+1 862 207 3288
The tragic predicament of Paradise Lost, then, is not Adam’s fall, though his fall is lamentable. The real tragic predicament of Milton’s masterful poem is that all of the characters are frustrated from not achieving true connection with one another, and the distance between them, which they are constantly attempting to bridge, grows wider and wider because of their desperate, misguided efforts. Satan wants to reconnect with God, but is driven farther away from Him because he cannot understand the concept of a wrathful God. Adam wants to connect with Eve, but does so impulsively and childishly, rather than in a mature assertion of his beliefs and the commitment to act responsibly. God wants to connect with all of the characters, but His need to preserve the greater order of society requires him to sacrifice the quality of individual relationships when His divine law is disobeyed. Although [the critic] offers a compelling reading of Paradise Lost, his analysis is revealed to lack the depth that a work of this scope merits. Adam’s fall is not simply the result of a decision between being obedient to God and choosing to love Eve. His fall is not even the most important action that occurs in the text. Rather, it is the complex negotiation of relationships among all of the characters and their failure to ever achieve connection that signify the most important elements of a poem that has endured for almost four centuries (Smith, Nicole. “Paradise Lost by John Milton: A Critical Reading of Adam’s Fall.” Articlemyriad. Dec 7, 2011. Jan 10, 2012. Web).
Focus for Essay #4: Select a relationship in “Paradise Lost.” Compose a Causal Argument, which shows the links in the causal chain of the relationship, establishing why the relationship is problematic and the causes and consequences which lead to the deterioration of that relationship. Use the Definitional claim-type to define “relationship,” primarily, but feel free to go further with definitional terms.
Sample topic focus: The Causes/Consequences of “true love”
[The critic] contends that by choosing to eat from the tree of knowledge, Adam struggles with his conscience because the decision forces him to choose between his loyalty to Eve and his loyalty to God, or, as the critic states, between “obedience to God and love of Eve—a choice between two such goods as are beyond easy conception” (n.p.). Is this really the choice that Adam was allegedly forced to make? Why does the critic conceptualize, as facilely as Adam does, that the act of transgression is an act of love? Even Eve realizes how hollow this argument is. The critic avoids addressing Adam’s process of deliberation, as related to the reader by the narrator in Book 8, but Eve tackles the subject head on. Again, Adam’s shallowness of character is revealed. Having chosen, of his own free will, to eat from the tree of knowledge in “Paradise Lost”, Adam becomes frightened and immediately shifts responsibility to Eve and accuses her of not being worthy of his actions. Eve questions why Adam, as the “head” (Book 8, l. 1155) of the couple, did not “command me absolutely not to go [to the tree]” (Book 8, l. 1156). Eve goes on to accuse Adam of being spineless; he was not “firm and fix’d in thy dissent” (Book 8, l. 1160). Adam responds with a characteristic childishness, asking “Is this the love, is this the recompense/Of mine to thee, ingrateful Eve…?” (Book 8, ll. 1162-1163). Both Adam and the critic fail to acknowledge that an immature decision to engage in an act that one knows is wrong is not true love; it is, quite simply, poor judgment and even poorer decision making (Smith, Nicole. “Paradise Lost by John Milton: A Critical Reading of Adam’s Fall.” Articlemyriad. 7 Dec. 2011. Web. 10 Jan. 2012).
TAKE ADVANTAGE OF OUR PROMOTIONAL DISCOUNT DISPLAYED ON THE WEBSITE AND GET A DISCOUNT FOR YOUR PAPER NOW!
