paradise lost失乐园赏析课件
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Paradise Lost
Type of Work
Paradise Lost is an epic poem which — like
the epic poems of Homer, Dante, Vergil, and
Goethe—tells a story about momentous events
while incorporating grand themes that are
timeless and universal.
Date
Completed
Milton completed the first version
of Paradise
Lost in 1667. It consisted of 10
books. In 1668
and 1669, he added an
introductory comment
about the verse form and
a special section with
summaries of each book.
In 1674, he published
the final version of the
epic, in which he divided
Books 7 and 10 into
two books each. The
completed work thus had 12
books instead of 10.
He also placed each
summary at the beginning of
the book it
summarized.
Sources
Milton
used the Bible, Homer's Iliad and
1
Odyssey, Vergil's Aeneid, and the
stories in
Greco-Roman mythology as sources of
information and as writing models. The Bible's
Book of Genesis is the main source for his
retelling of the story of creation and the
first
humans, Adam and Eve.
Settings
The settings are heaven, hell, the firmament
(苍
穹) (Chaos), and earth.
Characters
God the Father, God the Son: (trinity)Two of
the three divine persons making up the
all-powerful Godhead, the single deity（神性）
that created and ruled all that exists outside
of
itself. The third divine person, the Holy
Spirit,
does not play a role in Paradise Lost.
God the
Father is portrayed as just but
merciful,
condemning (批判) the defiant
（目中无人）and
unrepentant (不后悔的) rebel angels but
permitting redemption of the repentant Adam
and
Eve. God the Son volunteers to redeem them
by
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becoming human and
enduring suffering and
death.
Satan
(Lucifer, Archfiend): Powerful and
prideful
angel who, with legions (众多的) of
supporters,
leads an unsuccessful rebellion
against God
and suffers eternal damnation. To
gain
revenge, he devises a plan to corrupt God's
newly created beings, Adam and Eve, through
deceit. Modern readers often admire him for
his
steely defiance (藐视). He would rather rule
in
hell, he says, than serve in heaven. It was
not
Milton's intent, however, to create an
admirable
character; rather his intent was to
create a
character of colossal (巨大的) hatred —
loathsome (令人讨厌的), execrable (恶劣的),
incurably remorseless (冷酷无情的).
Adam
and Eve: The first human beings, created
by
God to fill the void（真空）that resulted when
God
cast Satan and his supporters out of the
celestial realm. Adam and Eve live on the
planet
earth in utter happiness in a special
garden where
spring is the only season and
love and godly
living prevail. Though they
have all that they
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want and
need, cunning Satan tells them they can
have
knowledge and status beyond their reach if
only they eat of the fruit of the Tree of
Knowledge. Eve can become a goddess, he says.
Vanity overtakes her. She eats. Adam
reluctantly
does the same.
Gabriel,
Raphael, Michael, Uriel: Powerful and
fearless
angels on the side of God.
Beelzebub, Mammon,
Belial, Moloch:
Powerful leaders in Satan's
army. In a great
council in hell, each of them
speaks his mind on
what policy devil-kind
should follow after losing
paradise. Should
they make a new war? Should
they make peace?
Ithuriel, Zephron: Angels who expel Satan from
the Garden of Eden with the help of a sign
from
God. Satan returns to the garden later to
complete
his devious enterprise.
Mulciber: Fallen angel who designs hell's
capital city and seat of government,
Pandemonium. In ancient Roman mythology,
Mulciber is another name for Vulcan (Greek:
Hephaestus), god of fire and the forge. As a
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blacksmith, he kept shop in
burning mountains
(volcanoes).
Sin:
Daughter of Satan. She was born from his
head
in the manner of Athena, Greek goddess of
wisdom and war, who sprang from the forehead
of Zeus, king of the gods.
Death: Son of
Satan and Sin
Various Other Angels and Devils
Milton's Solar System
In describing
the planets and other celestial
bodies, Milton
models God’s creation on the
Ptolemaic天动说的design (also called the
geocentric design) rather than the Copernican
design (also called the heliocentric
以太阳为中
心的design). The former placed earth at the
center of the solar system, with the sun and
other
celestial bodies orbiting it. Copernicus
and other
scientists later proved that the
earth orbits the sun.
Milton was aware of the
Copernican theory, but
he used the Ptolemaic
design—either because he
believed it was the
more credible theory or
because he believed it
would better serve his
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literary purpose. In Paradise Lost,
Adam inquires
about the movements of celestial
bodies—in
particular, whether earth orbits the
sun or vice
versa—in his conversation with the
archangel天
使 Raphael, but Raphael gives no
definite answer.
Raphael may have been
speaking for Milton.
Style and Verse
Format
Milton wrote Paradise Lost in
dignified, lofty,
melodic English free of any
colloquialisms and
slangs that would have
limited the work's
timeliness and
universality. The format, Milton
says in an
introductory note, is heroic
verse without
rhyme—in other words, blank
verse, the same
verse form used by Shakespeare
in his plays.
Milton's strong religious faith infuses
the
poem with sincerity and moral purpose, but he
does not allow his enthusiasm for his subject
to
overtake control of his writing. Though
Milton
frequently uses obscure allusions to
mythology
and history, as well as occasional
difficult words
and phrases, his language is
never deliberately
affected or
ostentatious炫耀的. What is more, it
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does not preach and does not take the
reader on
circumlocutory迂回的 expeditions. Like
a
symphony composer—mighty Beethoven, for
example —Milton is always in control,
tempering
his creative genius with his
technical discipline.
With a good dictionary
and an annotated有注
解的 text, a first-time reader
of Milton can easily
follow and understand the
story while developing
an appreciation for the
exquisite writing.
Epic Conventions
In Paradise Lost, Milton used the classical
epic
conventions—literary practices, rules, or
devices
established by Homer that became
commonplace
in epic poetry. Some of these
practices were also
used in other genres of
literature. Among the
classical conventions
Milton used are the
following:
(1) The
invocation 祈祷 of the muse, in
which a writer
requests divine help in composing
his work.
(2) Telling a story with which readers or
listeners are already familiar; they know the
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characters, the plot, and
the outcome. Most of the
great writers of the
ancient world—as well as
many great writers in
later times, including
Shakespeare—frequently
told stories already
known to the public.
Thus, in such stories, there
were no
unexpected plot twists, no surprise
endings.
If this sounds strange to you, the modern
reader and theatergoer, consider that many of
the
most popular motion pictures today are
about
stories already known to the public.
Examples are
The Passion of the Christ,
Titanic, The Ten
Commandments, Troy,
Spartacus, Pearl Harbor,
and Gettysburg.
(3) Beginning the story in the middle, a
literary
convention known by its Latin term in
media res
资源(in the middle of things). Such a
convention
allows a writer to begin his story
at an exciting
part, then flash back to fill
the reader in on details
leading up to that
exciting part.
(4) Announcing or
introducing a list of
characters who play a
major role in the story.
They may speak at
some length about how to
resolve a problem (as
the followers of Satan do
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early in Paradise Lost).
(5)
Conflict in the celestial realm. Divine
beings
fight and scheme against one another in
the
epics of Homer and Vergil, and they do so in
Paradise Lost on a grand scale, with Satan and
his forces opposing God and his forces.
(6) Use of dramatic irony. Dramatic irony is a
literary device in which a character in a
story fails
to see or understand what is
obvious to the
audience or readers. Dramatic
irony appears
frequently in the plays of the
ancient Greeks. For
example, in Oedipux Rex,
by Sophocles, dramatic
irony occurs when
Oedipus fails to realize what
the audience
knows—that he married his own
mother. In
Paradise Lost, dramatic irony occurs
when Adam
and Eve happily go about daily life
in the
Garden of Eden unaware that they will
succumb
to the devil's temptation and suffer the
loss
of Paradise. Dramatic irony also occurs when
Satan and his followers fail to understand
that it
is impossible ultimately to thwart挫败
or
circumvent divine will and justice.
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Plot Summary
All
Hell broke loose
Book IV, Paradise Lost
.
The Invocation of the Muse
.......Milton
opens Paradise Lost by asking a muse
to
inspire his writing. In ancient Greece and
Rome, poets had always requested “the muse” to
fire them with creative genius when they began
long narrative poems, called epics, about
godlike
heroes and villains. In Greek
mythology, there
were nine muses, all sisters,
who were believed to
inspire poets,
historians, flutists, dancers, singers,
astronomers, philosophers, and other thinkers
and
artists. If one wanted to write a great
poem, play a
musical instrument with bravado,
or develop a
grand scientific or philosophical
theory, he would
ask for help from a muse.
When a writer asked for help, he was said to
be
“invoking the muse.” The muse of epic
poetry
was named Calliope [kuh LY uh pe].
However, in
Book 7, Milton identifies
Urania—the muse of
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astronomy—as the goddess to whom he
addresses
his plea for inspiration.
In
Milton’s time, writers no longer believed in
muses, of course. Nevertheless, since they
symbolized inspiration, writers continued to
invoke them. So it was that when Milton began
Paradise Lost, he addressed the muse in the
telling of his tale, writing, “I thence invoke
thy
aid to my adventurous Song.”
The
Story
Satan and his followers rebel against
God. But
God and his mighty angels defeat the
rebels in a
terrible war. God casts them into
a dark abyss
with a lake of fire. There, the
defeated legions
deplore悲叹 their fate and
consider their future.
In a great council, the
many thousands of the
fallen assemble in the
capital city and seat of
government,
Pandemonium, where Satan sits on
his royal
throne, to hear their leaders speak their
minds on the course of action they should
take.
Moloc, a rebel leader who fought
fiercely
against the forces of the Almighty,
calls for
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renewed war.
Belial彼勒advises a do-nothing
policy,
maintaining that the horror of their hell
will
abate in time and that their surroundings will
brighten. To challenge God would only result
in
another defeat and more punishment. After
Mammon advises peace, Beelzebub—a majestic,
imposing figure—notes that God is creating a
new creature, man, who will occupy a new
world,
earth. If they turn this new creature
from his
ordained course, using force or
trickery, they can
enjoy revenge against God,
Beelzebub says. His
plan is not his own; it is
the plan of Satan, his
master. The assembly of
devils does not respond;
they do not know what
to say about this proposal.
Then the leader of
all the accursed, Satan,
speaks up. He first
bemoans悲叹 their environs:
Our prison strong,
this huge convex of Fire,
Outrageous to
devour, immures us round
Ninefold, and gates
of burning Adamant
Barred over us prohibit all
egress.
(Book 2, lines 444-447)
But if any
of them manages to break free, Satan
says, he
will encounter a dark void beyond which
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are unknown regions and unknown
dangers.
Nevertheless, Satan, as leader, says
he will
venture forth and
destruction seek
Deliverance for us all: this
enterprise None
shall partake参与 with me.
His of course is to
work his
deceptive charms against the new
creatures. He
will subvert 破坏God’s plan and
give hell a
reason to cheer. None in the
assemblage spoke
against this plan. Instead,
all rose with a
thunderous noise to give
assent:
Towards him they bend
With
awful reverence prone; and as a God
Extol
him equal to the highest in Heaven.
(Book 2,
477-479)
And so the assembly broke up and
ventured off
into the regions from whence they
came: Rocks,
caves, lakes, fens, bogs, dens,
and shades of
death,
A universe of
death, which God by curse
Created evil, for
evil only good,
Where all life dies, death
lives, and nature breeds,
Perverse, all
monstrous, all prodigious things,
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Abominable, inutterable, and worse.
(Book 2, 621-626)
Meanwhile, Satan
thoughts inflamed of
highest design Puts on
swift wings, and toward
the Gates of Hell
Explores his solitary flight. . .
Sin, who
was born from the archfiend's head, and
his
son, Death, who was born of Satan's union
with
Sin, decide to follow and assist their father.
In heaven, God the Father and God the Son
observe Satan flying in a rage toward earth.
Satan
will corrupt his new creatures, the
Father says,
even though they possess the
willpower to reject
sin. Their penalty will be
death. However,
because they will not rebel
against God but
instead succumb to Satan’s
temptation, they will
be redeemable—if someone
takes on the burden
of their sin by suffering
and dying on their behalf.
When the Son offers
himself for this task, the
Father accepts the
offer and approves of his
incarnation in the
world of man.
To reach earth, Satan must fly
past Uriel, a
member of the highest-ranking
order of angels,
14
the
Seraphim. Uriel watches over earth from his
post at the sun. Disguising himself as one of
the
cherubim—the second-highest-ranking order
of
angels—Satan asks Uriel to point out the
planet
where man dwells so that he may go
there,
admire this new creature, and praise
his great
Maker. Uriel instructs him, and
Satan resumes his
journey and arrives at
earth.
The sight of Paradise disheartens
him, for it
reminds him of all that he lost in
his rebellion
against God. After struggling
with
self-recrimination and doubt, Satan
regains
himself and enters Paradise, taking
the shape of a
cormorant—a web-footed sea
bird—and perching
in the Tree of Life (a tree
producing fruit which,
when eaten, yields
everlasting life) to observe the
newly created
Adam and Eve. They are beautiful,
happy
creatures who surprise Satan with their
ability to speak and think logically.
Later, when they are asleep, Satan whispers
evil
thoughts into Eve’s ear—of “vain hopes”
and
“inordinate desires.” When the archangel
Gabriel
learns of Satan’s presence in Eden, he
sends two
15
angels to expel
him. When they confront him,
Satan defiantly
scorns them and prepares for a
fight. An
angelic squadron descends toward Eden
under
the command of Gabriel, and a sign
appears in
the heavens in which God weighs the
adversaries in his golden scales. When Gabriel
tells Satan to look at the scales, the
archfiend sees
that they tip in the favor of
the celestial forces,
and he flees.
On
a mission from God, the angel Raphael
warns
Adam and Eve about Satan. So that they
understand the nature of their foe, Raphael
tells
them the story of Satan’s rebellion and
the great
war in which angels on both sides
fought fiercely.
It ended in Satan’s expulsion
from heaven,
Raphael says, after the Son of
God intervened on
behalf of the celestial
forces. A new world with
new creatures was
then created to fill the void left
by the
rebels cast into the deep.
Adam, a curious
creature, asks Raphael about
the earth and its
place in creation. Raphael
explains the
universe but warns Adam to temper
his desire
for knowledge with humility. When
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Adam expresses his great satisfaction
with Eve as
a mate, Raphael again cautions him
to be careful.
Living with and loving a
creature such as Eve,
with all of her charm
and beauty, is wonderful;
however, Adam must
not let her divert his
attention from his
responsibilities to God.
Satan returns to
the Garden of Eden in the form
of a snake and
tempts Eve to eat fruit of the Tree
of
Knowledge in defiance of a divine command
never to do so. If she and Adam taste the
fruit, he
says, they will become gods. Eve
eats. After
Satan leaves, Adam—though
reluctant—also eats.
And so Adam and Eve fall
from grace, and the
Son of God pronounces
judgment on the
transgressing humans.
When Satan returns in triumph to hell, the
multitude of fiends cheer him but suddenly
turn
into serpents. Earth becomes a place of
changing
seasons; the eternal spring is no
more. Adam is
downcast, wishing for death, and
blames Eve for
leading them astray. But they
reconcile and
decide to go on, confessing
their wrongdoing and
pleading for forgiveness.
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God decrees that heaven
will remain open for
them. But He sends the
archangel Michael down
to evict them from
Paradise. Before Michael
leaves, he tells them
about events to come in the
history of the
world and, from a hilltop, shows
Adam his
progeny—Cain and Abel (and the
murder of Cain
by Abel) and the descendants who
later will
form a covenant with God after a great
flood.
Michael then foretells the advent of a
Redeemer,
who will die for the sins of
humankind—then rise
from the grave and leave
earth but return later in
a second coming.
Adam and Eve then walk into
their new life.
The World was all before them, where to choose
Their place of rest, and Providence their
guide:
They hand in hand with wandering steps
and
slow,
Through Eden took their solitary
way.
(Book 10, lines 1537-1540)
They enter
the imperfect world, with all its perils.'
Imagery
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Milton's
imagery is at times graceful and
elegant, as
in this memorable personification in
Book 6:
Morn,
Waked by the circling hours, with
rosy hand
Unbarred the gates of light.
(lines 2-4)
At other times, the imagery is
imposing and
awe-inspiring, as in this
description in Book 7
that ends with
hyperbole:
There Leviathan
Hugest of
living creatures, on the deep
Stretched like
a promontory sleeps or swims,
And seems a
moving land, and at his gills
Draws in, and
at his trunk spouts out a sea.
(lines
412-416)
In Book 8, Milton describes the
commission of
the first sin in simple,
straightforward language,
followed by a
succinct personification summing
up the
terrible effects of the iniquity:
[H]er rash
hand in evil hour
Forth reaching to the fruit,
she plucked, she eat:
Earth felt the wound,
and Nature from her seat,
Sighing through all
her works, gave signs of woe
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That all was lost.
(line 780-784)
Milton also uses personification in Book 4 in
this beautiful passage about a quiet night,
the
starry sky, and the ascendancy of the
moon:
The wakeful Nightingale;
She
all night long her amorous descant sung;
Silence was pleased: now glow'd the Firmament
With living Sapphires: Hesperus that led
[Hesperus: evening star which the Greeks
associated with the brother
The starry
Host, rode brightest, till the Moon
of Atlas;
later Hesperus was associated with
Lucifer's
brilliant light.]
Rising in clouded Majesty,
at length
Apparent Queen unveiled her
peerless light,
And o'er the dark her
Silver Mantle threw. (lines
602-609)
Enjambment跨行连续
Milton uses frequently uses
enjambment (also
spelled enjambement) in the
poem. It is a literary
device in which a poet
does not complete his
20
sentence or phrase at the end of one
line but
allows it to carry over to the next
line, as in these
passages from the poem:
Of man's first disobedience, and the fruit
Of that forbidden tree, whose mortal taste
Brought death into the world. . .
(Book
1, lines 1-3).
Yet Chains in Hell, not Realms
expect: mean
while From me returned, as erst
thou saidst, from
flight,
This greeting
on thy impious Crest receive. 、
(Book 6, lines
186-188)
Milton's use of enjambment helps the
poem
flow from one line to the next.
Main Theme
In Book 1 of Paradise Lost,
Milton reveals the
central theme of the work:
to justify the ways of
God to man. Justify
here means to explain and
defend, and
ultimately to vindicate澄清, God’s
course of
action in dealing with Adam and Eve
after they
succumbed to the temptation of Satan
and ate
forbidden fruit.
21
.
Other Themes
Inordinate 过度的pride: It
leads to Satan's
downfall and his continuing
defiance of God.
Envy: Arising from Satan's
pride, it makes him
jealous of God the Son,
who is the favorite of
God the Father.
Revenge: It motivates Satan to corrupt Adam
and
Eve and thereby subvert God's plans.
Vanity: It leads Eve to believe—under the
temptation of Satan—that she can become
godlike.
Deceit: Satan appears in many
disguises and tells
many lies during his
mission to trick Adam and
Eve.
Infidelity: Adam betrays God by siding with
Eve
and eating the forbidden fruit.
Unbridled 不受约束的pursuit of knowledge: It
leads Adam and Eve to seek knowledge beyond
their ken, knowledge that will make them
godlike.
Volition意志: Angels and humans
alike possess
free will, enabling them to make
decisions. Satan
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freely
chooses to rebel against God, and Adam
and Eve
freely choose to eat forbidden fruit. The
consequences of their actions are their own
fault,
not God's. Milton uses this theme to
help support
the central theme,
man.
Disobedience违抗: All sins are acts of
disobedience against God, impairing or cutting
off the sinner's relationship with God. Adam
and
Eve and all of the devils disobey God
through
their sins.
Loyalty: Loyalty
to God and his ways are
necessary for eternal
salvation. Loyalty requires
obedience. All of
the good angels exhibit loyalty.
Repentance悔悟: Even though Adam and Eve
have disobeyed God, their repentance makes
them eligible for eventual salvation.
Hope: At the end of Paradise Lost, Adam and
Eve
enter the imperfect world with hope; they
can yet
attain eternal salvation.
Redemption赎回: Through the suffering and
death of the Son of God, sinful man can
reconcile
himself with God if he is sincerely
sorry for his
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sins.
Climax
The climax, or turning point, of
Paradise Lost
occurs when Adam and Eve succumb
to Satan's
temptations and eat the forbidden
fruit. This act
of disobedience results in
their downfall and
eviction from Paradise.
What Is an Angel?
An angel is a
supernatural being that serves
God by praising
and adoring Him and by carrying
out special
missions that assist humans. Angels
have the
additional task of opposing and
punishing
devils. Devils are angels cast out of
heaven
because they rebelled against God. The
word
angel derives from the Greek word angelos,
meaning messenger. The major western
religions—Christianity, Judaism, and Islam—all
accept the existence of angels. The rank of
angels
from highest to lowest is as follows:
1. Seraphim (Seraph)
2. Cherubim
(Cherub)
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3. Thrones
4. Dominations
5. Virtues
6. Powers
7. Principalities
8. Archangels
9.
Angels
Study Questions and Essay Topics
1. What does Satan mean when he says, “Better
to reign in hell, then [than] serve in heav’n”
(Book 1, line 263)?
2. What does Belial
mean when he says,
horror will grow milde,
this darkness light
(Book 2, line 220).
3.
Explain the allusion in the underlined words:
Altar breathes Ambrosial Odours and
Ambrosial Flowers(Mammon, Book 2, lines
243-244)
4. Write an essay that reviews
Milton's use of epic
conventions in Paradise
Lost. Be sure to give
plenty of examples to
support your thesis.
5. Write an essay
explaining the difference
25
between the Ptolemaic and Copernican
models of
the solar system. Include in your
essay
illustrations of both models.
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