Paradise Lost Critics Flashcards
Burden (Adam’s weakness)
‘By granting her permission, Adam becomes involved in what happens to her’
Empson (patriarchy)
‘Milton thought that Men aught to control Women but that would make him feel all the more outraged when Eve turns round and blames Adam for having let her go’
David Reid (on the Fall)
‘Error is a lapse of mind and, like nonsense, cannot be understood’
C.S. Lewis (on Eve’s action)
Through giving Adam the fruit, Eve commits ‘murder’
C.S. Lewis (on why Adam ate fruit)
‘Adam fell by uxoriousness’
Milton (purpose of epic poem)
‘To justify the ways of God to man’
John Carey (Satan)
‘Satan is superior in character to Milton’s God’
Tillyard (Adam vs Eve)
‘From first to last Eve takes and keeps the initiative … Adam on the other hand is
unprepared, laborious and on the defensive … And then comes the tragedy. Adam, who Eve
expects to be firm, suddenly weakens’
Fowler (Adam’s failure)
‘In a sense Adam becomes corrupt because he refuses to divorce Eve, because he wants solace at any price’
Christopher Hill (marriage)
‘Milton specifically compared the marriage contract to the political contract between King and people’
Sandra M. Gilbert (Milton)
Milton is the ‘patriarch of patriarchs’
William Blake (Milton)
Milton ‘was of the Devil’s party without knowing it’
Orazino Busino (selfishness)
.Milton argues that all are born selfish, while Webster argues that Catholics are made vain by their religion’
Barbara Lewinski (Satan + Eve)
Satan ‘confronts Eve with a barrage of definition, false syllogisms and rhetorical powers’
Stanley Fish (seduction)
Milton wants us to be seduced + corrupted by Satan, ‘just as our forefathers were’ to show that corruption everywhere
