Summary
Fuseli was introduced to the poetry of John Milton (1608-74) during his student days in Zürich with the Swiss scholar Jacob Bodmer. Paradise Lost held a special appeal for him, and other Romantic
artists, in that it explores the realms of the imagination, dreams and the supernatural.
The picture illustrates a moment in Milton's poem where he compares the fallen angels in the Hall of Pandemonium in Hell to the fairies who bewitch a passing peasant with the sound of their music and dancing:
fairy elves,
Whose midnight revels by a forest side
Or fountain some belated peasant sees,
Or dreams he sees, while over head the moon
Sits arbitress, and nearer to the earth
Wheels her pale course, they on their mirth and dance
Intent, with jocund music charm his ear;
At once with joy and fear his heart rebounds… (read more)
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