Catalogue Entry
New York Public Library Archives, The New York Public Library. "Blind Milton dictating "Paradise Lost" to his daughters" New York Public Library Digital Collections. Accessed March 4, 2021. https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/66760d80-c7f1-0135-7e34-49d3fe482577
In addition to his scenes of everyday life and portraits of people, Johnson created images of historical events and figures from works of literature, drama, and music. For example, “Carry Me, and I’ll Drum You Through” was inspired by an incident from the Battle of Antietam, 1862, and Membership Vote at the Union League Club, May 11, 1876, recorded a contentious meeting in which he participated much later. His Marguerite, Cosette, and Minnehaha are personifications of fictional heroines from novels and poetry. His Boy Lincoln represents both the future United States president and the archetypical American youth who, with determination and hard work, could succeed. Johnson rendered several of these imaginative images as both paintings and drawings. These literary and historical works evince both his personal interest in those subjects and his awareness of their popularity with the broad public. —AM
MacGibeny, 2021: William Walton, "Eastman Johnson, Painter," Scribner's, 1906, p. 271, describes this painting as "the 'Milton Dictating to His Daughters' of 1875, painted before [Johnson] had seen [Mihály] Munkacsy's more pretentious version of the same scene." The actual date of Johnson's painting is not known; Munkacsy's painting, owned by the New York Public Library, is dated 1877. While both artists' paintings depict Milton seated and his daughters seated as a group next to him, there are significant differences between the two compositions. Johnson places the poet at right, with his face raised; Munkacsy places him at left, with his head lowered. The setting, number and arrangement of the daughters, and attitudes of all figures differ as well, making clear that one is not a copy of the other.
John Milton (1608–1674). English poet. Author of Paradise Lost.
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