Paradise Lost Criticism

Karen Edwards, on heroes

“it is the nature of heroic activity that Milton is interested in”; “heroism is making the right decisions“

Karen Edwards, on women

“Milton is neither a misogynist nor a modern feminist […] the Bible gives a mixed message on the status of women”

Karen Edwards, on Eve’s role

Certain critics accuse Eve of being a “murderer”, but “are we sure that Eve really knows what death is?”

Karen Edwards, on the fruit

The actual consumption of the fruit is a “formality” - it is the prior decision to transgress that catalyses the Fall

Millicent Bell

“The mind cannot accept the fact that perfection was capable of corruption without denying the absoluteness of perfection”

Roberta Klimt, on Satan

“Satan can be read as a republican hero; God, infallible and omnibenevolent, a tyrannical monarch.”

Roberta Klimt, on Milton

Milton “requires his reader to make constant and careful judgements about a story we already think we know”

He “wants readers to struggle precisely so we can sharpen our critical faculties”

Hazlitt

Milton “did not scruple to give the devil his due”

William Blake

Milton was a “true poet and of the Devil’s party without knowing it”

Miller

“Adam attacks Eve for all the weaknesses of women chronicled in antifeminist tracts”

J. Martin Evans

“Her failure was primarily intellectual. His was moral.”

Karen Edwards, on hierarchy

“Satan is hugely worried about hierarchy and status” - hierarchical imagery and motifs in Paradise Lost are often tied to satanic/sinful outlooks

Orgel and Goldberg, on free will

“Adam and Eve are not in possession of enough information or experience to enable them to make a free choice”

Orgel