Paradise Lost Essays

12th Grade

Paradise Lost

Humans have instincts. However, some are often suppressed and viewed by society as immoral and unnatural because not all of them have pure intentions. In John Milton’s Paradise Lost, Milton retells the story of Adam and Eve and their fall from...

College

Paradise Lost

Milton’s exploration of heroism in Paradise Lost has been the focus of much debate and controversy since the poem was first published. Critical attention has shifted through the years from Satanism to feminism, from the exultation of Adam to the...

College

Paradise Lost

In Paradise Lost, John Milton endows angels with magnificent qualities, both positive and negative. Through symbolism, he shows their greatness. In a meaningful shift from earlier ideas of his time, Milton’s angels are shown to possess full free...

College

Paradise Lost

The potential for political meaning in the metaphors, allegories and allusions of Paradise Lost is rich for interpretations due to the shifting associations of political ideologies with various sides, in order to prove a spectrum of arguments. The...

College

Paradise Lost

In Book IV of Paradise Lost, Eve relates her birth and her first meeting with Adam. She claims to first have been distracted by her reflection on a pond, where she would have stayed had a voice not warned her away. The person on the pond “started...

12th Grade

Paradise Lost

An antagonist is essential to any story. Establishing a clear “bad guy” gives the story more emotion, uniting the reader with the protagonist(s) against a common enemy that is easy to hate. Every story has an antagonist, but only some are evil....

College

Paradise Lost

Following the story of Genesis, John Milton’s Paradise Lost gives insight to Adam and Eve’s Fall from Paradise and Satan’s war against God in heaven. While all of the characters add crucial detail to the storyline, Eve is arguably one of the most...

College

Paradise Lost

In Milton’s Paradise Lost, the species of man has been given free will, and is best illustrated through Satan and Eve due to their choices. Milton define free will as a way to become closer to God, for choosing God makes a person superior, as...

12th Grade

Paradise Lost

When one hears the word Satan, he thinks of an opposition to God. The name alone conjures up evil thoughts in most peoples’ heads. In the epic poem, Paradise Lost, a tale of the creation story, however this feeling of evil is quickly misplaced....

College

Paradise Lost

John Milton wrote Paradise Lost following the epic tradition while, at the same time, it articulates concerns relevant for the Seventeenth Century audience, including the idea of exploration. With this, Milton’s epic enunciates the colonial...

College

Paradise Lost

In Milton's Paradise Lost, Satan appears to be an antagonist to God, but is actually a hero in rebel form. Through his speeches and the birth of Sin, Satan establishes himself as a creator. Creation, especially through word, is the ultimate form...

College

Paradise Lost

In 1759, Voltaire published his magnum opus, Candide—nearly a century after Milton first published his own masterpiece, Paradise Lost. Upon finally settling on a farm with his dearest friends, Candide concludes the text by saying “we must...