicist and historian of art, and specialises in the culture of Renaissance Italy, and the influence of ancient Roman sculpture and classical Greek poetry on artists and writers in fifteenth-century Florence. He studied Classics so that he wouldn't need footnotes to understand the Latin and Greek references in Paradise Lost. His doctorate focussed on the work of the Renaissance polymath Politian (1454-1494), who was a hero both to John Milton and Dr Samuel Johnson. He is one of the founders of the Antigone Journal, a new and open forum for Classics in the twenty-first century.

By way of an introduction to the talk, he writes:

"Why is Paradise Lost the greatest poem in our language? And how is this, the work of a Puritan regicide, our national epic? English writers and thinkers have been arguing about this for over three hundred and fifty years. Sometimes these arguments get in the way of enjoying Milton's work, which is one of the richest sources of pleasure in English literature. Our best guide to Milton's poem remains Dr Samuel Johnson's "Life of Milton", from Lives of the Most Eminent English Poets (1779-1781). Dr Johnson's exploration of Paradise Lost and its author has itself become a monument of English literature. But was Dr Johnson right about Milton?"

The talk will be held in the upstairs room at the Sekforde pub in Clerkenwell, London. Doors to the upstairs will open at 7, and the talk itself will begin at 7:30, and will last for around 45 minutes (including a reading from Paradise Lost), followed by a 15 minute break, then up to half an hour for questions, finishing up at around 9. Drinks will be available all evening from the main bar downstairs, which will also of course also be open for drinks or dinner both before and after the event (though the kitchen closes at 9). See the Sekforde's menu here: https://www.thesekforde.com/food-drink.

Canon Club: Paradise Lost and Dr Johnson's "Life of Milton"

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