• In total there are 9 users online :: 0 registered, 0 hidden and 9 guests (based on users active over the past 60 minutes)
    Most users ever online was 789 on Tue Mar 19, 2024 5:08 am

Opening comments on Paradise Lost

#61: Jan. - Mar. 2009 (Fiction)
User avatar
Saffron

1F - BRONZE CONTRIBUTOR
I can has reading?
Posts: 2954
Joined: Tue Apr 01, 2008 8:37 pm
15
Location: Randolph, VT
Has thanked: 474 times
Been thanked: 399 times
United States of America

A Tale of Paradise Lost -- a version for children!

Unread post

Who would have guessed, a children's book version of PL!

Here is a description and review for A Tale of Paradise Lost

Image
User avatar
DWill

1H - GOLD CONTRIBUTOR
BookTalk.org Hall of Fame
Posts: 6966
Joined: Thu Jan 31, 2008 8:05 am
16
Location: Luray, Virginia
Has thanked: 2262 times
Been thanked: 2470 times

Unread post

You should get a hold of this book, Safrron, and post a review on that site. I like the idea of color illustrations. That's about as far towards making the poem visually literal as I'd want to go, though. On the site that Robert posted for the movie project, a PL novel is mentioned, written in plain modern prose. I hope that doesn't cause a third of the readers participating here to jump over to it, like the rebel angels!
User avatar
Saffron

1F - BRONZE CONTRIBUTOR
I can has reading?
Posts: 2954
Joined: Tue Apr 01, 2008 8:37 pm
15
Location: Randolph, VT
Has thanked: 474 times
Been thanked: 399 times
United States of America

Unread post

DWill wrote:You should get a hold of this book, Safrron, and post a review on that site.
I was thinking in the same vein. I've already put a library hold on the book.
User avatar
Thomas Hood
Genuinely Genius
Posts: 823
Joined: Sun Feb 17, 2008 7:21 pm
16
Location: Wyse Fork, NC
Been thanked: 1 time

Unread post

http://www.paradiselost.org/
-- a super Paradise Lost website

Especially the witty 301 Questions and Answers:

http://www.paradiselost.org/7-archive.html

Disadvantages: the Intro is slow to load and comes in with epic music that scares the cat :)

To skip the Intro start here:
http://www.paradiselost.org/novel.html
User avatar
Thomas Hood
Genuinely Genius
Posts: 823
Joined: Sun Feb 17, 2008 7:21 pm
16
Location: Wyse Fork, NC
Been thanked: 1 time

Unread post

http://www.forbes.com/2008/12/08/john-m ... corns.html
John Milton And His Money

"His great poem is studied in colleges all over the English-speaking world, and his ideals have become deeply rooted, not least in America. Milton argued for the separation of church and state, for freedom of worship and for the abolition of government censorship. He also contended the best kind of government was republican, an argument that has prevailed not in his native land, but in America.

Indeed, statesmen such as Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson and John Adams drew on their wide reading of Milton both to shape their republicanism and to address specific issues such as British taxation in America, the case for ecclesiastical disestablishment in Virginia and the wickedness of British rulers (whose arrogance Adams compared to that of Milton's Satan). . . ."

Gives details of Milton's finances. An article by Gordon Campbell and Thomas N. Corns, authors of John Milton: Life, Work and Thought (Oxford University Press, 2008).
User avatar
Thomas Hood
Genuinely Genius
Posts: 823
Joined: Sun Feb 17, 2008 7:21 pm
16
Location: Wyse Fork, NC
Been thanked: 1 time

Unread post

DWill wrote:I like the idea of color illustrations. That's about as far towards making the poem visually literal as I'd want to go, though.
There was a Classic Comics Paradise Lost.

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/shorts ... ation.html
-- arguments for simplified classics.

http://fish.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/11/3 ... ist&st=cse
Dennis Danielson's simplified Paradise Lost
User avatar
Saffron

1F - BRONZE CONTRIBUTOR
I can has reading?
Posts: 2954
Joined: Tue Apr 01, 2008 8:37 pm
15
Location: Randolph, VT
Has thanked: 474 times
Been thanked: 399 times
United States of America

Andrew Marvell

Unread post

I just came across this --

On Mr. Milton's "Paradise Lost"
by Andrew Marvell
(1621-1678)

When I beheld the poet blind, yet bold,
In slender book his vast design unfold,
Messiah crowned, God's reconciled decree,
Rebelling Angels, the Forbidden Tree,
Heaven, Hell, Earth, Chaos, all; the argument
Held me a while, misdoubting his intent
That he would ruin (for I saw him strong)
The sacred truth to fable and old song,
(So Sampson groped the temple's posts in spite)
The world o'erwhelming to revenge his sight.

Yet as I read, soon growing less severe,
I liked his project, the success did fear;
Through that wide field how he his way should find
O'er which lame faith leads understanding blind;
Lest he perplexed the things he would explain,
And what was easy he should render vain.

Or if a work so infinite he spanned,
Jealous I was that some less skilful hand
(Such as disquiet always what is well,
And by ill imitating would excel)
Might hence presume the whole creation's day
To change in scenes, and show it in a play.
Pardon me, Mighty Poet, nor despise
My causeless, yet not impious, surmise.
But I am now convinced that none will dare
Within thy labors to pretend a share.
Thou hast not missed one thought that could be fit,
And all that was improper dost omit:
So that no room is here for writers left,
But to detect their ignorance or theft.
That majesty which through thy work doth reign
Draws the devout, deterring the profane.
And things divine thou treat'st of in such state
As them preserves, and thee, inviolate.
At once delight and horror on us seize,
Thou sing'st with so much gravity and ease;
And above human flight dost soar aloft,
With plume so strong, so equal, and so soft.
The bird named from that paradise you sing
So never flags, but always keeps on wing.

Where couldst thou words of such a compass find?
Whence furnish such a vast expanse of mind?
Just heaven thee, like Tiresias, to requite,
Rewards with prophecy the loss of sight.

Well mightst thou scorn thy readers to allure
With tinkling rhyme, of thine own sense secure;
While the Town-Bayes writes all the while and spells,
And like a pack-horse tires without his bells.
Their fancies like our bushy points appear,
The poets tag them; we for fashion wear.
I too, transported by the mode, offend,
And while I meant to praise thee must commend.
The verse created like thy theme sublime,
In number, weight, and measure, needs not rhyme.
User avatar
Saffron

1F - BRONZE CONTRIBUTOR
I can has reading?
Posts: 2954
Joined: Tue Apr 01, 2008 8:37 pm
15
Location: Randolph, VT
Has thanked: 474 times
Been thanked: 399 times
United States of America

Unread post

It seems that in 2008 the BBC marked 400 years of John Milton with lots of programing. The first link is to the main BBC page on John Milton.

BBC - John Milton
User avatar
Robert Tulip

2B - MOD & SILVER
BookTalk.org Hall of Fame
Posts: 6499
Joined: Tue Oct 04, 2005 9:16 pm
18
Location: Canberra
Has thanked: 2719 times
Been thanked: 2661 times
Contact:
Australia

Re: The Zodiac Design

Unread post

Thomas Hood wrote:Milton may have based Paradise on the signs of the zodiac.
Hi Tom, this is a reasonable line of speculation. As you might know I have a strong interest in astrology from a philosophical and rational angle. The way I see your claimed correspondences is that the twelve signs of the zodiac do symbolise the structure of the natural year, with the meanings attributed to each sign corresponding to the climatic rhythm at that time, so Aries, from 22 March to 21 April, symbolises the opening of spring, while Pisces from 22 Feb symbolises the end of winter. This natural rhythm is a permanent feature of our planet encapsulating everything within it, although human artifice has enabled some level of alienation. The point, re Paradise Lost, is that Milton is indeed presenting a mythic cosmology which seeks to provide a comprehensive explanatory narrative - explaining the ways of God to man. Astrology also presents a comprehensive explanatory narrative in terms of the cycle of the seasons. Both have some purchase on reality, some element of accuracy, and so can be legitimately compared. It is not surprising that the twelve symbolic components of the natural year of astrology sun signs can be detected in the structure of Paradise Lost because both are a way of depicting the same ultimate reality of life on earth. Whether as you suggest this was deliberate on Milton's part I am not so sure. RT
User avatar
Robert Tulip

2B - MOD & SILVER
BookTalk.org Hall of Fame
Posts: 6499
Joined: Tue Oct 04, 2005 9:16 pm
18
Location: Canberra
Has thanked: 2719 times
Been thanked: 2661 times
Contact:
Australia

Unread post

Thinking of Paradise Lost as a movie, Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie could play Adam and Eve. I can't think who would make a good Satan - I'm thinking historical figures who could play the great deceiver - Goethe, Hitler, Robespierre, Stalin and Mao are names that come to mind. For God, C.S. Lewis, Kepler, Newton, Hildegaard, Jung or Heidegger could be a guide, like Virgil for Dante. Milton's take on Jesus as the eternal Son and the cross as a central symbol of the war of love against evil needs some theological exploration.
Post Reply

Return to “Paradise Lost - by John Milton”