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    Paradise Lost
    Paradise Lost
    Paradise Lost
    Ebook378 pages4 hours

    Paradise Lost

    By John Milton

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    Following both the adventures of Satan and the lives of Adam and Eve, this telling of key biblical stories is split into multiple books to form an epic poem. Beginning with Satan's promise to corrupt God's Earth, Milton tells the tale of how Satan entered the Garden of Eden and filled Adam and Eve's angelic existence with sin. Written in blank verse, this seventeenth-century English poem solidified Milton's reputation as one of the greatest poets of his time.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherDreamscape Media
    Release dateNov 13, 2018
    ISBN9781974997930
    Author

    John Milton

    John Milton (1608-1657) was an English poet and intellectual. Milton worked as a civil servant for the Commonwealth of England and wrote during a time of religious change and political upheaval. Having written works of great importance and having made strong political decisions, Milton was of influence both during his life and after his death. He was an innovator of language, as he would often introduce Latin words to the English canon, and used his linguistic knowledge to produce propaganda and censorship for the English Republic’s foreign correspondence. Milton is now regarded as one of the best writers of the English language, exuding unparalleled intellect and talent.

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    Reviews for Paradise Lost

    4/5

    1,749 ratings39 reviews

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    • 5/5
      Milton cria um diabo carismático e persuasivo, que clama: "Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven".
    • 4/5
      We had read selections of this book in my AP Lit class in high school, but as always, selections don't tell the whole story. I love reading religious literature, and this being one of the most famous epic poems in that genre, I quite enjoyed it. As an interesting aside, I did, however, find Lucifer/Satan to be far more sympathetic than he comes across in the Bible. I don't know if this was intentional on Milton's part, or simply something that was a result of describing his motivations.
    • 5/5
      There's all this debate over why Satan is so appealing in Paradise Lost. Did Milton screw up? Is he being cynical, or a double-secret atheist? And why is God such a dick?

      No one ever asks that about Iago, though, to whom I think Milton's Satan owes a debt. No one asks whether Shakespeare screwed up in making Iago so much fun; they just give him credit for, y'know, writing an awesome villain. And that's all Milton's doing. Satan is tempting for us because Satan is tempting for us. That's the point of Satan! If Milton didn't make him as appealing as possible, he'd be doing Satan a disservice. And Eve, for that matter.

      Similarly, God's a dick because God's a dick. You've read the Old Testament. He's not exactly all flowers and hugs there either. Again, Milton's just being true to his characters, and writing a great story while he's at it.

      There’s slightly more to it than that, yeah. For example: it's hinted, albeit obtusely, that God sets Satan up to fall. He gives a stern warning that anyone who disobeys him or his son will be cast out of Heaven. But since there's no sin or evil at the time of his speech, why give the warning? Isn't that like saying "Don't touch these cookies while I'm gone" to a kid who didn't realize there were cookies until you pointed them out? I get why people spend their entire careers arguing over this thing.

      Here’s my advice to people considering reading Paradise Lost: read the first two books. It starts with a bang, and it’s pretty amazing for a while. It slows down a bit in books III - VII, so if you’re not totally sold in the first two books (I was), you can either quit altogether with a fair idea of what Milton sounds like, or skip to books IX and X. IX is the actual temptation and fall (especially fun if you’re a misogynist), and X is an astonishing sequence where Adam and Eve contemplate suicide:

      "Why am I mocked with death, and lengthened out
      To deathless pain? How gladly would I meet
      Mortality my sentence...
      his dreadful voice no more
      Would thunder in my ears." (Adam, X.774 - 780)

      “We’ve totally mucked this up, and our kids are gonna justifiably hate us because we got kicked out of Paradise, and maybe we should just quit while we’re behind.”

      But really, the whole thing is worth it. Took me a while – it’s intense stuff, so I found that I had to read a book and then chew on it for a while to process it before moving to the next one – but it’s cool.

      In book VIII, if you’re cosmologically minded, Milton lays out the whole universe. Like Giordano Bruno, he understands that our earth is a tiny speck in the universe, and he gets that all the stars are suns like ours, and therefore could have planets like ours around them. He also thinks they might be inhabited; our species might not be God's only experiment. Elsewhere, other Adams and Eves may have faced the same test of the Tree of Knowledge - and they might have passed it. Isn't that an amazing thought?

      In books XI and XII, Michael tells Adam sortof all the rest of the stories in the Old Testament, which of course boil down to:

      “So shall the world go on,
      To good malignant, to bad men benign,
      Under her own weight groaning.” (XII 537 – 539)

      That’s your fault there, Adam. Nice work.

      He rushes through them though, and it makes me wonder whether Milton had originally intended to retell the entire Old Testament but got bored or intimidated or something. That would’ve been remarkable. Certainly Paradise Lost is better literature than the Old Testament is, and significantly more coherent.

      It’s also better literature than almost everything else. It’s pretty awesome. Probably the second-best poem by a blind guy ever. I give it two thumbs up.
    • 5/5
      I originally read this in response to finishing The Golden Compass series. Pullman spoke about Paradise Lost as one of the main inspirations for some of his thinking. Though I did study literature, I never had any intention of reading this work. I am so glad that I did. There are lines in there that move the heart and mind of course, the imagery gave me bad dreams, and it the experience is something that I will keep forever.Talk about closure, the last lines gave me so much hope and made me feel electric.
    • 4/5
      Milton wrote a great poem but it's also a byproduct of its day - 1667 - and he views events and characters very much through the male gaze; as do all organized religions and which the poem references. Thus, the apple on the tree of knowledge was (imo) something a religious-minded white Portuguese male would regard as sinful. As it stands, the sin no longer applies. It is 2005, eating the apple amounts to doing just that; eating an apple. Unless you have the apple representing something else, i.e., update the sin attached to it. What if it the apple was meant to test the consequence of giving Adam and Eve free will? See what they'd do with it? It's almost as if Satan was allowed to escape hell because it was part of God's bigger plan. Of course - so that man could LOVE God of his own free will. Even the simple act of eating does of course symbolise our interactivity, our symbiosis, with nature - that in itself bears a responsibility. So, the apple was an interface in a way between mankind abnegating responsibility to God's will and being participatory in it instead. That's Evolution! Moral certainty of sin/grace evolved too - quite rightly into today's concept of contingency and context.In my book Milton is the main man, the Yeats of his day, but with a much less comedic outcome and overall strike rate of gags. Cromwell’s PR man and a life spiralling out of control, the linguistic mouthpiece for himself first and discovered deeper than anyone sane person would hope to emulate or seriously hope to outlive as a narrative of reality the fates allotted exquisitely and which has long been understood in the brythonic tradition, that each life is unique and a poem in itself. Milton went blind, the cruelest fate but one which propelled him to the highest ridge of poetic attainment, forged in the turbulent bloodletting in which his first robust roar for himself first as the poet of a revolution; like Mayakovsky, fate put him in a certain space and time and he surrendered to the powerful spiritual combination of his intellect and passion, and it is befitting, though entirely tragic, that the first seriously poetic cornerstone figure whose gravitas came from the real life antics his person was part and often a central linguistic force affecting not to mirror as the Luna light of William Shakespeare did in far less personally turbulent times when he struck the primary metrical coinage of modern English bardic lore; but acting as the show and pazzaz, the me, me, me of being needy, very clever, broke the mould and everyone since conspires to make the best of a poor do with this chap, who let's face it, we read far less of than beyond a few verses before switching off, knowing we are being offered caviar, but preferring instead the real staple of British poetic. Rustics we are, as well as morons clotted whimsies, we indulge in because intellectually, we are all “me arse”, and as Graves said, admitting Milton is the British genius, should not blind us to the basic error which is the very grain, grease and premise of poetry, the binary opposite set of circumstance and premise which create the journey and object of linguistic artifice we call poetry.And Milton discovered it at a terrible cost of a new national poetic born in less than charitable times, a most intellectually fascinating, but less natural than Shakespeare; he’s a great source of refuge for the fire and brimstone mobs; one can imagine his frenzies fed to direct action, like Cromwell, possessed by a warp spasm of uncontrollable madness when the Muse was in full flight, inventing the terrors only too, too real, and so Milton is extremely strong proof, best for whipping one's rabble into shape with him and Cromwell, two very divisive national martyrs who have a high regard domestically but globally are seen as fundamentally flawed perhaps; life's too short for taking on Milton in one mad binge, and really one needs next to none of him, as he cannot be cooked up to offer us anything other than mad loathing and foaming, a terrible wisdom bought at horrific cost, and after him the artificial decorum of the new bores in the coffee shops which exploded in 18th Century London, where Horribles got together and bitched, the blind leading the suicidal bad vibe, which I think it is fair to say, is essentially, supremely competitive.Please adopt me as your protégé Milton; I want to carry the rumens' flame to the next generation of young poets seeking to set out into the treacherous straits of amateur verse, just how to set about switching over to be a pro, to attain that gravitas only our most ennobling examples of savvy exotica we concoct in the thoroughly unpleasant and incredibly jealous septic tank heritage Milton and various other chaps had no fun inventing.NB: My wife and I once saw a dramatisation of “Paradise Lost”. In the first, before the Fall scenes, Adam and Eve were completely naked in the Garden of Eden and, no doubt as a result of their cuddling, Adam soon got rather a splendid but no doubt unwanted, erection. This distraction was, as I pointed out to my wife, sadly appropriate since the early Christian church maintained that before the Fall, Adam was able to control his penis at will. This postlapsarian actor, of course, could not.
    • 4/5
       This was somewhat slow going, but worth the effort to persevere with it. I had the oxford Classics verison, which phas an essay at the beginning to put the poem into context, which was helpful. it also had footnotes for references in the text to classical legends and diffiocult worrds or phrasings, which was very useful!

      The text concerns the biblical acocunt of creaction and the expulsion of Adam & Eve from paradise - hence the title. Regardless of if you believe, it makes for a really good read, but takes a little effort to get into it each time. The text has a hypnotic flow and rhythm to it. Tthe language is sometimes a little obscure, but not excessively so, it isn't like every line requires serious explanation. There are also a large number of legends worked into the text, all building this into a complex mass of intertwined threads, rather than a straightforward retelling of the same story. It is also one of those works that you realise has been referenced in other books you've read - the number of times I found myself thinking "I've read something like that before" and realising that it was a reference to Milton that I'd not known at the time. It was excellent, but I'm going for something a little lighter next time!
    • 4/5
      I'd be lying if I said I understood and enjoyed every word of Paradise Lost, but there's no getting around the fact that it's beautiful and terrifying and provoking. It's definitely a book that requires many rereadings.
    • 5/5
      I read this many years ago and thought that it was actually a very fascinating read compared to other literature of its day. I loved the style and language in which it was written, and I think that makes me enjoy it all the more. I am sure that I will read it again very soon.
    • 5/5
      As this was my first epic read, I cannot profess to be well-trained as to the vastness of other works, but the beauty of this work lies in its broad overview of Scripture, character, and life. Not merely striking the main points of Eden, as I was expecting, but surveying large portions of history. It felt huge without being overly laborious to read.The wording was not nearly as stilted as I was lead to believe it would be, though at times the footnotes were indispensable--I am still rather ignorant of many of his references.A wonderful work that I hope to reread in time.
    • 4/5
      I expected to have more trouble reading Milton's Paradise Lost than I actually did, mostly because it's written in blank verse. As a matter of fact, that didn't matter much. It flows wonderfully and it's great to read aloud. The rhythms and the way the words were strung together were just lovely -- my synaesthesia just pretty much regarded it as a feast! I also enjoyed the classical sort of structure, which reminded me of the Aeneid.

      I didn't so much enjoy the characterisation of Eve or the angels, and it doesn't fit with my view of Christianity, but that didn't keep from enjoying reading it.
    • 5/5
      This was very powerful. I am not the most religious person in the world, but I found the subject matter intensely interesting. The poetic beauty of Milton words captivated me throughout the course of the work. Sadly, I tried "Paradise Regained" but I did not get far into the read before I became disinterested. I guess we are fascinated more by evil than goodness. Sad. I may retry "Paradise Regained" but I fail to see how it can be as moving as "Paradise Lost."
    • 5/5
      Certainly one of the best poems ever written in English!
    • 4/5
      861 Paradise Lost, by John Milton (read 24 Jul 1966) I read this in full and felt it was good to have read it. From it I extracted one of my favorite sayings: "The mind is its own place, and in itselfCan make a Heav'n of Hell, a Hell of Heav'n." This is in Book I, line 253.
    • 4/5
      Formidabel kosmisch epos, met vooral in de eerste helft grote scheppende kracht, maar daarna “verworden” tot een uitgebreide navertelling van Genesis. Nochtans zijn de delen over het scheppingverhaal en de menselijke zondeval (vooral de interactie tussen Adam en Eva is meest poëtisch). Weinig actie, behalve in de strijdtaferelen, de tweede helft is vooral verhalend
    • 5/5
      This one definitely makes the short list of must reads. It's great poetry and I enjoyed the effect of its having originally been in English. It's also a great interpretation of the creation story; I observed a number of new ideas as well as some that I myself have posited and refuted. More than anything else I've read, Milton does a superb job of bringing out the essence of the situation, the passions that were felt, and the reason for each event.
    • 4/5
      We had read selections of this book in my AP Lit class in high school, but as always, selections don't tell the whole story. I love reading religious literature, and this being one of the most famous epic poems in that genre, I quite enjoyed it. As an interesting aside, I did, however, find Lucifer/Satan to be far more sympathetic than he comes across in the Bible. I don't know if this was intentional on Milton's part, or simply something that was a result of describing his motivations.
    • 4/5
      I had dreaded taking a class on this but ended up absolutely loving the text. I didn't like my professor and his ideas so much, but found that the text stands on its own as excellent literature, which is something I can't say for Shakespeare.
    • 5/5
      This epic poem is stunning; a magnificent read all the way. I loved it.
    • 5/5
      Quite a read for a poet! My first journey with an epic poem in its entirety, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Too many lines of good verses to name--phrases that inspired me for their deft command of language--and a great amount of passages that left me feeling triumphant. One of the simplest lines I liked the most, spoken to the Son: "Two days are therefore pass'd, the third is thine"; and a favorite passage, sung to the Creator: "Who seeks To lessen thee, against his purpose serves To manifest the more thy might: his evil Thou usest, and from thence creat'st more good."I was impressed with what creativity the characters' experiences and emotions were developed. Story-wise, my favorite character is the Son, the unmatched warrior amid all the hosts of heaven who compassionately serves as intercessor for fallen humankind. This classic presents a challenge to me, both as a poet and as a novelist.
    • 5/5
      Don't care if it's blasphemy, Satan is awesome!!! He becomes a character that drives a much needed retelling of Genesis. Milton knew how to use his character and his words to create a book that was one of only two that would usually be found in anyone's house during the 18th and 19th century.
    • 4/5
      Okay, I only read part of it, and it was for college. It was incredibly well written and entertaining. My only issue is the complete lack of biblical credibility. It's LOOSELY based on the three little chapters that it covers in the Bible and takes A LOT of artistic license. In doing so, it tells a few outright lies.

      I take comfort in that I doubt anyone takes their biblical knowledge from it.
    • 5/5
      Read many years ago, but still amazes at every re-perusal. Shows that even for a person of Milton's erudition, devotion and great idealism Adam, Eve, and Satan are easier to portray than God. But his ardent and humble invocations of the divine Spirit did not , in my opinion, go completely unanswered!
    • 4/5
      I have been wanting/intending to read this for a long time. I don't think I was ever required to read it in school other than maybe some small excerpts. I've always enjoyed epic poetry like this and found Milton's imagery and language exceptional. On the down side, I was struck by his negative portrayal of Eve (Adam, of course, was pure as the driven snow until he ate the apple just to please her) and her exclusion from many of the scenes highlighted Milton's patriarchal bias.Aesthetically, this edition by the Folio Society is awesome. Blake's illustrations are magnificent and the layout and design of the edition is impressive. The choice of font and it's size makes it much easier for me to read then when I attempt to read a long poem like this stuffed into small print.
    • 3/5
      A 17th century epic of the Genesis account with references to classical mythology throughout. From the beginning formations of the earth to the design of paradise to the creation of Adam and Eve to the Fall. The idea behind the verse is that paradise is lost but hope still remains through Christ who will save the offspring of our first parents who sinned. Adam is shown a vision when his hope is diminished that encompasses all of humanity from Noah to Abraham to Joseph of Egypt to David and up through Christ’s birth and death. The world is corrupt but there is hope for all in the end. Very difficult but interesting to read; there are notes to help through all the references to the mythology and other passages that we today are unfamiliar with.
    • 4/5
      I never would have picked this up on my own, but reading it for class gave me a real appreciation for all the effort Milton put in to composing this piece. It was fun to try to reconcile my own beliefs with what Milton puts forth as the narrative of the Fall(s), and after a while, I think I actually enjoyed reading it. Maybe. Or I just got used to it, at least.
    • 4/5
      I don't think anyone would say that Milton is an easy read, but it is worthwhile. The prose of Paradise Lost is some of the most beautiful in the English language.
    • 4/5
      Another one of those freshman English assigments I cribbed my way through. When I reread it finally as an adult I was astonished. I returned to it because of Mike Carey's Lucifer and Steven Brust's To Reign in Hell, contemporary fantasy on the same themes. And I was surprised and delighted to find depth of character and excitement in a Stuffy Old Classic.
    • 3/5
      I wasn't exactly sure what I was getting myself into, but this telling of the creation and the expulsion of Adam and Eve from Paradise was entertaining even though the writing was a bit different from what I am used to.I found it amusing that according to Milton Sin and Death were the offspring of Satan and that Chaos' consort is Night with Confusion and Discord along for the ride.The manner of using words as names for creatures was very inventive.Rarely, do I like Classics this old, but this one worked f or me.
    • 3/5
      Even though I don't hold with religious belief, that didn't stop me from adoring Dante's Divine Comedy and I've loved Homer's epic poems. Yet I can't say that Milton's Paradise Lost spoke to me. Much of the poem felt repetitive and bloated with discourses on such matters as heliocentric theory. His recapitulation of Genesis is part plagiarism, part bizarre twisting. (Among other things, according to Milton, "God the Son" who would become Jesus was really the Creator.) Unlike Dante, who never lost the human even when dealing with the divine, in Paradise Lost so much is focused on God, Satan, and their angelic allies. Only Adam and Eve are human--and the depiction of Eve gave me no end of problems. And unlike others Milton is compared to such as Homer, Dante, Chaucer and Shakespeare, if Milton has a sense of humor, I completely missed it.I did recognize passages of beauty and grandeur in Paradise Lost, but rather disconcertingly they were almost always spoken by Satan. "The Mind is its own place and itself can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven." "Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven." Ironically, according to the introduction to the edition I read, Milton was himself a rebel. He supported Cromwell's republic which executed a anointed monarch and argued against censorship in his treatise Areopagitica. It seems incongruous that in Paradise Lost he seeks to "justify the ways of God to men" by making disobedience and a desire for knowledge the root of all evil. So maybe it's not that surprising that Romantics such as Shelley and Blake would see Satan as the hero of Milton's epic. Especially since Milton's God has all the hallmarks of a despot. Milton describes God as a "sov'reign King;" the purpose of angels and humans is to praise (flatter) him, he's arbitrary, capricious and rigid in his commands, jealous of his power, willing to sacrifice others for his ends and decrees "torture without end."I found it hard not to gag at the depiction of Eve from the start who says to Adam, "God is thy law, thou mine." It's not all negative. It's through Eve that Milton depicts humans arriving at self-awareness and Milton is sex positive. He insists the unFallen Adam and Eve had sex for instance and he supports marriage. But Milton emphasizes Eve's subordination, inferiority and centrality to the human tragedy throughout. Says Adam:Of Nature her the inferior, in the mindAnd inward faculties, which most excel;In outward also her resembling lessHis image who made both, and less expressingThe character of that dominion givenO'er other creatures. God sends a warning through the Angel Raphael to Adam--not Eve--merely telling him "to warn thy weaker." Eve succumbs because of flattery and vanity. Adam disobeys God out of love, joining her in sin because he fears otherwise they'd be divided. So woman is weak in herself--man only if and when he's weakened by woman. "Sin" is also female with parallels to Eve--a grotesque demoness who is the daughter of Satan and through an incestuous union with him the mother of Death. Both Sin and Eve are in league with Satan and bring death into creation.Unlike the case with Homer, I can't blame an initial negative reaction to Milton as the result of being forced to read him in school, a lack of maturity or a bad translation. Milton wrote in English and I've read Paradise Lost only recently for the first time. However, Milton greatly influenced the Romantic poets and even how many Christians see the story of Adam and Eve and Satan. Because of that I'm glad I read the poem and do encourage others to read it. Besides the glints of beauty, many of Milton's religious views are, well, unique. The glimpse of his political views are interesting too--almost libertarian.He gave us only over Beast, Fish, FowlDominion absolute; that right we holdBy his donation; but Man over menHe made not Lord; such title to himselfReserving, human left from human free.Nevertheless, unlike Homer or Dante, I can't by any means see Paradise Lost as a favorite or a work I'd ever reread nor am I tempted to read the sequel, Paradise Regained.
    • 2/5
      I read this in college and really enjoyed it. But, I think that was because I had a wonderful professor who loved Milton and her energy was infectious. Reading it now, I found it very misogynistic. The poetry was beautiful and I enjoyed the metaphors, but I couldn't take Milton's contempt against women very easily. Oh well, I guess I won't be continuing on with Paradise Regained.

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    Paradise Lost - John Milton

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