Milton's Paradise Lost and the Literary Epic

Core Idea

John Milton's *Paradise Lost* (first edition 1667 in ten books, second edition 1674 in twelve) retells the biblical fall of Satan and of Adam and Eve as an English epic in blank verse. It uses the conventions of Homer and Virgil, such as the invocation of the Muse, the opening in the middle of the action, catalogues and epic similes, while claiming a higher subject than war. Milton states his aim in Book 1: to "justify the ways of God to men." The poem's magnetic portrait of Satan has divided readers ever since.

How It's Best Learned

Read the first 26 lines of Book 1 and label each epic convention you find, then compare them with the opening of the *Iliad* or the *Aeneid*. Next, read Satan's speeches in Books 1 and 2 aloud and ask why they are so persuasive. Then read the final lines of Book 12, where Adam and Eve leave Eden, and discuss whether the ending is tragic, hopeful or both.

Common Misconceptions

• *Paradise Lost* is a rhymed poem. (It is in unrhymed iambic pentameter. In a note added in 1668, Milton defended his choice and called rhyme "the invention of a barbarous age.")
• Satan is plainly the hero because he gets the best speeches. (That is one influential reading, but the poem also shows his rhetoric decaying, his body shrinking into serpent form, and his self-deception, inviting readers to resist being charmed.)
• The poem follows Genesis closely and adds little. (Genesis gives the fall in a few verses. Milton invents the war in Heaven, the council in Hell, long conversations in Eden, and the archangel Michael's vision of future history.)

Explainer

Epic poetry came to Milton with a long set of rules. Homer and Virgil began by calling on the Muse, opened in the middle of the story, listed warriors in long catalogues, and compared their heroes to lions, storms and stars in extended similes. Renaissance poets wanted an English epic to match them. John Milton (1608-1674) thought about the project for decades and chose, in the end, not a national hero but the first story of the Bible.

*Paradise Lost* begins with the whole argument in one sentence: "Of Man's first disobedience, and the fruit / Of that forbidden tree," then calls on a "Heav'nly Muse" and claims a goal no classical poet had tried, to "justify the ways of God to men." Milton was blind by 1652 and composed the poem by dictation. It is written in blank verse, a choice he defended against the fashion for rhyme.

The action opens in medias res. Satan and the rebel angels lie on a burning lake in Hell after their defeat. Milton uses the classic devices to measure them. Satan's shield is compared to the moon seen through the telescope of "the Tuscan artist," Galileo. A catalogue names the fallen angels who will later be worshipped as pagan gods. In Book 2 the devils hold a council in their new palace, Pandemonium, and Satan volunteers to travel to the newly created world to corrupt humanity.

Satan's speeches are the most quoted parts of the poem: "The mind is its own place, and in itself / Can make a Heav'n of Hell, a Hell of Heav'n," and "Better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heav'n." Romantic readers such as Blake and Shelley admired his defiance. Other critics point out that the poem shows his arguments turning into self-justification, and that by Book 10 he and his followers are turned into serpents.

The human story ends quietly. After the fall, the archangel Michael shows Adam the future of the world, including the promise of redemption. In the final lines, Adam and Eve, "hand in hand with wand'ring steps and slow," leave Eden to begin history. Ask how the poem uses epic tradition, and where it changes what heroism means.