Lecture Literary criticism - Lecture 9: Paradise lost

Milton composed his early verse in Latin,in the fashion of a classically educated person. In 3rd year at Cambridge he expresses his desire to abandon such fashionable poetry in order to write in his native language. Like Homer & Virgil before him.Milton would be the epic poet of the English national.

PARADISE LOST

• Milton composed his early verse in Latin,in the fashion of a classically educated person

• In 3rd year at Cambridge he expresses his desire to abandon such fashionable poetry in order to write in his native language

• Like Homer & Virgil before him.Milton would be the epic poet of the English national

• The poet vacation to which Milton was heir is both nationalistic and

religious in character

• He plays the role of poet-historian as he chronicled the religious history

of a people

• A sense of religiosity and patriotism drive Milton’s work

• On the one hand he felt he could best serve God by following his

vacation as a poet His poetry would on the other hand served England

by putting before it noble and religious ideas in the highest poetic form

• In other words Milton sought to write poetry which,if not directly or

overtly didactic,would serve to teach delightfully

• The body of work emerging from these twin impulses-witnesses his development as a Christian poet and a national bard

• Finally it is in Paradise lost that Milton harmonizes his two voices as a poet and became the Christian singer,as it were of epic English poem

• In Paradise Lost Milton was not only justifying God’s ways to humans in general;he was justifying his ways to the English people between 1640-1660

• He was telling them why they had failed to establish the good society

by deposing the king and why they had welcomed back the monarchy

• Like Adam and Eve,they had failed through their own weakness,their own lack of faith,their own passions and greed,their own sin

• God was not to blamed for humanity’s expulsion from Eden nor was He

to blame the trials and corruptions that befell England during the time of common wealth under Olives Cromwell

• Paradise Lost was more than a work of art.Indeed it was a moral and political treatise,a poetic explanation for the course that English history had taken

• Milton began Paradise lost in 1658 and finished in 1667.

• He was blind during much of it

• Milton claimed to have dreamed much of Paradise Lost through the night time agency of angelic muses

• Besides lending itself to mythologization,his blindness accounts for at least one troubling aspect of the poem;its occasional inconsistencies of plot

• Because he could not read the poem himself he has to remember what

he had written so his memory some times prove faulty

• Milton’s speaker begins “Paradise Lost” by starting that his subject will

be Adam and Eve’s disobedience and fall from Grace.he invokes a

heavenly muse and asks for help in relating his ambitious story and God’s plan for mankind

• The action begins with Satan and his fellow rebel angels who are found chained to a lake of fire in hell.they quickly free themselves and fly to land,where they found minerals and constructed “Pandemonium” which would be their meting place

• Inside the Pandemonium the rebel angels who are now devils debate whether they should begin another war with God.Beelzebub suggests that they attempt to corrupt God’s new creation

• As He prepares to leave Hell,he is met at the gates by his children Sin and Death who follow him and build a bridge between Hell and earth

• In heaven God orders the angels together for a council of their own.He tells them of Satan’s plans.The son volunteers to sacrifice himself for the sake of mankind

• Satan travels through night and chaos and finds Earth.He disguises

himself as a “cherub” to get past Uriel.He tells Uriel that He wishes to

see and praise God’s creation

• He lands on the Earth and seeing the splendor of paradise brings him pain rather than pleasure

• He reaffirms his decision to make evil his good and continue to commit crime against God

• He leaps over the wall and take the form of a bird and perched itself on the top of tree of life

• Uriel had doubts so he warned the other angels that there is an

imposter among them

FIRST TEMPTATION

• Meanwhile Adam & Eve tend the garden all the while obeying God and not eating from the tree of knowledge.After a long day of work they

came back and rest when Satan took form of a toad and whispered in Eve’s ear.Angel Gabriel sent there to guard recognizes satan and

ordered him to leave satan gets ready to fight but is scared away.God then sent angel Rapheal to teach Adam & Eve of the dangers they face with satan

RAPHEAL’S MEETING WITH ADAM & EVE

• Rapheal arrives on Earth and eats a meal with Adam and Eve.He told them the story of Satan

• Adam asked for the story of creation then he asked about the

movements of planets

• Rapheal warned him against his seemingly unquenchable search of knowledge

• Adam tells Rapheal about his first memories and also confessed the intense physical attraction to Eve

RETURN OF SATAN

• 8 days later he returned and this time he took the form of a serpent.He found Eve alone and complimented her.She was surprised to find an animal who could speak

• Satan told her that this was because he ate from the tree of

knowledge.He said that God actually wanted them to eat from the tree and this is but a test of their courage

• She ate the fruit and immediately was distraught and searches for

Adam who on finding out that Eve has fallen decided to eat the fruit so that he could fall with her rather than losing her completely

• After eating the fruit he looks at Eve in a new way and they turn to lust.

• God immediately learns of their disobedience and sends the sin to punish them but with justice and mercy

• The serpent is punished first.

• Adam’s punishment.

• Eve’s punishment.

SATAN CELEBRATES TOO SOON

• Satan reaches hell where they all celebrate as they think that they have defeated God

• Shortly thereafter the devils unwillingly turned into snakes and try to reach fruit from imaginary trees that shrivel and turn to dust as they

reach them

ADAM & EVE REPENTS

• At first they blamed each other and Eve contemplated to take her life.

• Adam moved by her speech forbids her from doing so

• They decided the best way to enact revenge over satan is to stay obedient to God

• Together they pray to God and repent.

ADAM & EVE FORGIVEN

• God hear their prayers and they are forgiven but they must leave the paradise

• Adam is then given a glimpse of what follows.

• They leave the paradise.

THEMES , MOTIFS & SYMBOLS

• The importance of obedience to God.

• The Hierarchical nature of universe

• The fall as partly fortunate

• Light and dark

• The geography of the universe

• Scales in the sky.

• Adam Wreath.