ENGLISH
2310 THIRD
ESSAY ASSIGNMENT
GRADY FALL 2017
Essays
should be in 12-point type, double-spaced with one-inch margins, and 1700-2000
words on one of the topics below. Be sure to refer as helpfully and specifically
as possible to the texts upon which you're basing your argument--and be sure to
have an argument or thesis. Your essay should have an original title, and it
should not use the word "mindset.”
Essays are due in on Friday, December 8,
the day after the last day of
class.
When
you submit your essay electronically, please indicate whether you would like to
receive it back on the day of the final
exam with a grade and no marginal comments, or whether you would like to
receive it later on—probably after the end of the semester-- with the usual set
of comments.
1.
Design your own topic, of
suitable specificity and sophistication, about something that interests you in
Milton’s Paradise Lost or Pope’s Rape of the Lock. Consultation with the instructor is required
for those of you intending to use this option; talking with one another is
highly recommended, too. Please inform
me by Thursday, December 3 about the topic you propose to pursue.
2. William Blake
wrote of Milton in 1793 that "The reason Milton wrote in fetters when he
wrote of Angels & God, and at liberty when of Devils & Hell, is because
he was a true poet and of the Devil's party without knowing it." Comment
on Blake's claim. What poetic effects is he referring to? What in Paradise Lost would make Blake think
Milton was "of the Devil's party"? How do you think would Milton have
reacted to this assertion?
3. The critic William Empson,
in writing about Paradise Lost,
claimed that "the central problem about the poem" is "how Milton
can have thought it to justify God." Empson
suggested that because Milton was saddled with the insoluble problem of
"why God had to procure all these falls for his eventual high
purpose," Milton himself, when he began writing the poem, "was
exactly in the position of the Satan he presents, overwhelmingly stubborn and
gallant but defending a cause inherently hopeless from the start." Do you
agree with Empson? How successfully does Paradise Lost "justify the ways of
God to men?" (Remember--this means Milton's God, God the character
in the poem.)
·
One way to approach this topic would be to count up how many times in
the poem God (and Milton, and other characters) must remind us all that his
foreknowledge did not make the Fall inevitable.
4. C.S. Lewis explains the causes of the Fall quite simply: "Eve fell through pride," he
writes, while "Adam fell through uxoriousness."
Is he right? Reaffirm your own fallen state by entering once again into the
"vain contest" over the cause or causes of the Fall.
Be sure to refer to the text to support your position.
·
An alternate approach to the topic of the Fall
would be to ask not why it happened, but exactly when it happened—is there an event or moment in the poem that makes
the Fall seem inevitable?
5. In Books II and
III of Paradise Lost, Milton
deliberately contrasts the Parliament in Hell with the proceedings in Heaven
long before we ever get to see the earth; again in Book X, he shows us scenes
in both Heaven and Hell. Write an essay about these paired scenes. Some
questions you might consider: What is the effect on the reader of these
juxtapositions? How do these paired scenes satirize, comment on, or explain one
another? How do they point to the larger ways in which good and evil manifest
themselves or perform their operations in the poem? Is hell fundamentally like
heaven, or only superficially similar to it?
5A. In Books II and
III of Paradise Lost, Milton
deliberately contrasts the Parliament in Hell with the proceedings in Heaven,
and he does it by showing us the scene in Hell first. It’s not the last time that Milton shows us
Satan imitating God or the Son or other heavenly creatures—the epic voice is
constantly commenting on the practice--but it seems like each time we are shown
the imitation before we see the real thing. Discuss some of these incidents, and the
effect Milton achieves (or tries to achieve) by working, as it were, backwards.
6. Examine Satan's
transformations in Paradise Lost,
from brightest of angels to fallen angel, from youthful cherub to cormorant to
lion to toad to mist to serpent to devil and back to serpent again. Does Satan
degrade himself, or is he degraded by some other force--God, or Milton, or
evil? Look closely at the language surrounding his transformations, who speaks
and what their moral or poetic perspective is on his character.
6A. Pausing for
another soliloquy before he enters the sleeping serpent, Satan muses “But what
will not ambition and revenge / Descend to?” (9.167-8). There’s a lot of
language about rising and falling in Paradise
Lost, right from the very beginning.
Some if it is meant literally and some metaphorically; some of these
motions are done for evil purposes, some for good; some is entirely
hypothetical. Discuss some of this language in the context of an argument about
the significance of rising and falling in Milton’s poem.
7. Epic poems are typically heroic poems--think Beowulf--but although Milton models Paradise Lost on the epic poems of Homer
and Vergil, his subject requires him to develop a different account of heroism
than that usually found in the epic tradition.
What sort of actions does Milton portray as heroic in Paradise Lost? What is his attitude toward the traditional
notion of heroic behavior described in other poems? Does Paradise
Lost even have a hero? Does it have more than one? (Note: not
questions to answer in sequence!)
8. Does it matter—is it significant—that Milton gives
Eve the last speech of Paradise Lost?
If so, why? If not, why not? (It’s highly likely that this topic, if done
well, will require you to revisit other passages in the poem in which Eve
features significantly.)