Milton - Paradise Lost Notes

• John Milton 1608-1674
• Puritan Revolution
• Milton's poetry & prose reflect deep personal convictions, a passion for freedom & self-determination, and the urgent issues & political turbulence of his day.
• Paradise Lost, with its themes of fall, damnation, war in heaven, and future redemption for an erring humanity
• Milton combined the traditional erudition of a Renaissance poet with the committed politics of a puritan radical, both of which contributed to his crowning achievement, Paradise Lost
• The intellectual rebelliousness of his prose works inflects the epic's dramatic embellishment of such problems as the origin of evil, sin, and death
• Paradise Lost reaches humanities psychological depths, arrogance, despair, revenge, self-destruction, desire, and self-knowledge
• Paradise Lost dramatizes human way fairing in the face of full, not unlike Milton's own heroic perseverance in writing his epic after the loss of the world he helped to create.
• Paradise Lost
• Blank verse epic poem
• composed while Milton was completely blind. 1658-1668
• Significant revision published 1674
• first edition - 10 books
• 1674 - 12 books published
• Biblical story of the fall of man: the temptation of Adam & Eve by the fallen angel satan & their expulsion from the Garden of Eden
• Milton's purpose, stated in Book 1, is to "Justify the ways of God to Men."
• First Epic poem ever written in English
• Paradise Lost is about devastating loss attended by redemption
• The reader's knowledge of the fall creates a sense of tragic inevitability
• Satan, no less than Adam & Eve, appears in all the psychological complexity and verbal grandeur of a tragic hero
• Following epic tradition, Milton places this part of the action ("Lucifer, Contriving Adams ruin") at the forefront of this poem beginning
• in media res
• Latin for "into the middle of things"
• Usually describes a narrative that begins not at the beginning of a story, 'but somewhere in the middle - usually at some crucial point in the action.
• So powerful in Milton's opening portrayal of Satan that the Romantic poets thought Satan was the hero of the poem
• Focusing on the first 2 books, the romantic reading sees him as a dynamic rebel.
• From a Renaissance pov, Satan is more like an Elizabethan hero-villain, with his many soliloquies and his tortured psychology of brilliance twisted toward evil.
• Only in Book 9, however, does Milton say, "I now must change these notes to tragic," thereby sign along that he is about to narrate the fall of Adam and Eve
• From this point on, the poem follows Adam & Eve's tragic movement from sin to despair to the recognition of sin & the need for repentance.
• Adam & Eve's learning through suffering & the prophecy of the son's redemption of sins make this a story of gain as well as loss (on the order of Aeschylean tragedy)
• Prior to Aeschylus, tragedy had been dramatically limited dialogue between a chorus & one actor, Aeschylus added an actor, who often took more than one part, allowing for dramatic conflict.
• In the sophisticated theology of his tragedies human transgressions are punished by divine power, and humans learn from this suffering, so that is serves a positive, moral purpose.
• Milton creates his poem as a microcosm of the natural universe
• a representation of something on a much smaller scale
• Ideal vision of the world before the fall **
• One where day and night are equal and the sun is always in the same sign of the zodiac
• An image that embodies in poetic astronomy of the world of simplicity and perfection that humans have lost through sin.
• Does Eve play on Adam's ego?
• Adam and Eve are almost the same persion, almost totally in Sync?
• Adam & Eve's dbate
• She wants to split up to get more work done
• Adam says no. Wants to protect her
• She asks how they can be happy if they are always in fear. Him tempting implicates him, not them. We should each be strong enough to resist alone.
• Adam gets impatient
• Everything's perfect but reason can be deceived.
• They should protect each other
• But if you want to go, go
• Why does she do it?
• Adam puts Eve above God
• Temptation is all based on lies.
• Uriel pointed out the way to Paradise for Satan.
• Satan resents God who gave him so much
• Repent = submission, not changing
• submission for ease, not sincere
• turns fully evil because he won't really repent
• Adam and Eve are the bower before the fall
• Satan is seeing them for the first time
• Submit/Submission
• Satan tempts Eve who is a picture of him?
• Submission a big deal here and in Beowulf
• Contemplation ≠intelligence
• Adam
• Big forehead
• Broad shoulders
• Manly length hair
• Built for contemplation
• & Valour
• Eve
• Long blond hair (golden, radiant)
• Slender waist
• Milton makes her radiant
• Wanton ringlets
• Hair to the waist
• not vein
• Adam will need muscles later
• She yields her submission, he receives it. not forced
• Eve learns to love his manly grace & wisdom
• Wisdom trumps beauty
• She is claiming to have obtained wisdom. 

This is an epic poem on what for Milton is the grandest theme possible: The Fall of humanity and the roll of that fall in God's grand design for his Creation. Milton's language and syntax are thus consciously chosen and fashioned to convey the seriousness of his purpose. That's not to say there isn't a good deal of situational humor, irony, and even punning in Paradise Lost, but first-time readers are sometimes intimidated by the poem's self-conscious formality. Nonetheless, for all its grandeur and complexity, the poem, appears harder to read than it actually is. As you read, be on the lookout for the following, which might give you some initial puzzlement. And as you read, keep in mind two things:

1. No tips sheet is a substitute for what is needed in reading Paradise Lost–or any rich and rewarding work of literature: time and attention.
2. Milton composed his epic after he had become totally blind. He only spoke these lines or sounded them out in his head; he never saw them. Composed orally (and aurally), the poem is meant to be heard. If you're having difficulty with it, read aloud to yourself. Read aloud, READ ALOUD, READ ALOUD. And as you read, follow the cues provided by the punctuation: if there's no pause at the end of a line, keep reading as if there were no line break; if there's a comma, pause briefly; a semi-colon, pause; a period or question mark, stop fully, even in the middle of a line.

Look out for:

• Inverted syntax, especially direct objects preceding subjects and their verbs: "Him the Almighty Power / Hurl'd headlong flaming from th' Ethereal Sky" (I, II. 44-45)
• Elaborate poetic sentences (as in the opening invocation, lines 1-26). There's no trick to reading these; just keep in mind that English requires a sentence to have a subject and verb. Look for these parts of speech, and ask yourself who's doing what and to whom.
• Epic similes and extended metaphors. These are meant to help you visualize what otherwise would remain an abstraction or would be difficult to imagine. The first part of the comparison is often introduced by phrases such as "As when..." or "Just as..."; the second part, with phrases such as "so..." or "just so... See Book I, lines 302-313. Here, the Fallen Angels lying stunned on Hell's lake of fire are compared to fallen leaves floating on a brook, then to sedge drifting on ocean waves, then to the carcasses of Pharaoh's soldiers floating on the Red Sea after the Exodus. Or see Book I, lines 338-346: "As when the potent Rod..." (338) / "So numberless..." (344)
• Allusions to Scripture and Biblical lore, as well as to classical mythology. Make good use of your footnotes.
• Redundant phrasing: Milton frequently repeats an idea or description in different terms to emphasize a desire effect.
• Speech tags: Milton omits question marks, but is careful to indicate who is speaking, and when the speaker has finished, as when Satan first addresses Beezlebub in book I (II. 81-126)
  "To whom th' Arch-Enemy, / And thence in Heav'n call'd Satan, with bold words / Breaking the horrid silence thus began: ..." [Satan then speaks to Beezlebub in lines 84-124]
  "So spake th' Apostate Angel" (l. 125) [Satan has finished speaking.] "And him thus answer'd soon his bold Compeer" (l. 127) [Beezlebub replies to Satan in the lines following, 128-155]
  Keep track of who's speaking when  with marginal notes ("Satan speaks...", "Beezlebub replies..."), and if it helps, you might insert quotation marks around the characters' speeches.
• Dramatic elements: Milton's epic was first conceived as a drama. Try to visualize the dramatic settings and contexts. Keep in mind where the characters are, what they've experienced, and what they want to accomplish.