Free Provide A Hypothesis As To Why Shakespere Would Include Three Sonnets That Are Not Essay Sample

Thesis statement- The story of paradise lost is Milton's attempt to understand the storyof man's creation, his fall, and eventually his expulsion from Eden in light of his understanding of religion, heroism, and love.
In his writing, Milton seeks to conform to the writing standards set by the centuries of poetic traditions. He chose to use the epic genre used by writers such as Dante and Ariosto who were prolific writers of the Renaissance and Medieval eras. In so doing, Milton’s Paradise Lost has the various aspects that constituted the traditional epic themes of war, origin (especially with regard to the interaction between the heavenly and earthly beings), empire, and nationalism. In this way, he inexplicably raised the expectations of his readers by placing himself among the greats of that era. The decision to use the English language rather that the more popular languages such as Latin or Greek go on to show that he ideally sought to glorify England in an attempt to celebrate its culture and in a way influence how the world perceives it as other poets before him had celebrated their native lands in their works.
Unlike other literary works of the time, Paradise Lost does not have an outstanding hero. The various characters that have been portrayed as heroic include Adam, Satan, and the Son of God. In the poem, the Son of God is an important character but then again the story is really not about him. The character that is Adam eventually questions the traditional perception of heroism because unlike other heroes such as Aeneas, Adam is seen to be disobedient which is quite different from the heroic martyrdom that had been expected of epic heroism. This leaves Satan who Milton portrays as having hero like qualities.
Paradise Lost though widely accepted to be of the epic genre, also has elements of lyric poetry, tragedy, and even samples of georgic verses. In his attempt to capture mans’ life in paradise, his relationship with God and his uneventful fall from grace; he employs forms of tragedy such as soliloquy both for its therapeutic and affective effects. He depicts God as an omnipresent divine being that humans can relate to yet still maintains his aura of mystery.
However, this is sometimes seen to be contradictory in how Christianity or religion for that matter depicts God. Milton attempts to make the reader understand that it is in Gods nature to be of sovereignty and justice and wrath yet one who can also interact with humanity as an individual who speaks and whose Son sits on His right hand side.
Of concern to critics and scholars alike is the defensive stance that Milton takes when explaining fall of Adam and Eve in that, though God had the knowledge of their fall He did not avert it. He explains that it was due to their own free will that they disobeyed God, which absolves God of setting them up to fail so to speak.
God created man and gave him free will as He did with the heavenly beings to choose their destiny, their choices however, they had consequences. This makes it seemingly easier to trust Satan’s’ somewhat logical challenge to Gods’ authority due to His complexities.
The understanding of Gods’ nature is thus twofold. On one hand Satan’s’ question over the Son of God’s ascension to power because he also wants a share in the rule of man, the allure of power and the evident doubt on Gods’ authority. Therefore, of his own accord, Satan rebels against God and rejects repentance since it requires submissiveness because he is tempted by power, and thus tries to seduce others to follow his path. This constitutes sin because Gods’ rule and authority are that of a true monarch, they should never be questioned. On the other hand, the reader has a renewal in faith once he realized that Satan’s’ interest are for selfish gain.
In Milton’s view Paradise Lost is the story of Adam choosing Eve over God through the action of eating the apple from the forbidden tree of knowledge. In so doing, he chose love and death over God. Milton’s imagination reveals that human love (in this case Adam’s love for Eve) overcame human obedience to the creator. Adam sins out of love and perhaps lust, while Eve sins in an attempt to match up to Adam’s knowledge. In Milton’s opinion, she was tempted by ignorance and the belief that she would be an equal to Adam’s intellect.
In his writing, the author sticks to the traditional doctrines that a woman must submit to her husband, and any other male authority figure in her life as man submits to God. In his view, the woman is incapable of making the right decision and therefore must rely on the man; she is ignorant by choice, vain and narcissistic, and stubborn. In this regard, she is best suited to be obedient and biddable because ill-suited for learning and of a weak mind. Yet in all her weaknesses, she is the reason for Adam’s undoing. Her beauty and charm is what weakens Adam’s sensibilities to reason and cause him to question why God created her in the first place.
Milton acknowledges that Adam in his solitude got lonely and asked God for a companion. The path from loneliness to devotion to one partner makes for interesting observation on human relationships between a man and woman. He tries to restructure the notion of the nature of marriage to be of friendship and intellectual fulfillment thus shifting from the primary one of procreation. Despite this attempt, he eventually accepts that this alone is not enough to sustain a marriage; desires of the flesh are part and parcel of the human nature.
It is important to note that though Adam finds Eve to blame for their predicament, he does not seek another companion, however, lust negates the pure devotion he once had for her and this is the flaw that has proven most destructive in humanity’s attempt to reconnect with God.
The superiority of man has been cause for offence to feminists in many aspects especially in the matter of redemption. Milton in the book absolves Adam of majority of the blame on sin and places it squarely on Eve yet it does not show if at all she is redeemed of her sin upon repentance. In the last books (chapters), the angel Michael announces the coming of a savior, she is seen to be asleep while Adam is awake to receive this news and is grateful for it. Again it falls upon Adam to relay and interpret this news to her once she awakes, therefore her repentance and submissiveness once she realizes she cannot outwit her husband is not seen to have any impact in both their salvation.
With regard to salvation, the Son of God like previous classical heroes is seen to be both glorious and vulnerable. He is portrayed as a kingly figure with military prowess, goodness, a statesman, Godly as would any classical hero but with a hint of martyrdom in that he is promised to suffer just like the biblical reference to Christ. Milton uses Paradise Lost to show the reader what has been over time considered the new Christian heroism, the story of perseverance in time of great personal struggle for the greater good of all humanity.
In his description of the Son, Milton created cause for concern by referring to His creation as that which occurred in that present time thus inadvertently threatened the Christian perception of the Holy Trinity. Questions as to how the Trinity is three in one are an example of the type of knowledge that man cannot comprehend without God’s grace. The Son of his own accord obeys the Father and the Father finds favor in His Son so much so that the Son sits on the right of His Father.
During his trip to Italy, Milton saw many works of art that stirred his imagination in their interpretation of the story of humanity according to Genesis. The two Medici tapestries, Veronese’s creation of Eve, Masaccio’s The Expulsion, Cranach’s Adam and Eve, and Durer’s The Fall and the widely speculated samples of those renaissance works of art. There is no concrete documentation of the exact pieces he saw but the imagery in the above named works is convincingly and consistently accurate of the examples of the inspiration that steered him to writing Paradise Lost as he so did.
The image that best depicts Milton’s imagination is Durer’s The Fall. The image shows the events of the temptation where Eve was tempted by the devil. Eve is seen as accepting something, more believed to be the forbidden fruit, from the devil. The devil is illustrated as a serpent with human skin, coiled around a tree believed to be the Tree of Knowledge. His tail is very long, flowing down to the roots. The upper body of the devil is human, and he is seen lowering his upper body from the tree as if to hand something down.
Adam, on the other hand, is shown pointing at something on the tree. From the image, it appears as if he is pointing at the devil. Both Adam and Eve are naked, as it is written in the bible, they were the very first human beings to be created by God, and had not yet seen their nakedness before eating the forbidden fruit.
An angel of God is seen in another part of the image with a sword, wearing a robe of sorts and wielding a sword. The sword is pointed at Adam. Adam’s face is seen showing dejection, as is Eve’s. Eve is cowing behind Adam as if to bury her head away in order to hide in shame from the angel. They are illustrated as walking away from the Kingdom of God. They are both still naked, but Eve is seen to be conscious of her nakedness.
The part of the painting where Adam and Eve are walking away appears to be dry as compared to the part where they are yet to partake of the fruit. The grass seems to be greener in the latter than in the former.
This piece of art best captures the imagination in accordance with Milton’s Paradise lost. Satan is depicted as the serpent who seduces Eve with the fruit from the tree of knowledge with the promise of having knowledge and understanding that Adam possesses.
Eve makes the decision to eat the fruit out of her free will through the Devils false promises. Again, this is in line with the theme in Paradise Lost of the fall from grace out of man’s free will and Satan’s use of deception to pull man further away from the grace of God. Satan who refused to repent and submit to God without questioning His authority continues to deceive and seduce man to date as he did with the fallen angels as depicted in the battle between Heaven and Hell. Angel Michael is seen to try to explain to Adam in a way that he will understand what caused the division of the angels into the Devil’s and God’s angels.
In the book, angel Raphael tries to help Adam understand that not all knowledge contributes to the understanding of God and one’s self. In the painting, Eve’s greed to have the same level of knowledge as Adam clouds her judgment and thus she ignores the consequences of her actions. Despite realizing the error she has made, she still invites Adam to partake of the fruit. Adam is blinded by his devotion to Eve and chooses to eat the fruit, and in a way he ignores God’s warning against it. This action highlights Milton’s understanding of the human relations of marriage and friendship based on the need for companionship that overpowers his devotion to God.