SOURCE: Hiemstra, Anne. “Reconstructing Milton's Satan: Meredith's ‘Lucifer in Starlight.’” Victorian Poetry 30, no. 3 (summer 1992): 123-33.

In the following essay, Hiemstra regards “Lucifer in Starlight” as an adaptation of John Milton's Paradise Lost with nineteenth-century sensibilities and concerns, tracing significant parallels between the poems.

“lucifer in Starlight”

On a starred night Prince Lucifer uprose. Tired of his dark dominion swung the fiend Above the rolling ball in cloud part screened, Where sinners hugged their spectre of repose. Poor prey to his hot fit of pride were those. And now upon his western wing he leaned, Now his huge bulk o'er Afric's sands careened, Now the black planet shadowed Arctic snows. Soaring through wider zones that pricked his scars With memory of the old revolt from Awe, He reached a middle height, and at the stars, Which are the brain of heaven, he looked, and sank. Around the ancient track...