PARADISE LOST

ASSIGNMENT

John Milton (9 December 1608 – 8 November 1674) was an English poet,

polemicist, man of letters, and civil servant for the Commonwealth of England

under its Council of State and later under Oliver Cromwell. He wrote at a time of

religious flux and political upheaval, and is best known for his epic poem Paradise

Lost (1667), written in blank verse. William Hayley's 1796 biography called him

the "greatest English author" and he remains generally regarded "as one of the

preeminent writers in the English language", though critical reception has

oscillated in the centuries since his death (often on account of his republicanism).

Samuel Johnson praised Paradise Lost as "a poem which...with respect to design

may claim the first place, and with respect to performance, the second, among the

productions of the human mind", though he (a Tory and recipient of royal

patronage) described Milton's politics as those of an "acrimonious and surly

republican". Poets such as William Blake, William Wordsworth and Thomas

Hardy revered him.

Milton. The first version of the same was published in 1667, consisted of ten books

and over a thousand lines of verse. A second edition followed in 1674 that

consisted of twelve books with minor revisions throughout and a note of

versification. According to the critics, it is one of the major works done by Milton

and has helped solidify his reputation as one of the greatest poets of his time.

Paradise Lost dramatizes a series of more or less mistaken interpretations of God

in order to claim a terrific prerogative for poetry as the only human endeavor

pitched high enough to be adequate to the God the poem imagines. The book,

Paradise Lost, because axioms of philosophy are not axioms until they were

proved upon the pulse, and most readers on both sides of this vexed issue have had

to go elsewhere even for the terms of an argument about God’s justifiability.

The readers of Paradise Lost are usually surprised to see the fact that there is

literally little or no mention of Satan in the book, only a talking snake. In job, he is

a sneaky member of Heavenly Court, in the Gospels he is the opponent of Jesus in

the wilderness and in the Revelation he appears as a great dragon to fight a cosmic

battle with angel Michael. Satan dominates the first two books of the series and in

his splendid antithesis he proclaims an early speech is one of the best spoken lines

in English history.

“Better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heav’n”

In the opening description of Satan’s fall and punishment, the narrator’s comments

are not neutral; he points to Satan’s ‘envy revenge’ (I.35), ‘his ambitious aim’

(I.41) to equal God. God is just while Satan is “impious”. Satan evokes many

readers’ sympathy, both because of what he says himself and what the narrator,

perhaps not intentionally, reveals about him. We are told he is capable of love and

jealousy, despair and remorse. Working against this complete condemnation of

Satan, however, are lines which draw our sympathy:

“for now the thought

Both of lost happiness and lasting pain

Torments him”

(Paradise Lost, I.54)

Satan is shown as a much more attractive figure than God, and for some even a

heroic figure. In Satan’s resentment of ‘Tyranny’, the reader is easily carried away

in admiration. The Satan that sticks throughout the text of the reader is the figure

who drives the poem into motion through his reaction of finding himself in Hell

that God has made for him and his fellow angels; who embodies the classical epic

and so calls it question who rebels against what he regards as tyranny and fights a

heroic war. Everything Satan says is superficially convincing but subtly “off”,
corrupted. The Father of lies persuades us that God was in fear for his empire and

his throne ‘shook’; but for now Satan’s rhetoric is extremely effective.

It is especially those speeches to his fellow devils, and later to himself, in the first

quarter of the poem that makes Satan such a compelling character. As in

Shakespeare’s tragedies with a villain as the hero (Macbeth), we meet and get

close to him early. We are told that in Hell, Satan and his crew “Lay vanquished,

rolling in the fiery gulf” (I.52). nine days after his fall from heaven, we quickly get

into his thoughts and then his perceptions:

“for now the thought…

The dismal situation waste and wild”

(Paradise Lost, I.54-60)

The light in hell or the lack of it, also reinforces through the allusion Milton’s

challenge to the whole epic tradition from which he draws the heroic aspect of

Satan’s character. Percy Shelley sees Satan as a forerunner of his own explicitly

revolutionary hero Prometheus, and it’s hard to quarrel with him that even for

Milton, Satan was on the side which saw itself as resisting oppression. To the

devils, Satan is Biblical “tower of strength”; also their king, “whose towering and

steadfast height” is an image of his “royal dignity”; but to the reader he is like that

Tower of Babel, so frequently mentioned in this and other books of poem, famous
for its collapse. At the review, Satan’s face is seen for the first time. it’s “doubtful

hue” reflects the devils’ own hopes and fears; and afterwards, when he speaks to

them.

Milton places the whirlpools and volcanoes, in his imagery, keeping Satan himself

a little vague but realistic and intensely human; he turns even astronomical similes

to pathos, so that Satan is more interesting than any merely horrid Pluto.

The “Signs of remorse and passion’ are not for himself, but the troops. These are

the tears of a trusted general, a popular monarch, drawn out by his subordinates’

affection and faith in him. Satan at this point becomes an entirely sympathetic

character, as his strength and courage could alone never make him for any reader

but a young school boy.

The devils build Pandemonium; and this temple, another traditional feature of Hell,

is the final example in Book I of the devils’ pitiable attempts to better themselves.

We may consider it here as an introduction to the portrayal of the devils, for the

topography of the Hell is designed chiefly to suggest the nature of its inhabitants.

The labor involved in building Pandemonium is itself ludicrous: so cleaver, so

human, so industrious- the devils appear as intelligent apes. Thus in the features of

Hell we have a number of indications that the devils, if not Satan himself are
characters to be greeted with derision, even pity. They are not described directly at

all and in this way they differ from Satan and the peers.

In conclusion, even though Milton tried to attract the readers by making them

sympathize for Satan and depicting him as the hero of the book. But still there are

contrasting views on Satan’s heroism, yet he portrayed a tragic hero in the text.

The fixed mind and refusal to repent make him seem like a hero in the epic scene.

The character of Satan has been compared to Milton by many critics, for even

Milton didn’t favour supremacy, therefore Satan is considered as a hero of

Paradise Lost by many.

BIBLOGRAPHY:
PARADISE LOST

ASSIGNMENT

SUBMITTED BY:

RUPAL ARORA

BA (H) ENGLISH, II YEAR

1404