The dissertation examines the presence of theater and drama in the poetry and prose of seventeenth-century English poet John Milton. I argue that problems and tensions pertaining to his identity as a Christian poet and as a public writer play out upon stages, both literal and more metaphorical, that appear in his texts, and are informed by the performance dynamics of the public theater.

Milton was attracted to the stage as a vehicle for delighting and edifying audiences. Yet he also came to approach the stage as a locus of productive tension where the poet struggles to maintain a balance between his agency as an author, his sense of responsibility to a reading public, and his obedience to God. His poetry and prose incline towards theater while at the same time they examine and mediate its unsettling, potentially dangerous influence upon the staged actor. Though his texts show an acceptance of some anti-theatrical views, they emphatically reject most.

While the early writings include a lighthearted collegiate entertainment and a courtly masque, later work, following his last publicly staged work in 1634, becomes more engaged with the problems of theater. The late masterworks show a continuing interest in performance as theater spaces frame struggles of obedience. Performance dynamics not only influence changes in Milton's use of dramatic form, which becomes increasingly complex, psychological, and conflict-ridden, but also are vital to understanding the development of his scriptural poetics.

The dissertation includes extended analyses of five texts—the Vacation Exercise (1628), the Ludlow Maske (1634), Animadversions (1641), Paradise Lost (1667), and Samson Agonistes (1671)—while touching upon a broad range of texts from throughout Milton's career. It develops a narrative of Milton's engagement with the stage through historical, literary, psychological, social, and theological coordinates.