Regan Garey
Dr. Cox
ENG 236A: British Literature
10-19-15
Study Guide #7: Paradise Lost
5.Compare the passage of Eve and Adam’s temptation with the Biblical description (Genesis 3) What similarities and differences do you notice? How do these impact the story? Think particularly about the characters’ physical locations. There are many similarities between the texts Paradise Lost and Genesis 3. Both of these stories are centered on temptation and the fall of man from God’s graces. One similarity between the stories is that the devil took the form of a serpent when he spoke to Eve in the garden. When Eve asks how he, a snake, can talk like a human, he says that he “chanced a godly tree… loaden with fruit” (Book 9, Line 575-577). Another similarity is in how the devil tries to persuade Eve. The serpent tells Eve that not only did eating the fruit not kill him, but also it gave him knowledge that made him like God. He tells her that she “shall not die” because he has “touched and tasted” and is not only still alive, but he has also moved higher up on the chain of beings (Book 9, Line 685 & 688). In both stories, Eve was the first person to eat of the fruit. Eve saw that the fruit was “desirable for gaining wisdom” so “she took some and
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Creative: Read Lanyer’s “Eve’s Apology in Defense of Women” and then write your own Defense, responding to the explicit and implicit charges Milton lays at Eve’s door. Write in Eve’s voice. Yes, I am a woman. Yes, I made a mistake. Haven’t you made one before, too? I am blamed as being the reason for the Fall of all of mankind. Can you imagine having that on your shoulders day in and day out? I have personally been told that I am the reason that the Fall happened and God took us out of Paradise. It was my personal wrongdoing that put sin into our world and took us as humans out of God’s good graces. I admit that I made mistakes during my life and have taken paths that I shouldn’t have, but consider this: are you truly guilt