WEBVTT 00:01.740 --> 00:04.730 Professor John Rogers: Paradise Regained. 00:04.730 --> 00:08.820 Well, as anyone who's read -- and maybe there's someone 00:08.817 --> 00:12.977 here in this room who has read the continuation of the novel 00:12.975 --> 00:17.335 Gone with the Wind -- as anyone who has read that 00:17.344 --> 00:19.274 knows, or as anyone who's seen, 00:19.274 --> 00:21.624 let's say, "The Bride of Chucky" or "The Fast and the 00:21.623 --> 00:23.653 Furious, Part 3," knows, 00:23.646 --> 00:30.056 sequels are rarely greater than the original works whose stories 00:30.059 --> 00:33.569 they continue. It's almost as if the 00:33.567 --> 00:38.897 diminished appeal was something like an inevitable and necessary 00:38.898 --> 00:40.758 fact of the sequel. 00:40.760 --> 00:43.870 It just comes attached to the notion of the sequel. 00:43.870 --> 00:47.860 I think that the disappointment aroused by a sequel, 00:47.856 --> 00:51.606 a sequel of any kind, is a phenomenon about which 00:51.609 --> 00:54.719 John Milton, as he wrote Paradise 00:54.724 --> 00:59.674 Regained, must have been extremely aware.It was 00:59.669 --> 01:04.369 Thomas Elwood -- he was one of the young men who acted as a 01:04.371 --> 01:08.991 secretary for Milton -- who claimed years after the poet's 01:08.992 --> 01:13.292 death that he had been responsible for Milton's having 01:13.288 --> 01:17.178 written the sequel to Paradise Lost. 01:17.180 --> 01:20.950 He recorded having told Milton after he had read an 01:20.954 --> 01:24.804 early manuscript copy of Paradise Lost -- this is 01:24.798 --> 01:29.058 before Paradise Lost was even in print -- he reports to 01:29.062 --> 01:33.282 us having told Milton, "Thou hast said much here of 01:33.282 --> 01:36.682 paradise lost, but what hast thou to say of 01:36.675 --> 01:40.595 paradise found?" And then Elwood continues, 01:40.598 --> 01:44.458 and it's [laughs] a wonderful little bit of 01:44.456 --> 01:49.776 information: "Milton made no answer to me but sat some time 01:49.783 --> 01:54.563 in a muse."Like a lot of critics of Milton, 01:54.560 --> 01:57.660 I have a hard time believing that it was Elwood, 01:57.663 --> 02:00.773 squirmy little Elwood, who planted the idea of a 02:00.766 --> 02:04.196 sequel to Paradise Lost in Milton's head, 02:04.200 --> 02:07.270 but I think it's nonetheless interesting that this story has 02:07.265 --> 02:08.715 been so widely circulated. 02:08.719 --> 02:13.429 It's almost invariably cited by scholars of Paradise Regained 02:13.428 --> 02:17.838 because I think in some way readers are looking for some 02:17.837 --> 02:21.497 excuse really for Milton's having written it. 02:21.500 --> 02:24.750 Paradise Lost seems in itself so absolutely complete 02:24.752 --> 02:25.932 and so magnificent. 02:25.930 --> 02:29.970 The idea that it requires a sequel is one that seems 02:29.970 --> 02:35.200 suspicious or questionable to a lot of Milton's readers.Now, 02:35.199 --> 02:37.669 Milton's own nephew, Edward Phillips, 02:37.669 --> 02:41.099 described the way in which readers even in Milton's 02:41.099 --> 02:44.529 lifetime judged the sequel to be the inferior, 02:44.530 --> 02:46.930 the lesser of the two works. 02:46.930 --> 02:49.940 Phillips tells us in his biography -- and this is 02:49.940 --> 02:53.140 actually usefully included in the back of the Hughes 02:53.138 --> 02:56.898 edition -- Phillips tells us that Paradise Regained 02:56.901 --> 03:01.041 "is generally censured to be much inferior to the other, 03:01.039 --> 03:03.929 though [Milton] could not hear with patience 03:03.933 --> 03:06.493 any such thing when related to him." 03:06.490 --> 03:11.000 I love this image of the old man impatient with any comment 03:11.002 --> 03:15.052 that might belittle the accomplishment of the sequel, 03:15.048 --> 03:17.848 and I think it's a moving image. 03:17.849 --> 03:20.609 If Milton's nephew is right here, as I suspect he is, 03:20.607 --> 03:23.357 then I think it's worth pursuing the reason for which 03:23.364 --> 03:26.444 Milton might have considered Paradise Regained, 03:26.439 --> 03:29.699 the sequel, to be the greater work or a 03:29.699 --> 03:33.379 work in some way more sophisticated and more advanced 03:33.384 --> 03:35.514 than Paradise Lost. 03:35.509 --> 03:38.729 I think in a lot of ways it is exactly that.Now, 03:38.733 --> 03:42.593 surely one of the first things that we notice when we read the 03:42.589 --> 03:45.809 sequel to Paradise Lost is really the radical 03:45.813 --> 03:47.713 difference of its style. 03:47.710 --> 03:50.400 The literary style, or what we can think of as the 03:50.401 --> 03:52.491 verbal texture, of Paradise Regained 03:52.488 --> 03:55.568 really constitutes one of its greatest departures and 03:55.565 --> 03:58.585 obviously one of its most deliberate departures from the 03:58.586 --> 04:01.526 first epic. Although most readers of 04:01.532 --> 04:05.892 Regained find it less stylistically pleasing than 04:05.891 --> 04:08.371 Lost, Milton has embraced 04:08.367 --> 04:10.557 this style, I think, for an important reason. 04:10.560 --> 04:15.630 He has very consciously imposed a set of constraints on his 04:15.629 --> 04:20.609 verbal style and a set of constraints on his entire poetic 04:20.611 --> 04:23.901 imagination. Our appreciation of the beauty 04:23.902 --> 04:27.122 and the meaning of this poem is actually, I think, 04:27.120 --> 04:31.170 inextricable for our understanding of this poem -- 04:31.165 --> 04:35.785 our understanding of the severity of the lesson that this 04:35.789 --> 04:40.829 poem has to teach us.This poet -- and we know this because 04:40.826 --> 04:45.116 we've spent a lot of time with John Milton now -- was 04:45.119 --> 04:50.159 instinctively given to verbal excess to an almost unimaginable 04:50.156 --> 04:53.316 degree. He clearly had to struggle hard 04:53.317 --> 04:56.547 to rein in a lot of his most powerful literary impulses in 04:56.548 --> 04:59.948 order to produce a work such as Paradise Regained, 04:59.949 --> 05:05.509 a work of such seemingly charmless severity. 05:05.509 --> 05:09.749 This poem has been scrubbed clean of verbal and imagistic 05:09.749 --> 05:12.999 extravagance, scrubbed cleaner even than the 05:13.004 --> 05:16.264 last two books of Paradise Lost, 05:16.259 --> 05:19.669 which were themselves radical departures. 05:19.670 --> 05:22.300 I think in a lot of ways Paradise Regained 05:22.297 --> 05:25.997 resembles stylistically, in terms of its verbal texture, 05:26.000 --> 05:28.350 the last books of Paradise Lost.Now, 05:28.348 --> 05:31.058 Milton has purged this poem as well of the grammatical 05:31.055 --> 05:33.655 obscurity, the syntactical obscurity that 05:33.660 --> 05:35.550 we found in Paradise Lost. 05:35.550 --> 05:38.720 You remember all of those ambiguities, syntactical 05:38.723 --> 05:42.263 ambiguities, that were always opening up far more signifying 05:42.256 --> 05:45.606 possibilities than we could even begin to deal with. 05:45.610 --> 05:49.950 Milton has clipped so many of those long and wandering 05:49.950 --> 05:54.210 sentences into short and unequivocal declarations, 05:54.209 --> 05:58.179 and he's replaced the lushness of so many of those similes and 05:58.183 --> 06:01.963 literary ornaments with what we can think of as the Puritan 06:01.961 --> 06:06.001 austerity of simple argument and simple statement of fact. 06:06.000 --> 06:11.350 This poem has been written in what is often described now as 06:11.350 --> 06:15.430 the period's plain style -- something like the 06:15.432 --> 06:19.062 conversational style of unambiguous, 06:19.060 --> 06:23.380 straightforward language that was supposedly favored by the 06:23.375 --> 06:26.645 Puritan clergy in the seventeenth century, 06:26.650 --> 06:27.770 and I think that makes sense. 06:27.769 --> 06:31.529 This poem has been written in what we can think of as the 06:31.534 --> 06:34.294 plain style.But if that's the case, 06:34.290 --> 06:37.500 how strange and how surprising that this poem, 06:37.501 --> 06:41.001 which is written in a poetic language as plain and 06:40.997 --> 06:44.777 unambiguous as anything Milton ever put on paper, 06:44.779 --> 06:49.889 how unbelievably odd it is that this poem paints for us a world 06:49.892 --> 06:54.512 in which so few statements can actually be understood! 06:54.509 --> 06:57.209 All of the characters in Paradise Regained, 06:57.208 --> 07:00.348 and I'm including -- there aren't that many of them -- but 07:00.348 --> 07:02.978 I'm including, of course, the Son of God. 07:02.980 --> 07:06.780 All of the characters fail at some time or another to 07:06.777 --> 07:10.717 understand even the clearest, even the most perspicuous 07:10.720 --> 07:13.600 language. Much like Adam in Books Eleven 07:13.596 --> 07:16.926 and Twelve of Paradise Lost, the characters in 07:16.934 --> 07:20.854 Paradise Regained are on some level profoundly clueless 07:20.851 --> 07:24.571 and their cognitive incapacity -- which actually comes in a 07:24.574 --> 07:28.354 variety of shapes, depending where you are in the 07:28.345 --> 07:31.955 poem -- their cognitive incapacity usually involves 07:31.955 --> 07:35.555 their inability to interpret fully and to interpret 07:35.564 --> 07:40.114 accurately a statement or a text that in our estimation seems to 07:40.112 --> 07:44.522 be just about as clear and as unambiguous as it could possibly 07:44.516 --> 07:47.906 be.Now, one of the texts that proves so 07:47.906 --> 07:51.736 puzzling to the characters of Paradise Regained is also 07:51.737 --> 07:54.497 a puzzle to Adam in Paradise Lost, 07:54.500 --> 07:59.730 and so I want to look back at the ending of Paradise Lost 07:59.729 --> 08:04.339 in order to see a way in which that poem had been 08:04.337 --> 08:08.057 preparing us all along for the sequel. 08:08.060 --> 08:12.720 I think you'll remember our mentioning in class that odd and 08:12.724 --> 08:17.154 sometimes irritating way in which Adam was always jumping 08:17.151 --> 08:22.131 the gun in his interpretation of future Christian history in the 08:22.132 --> 08:25.692 lesson that Michael was presenting him. 08:25.689 --> 08:29.049 One of the central historical documents that Adam seemed 08:29.045 --> 08:32.515 particularly predisposed to misinterpret was what is known 08:32.522 --> 08:37.322 as the Protoevangelium, and that's been spelled for 08:37.322 --> 08:41.292 you, P-r-o-t-o-e-v-a-n-g-e-l-i-u-m, 08:41.291 --> 08:48.531 on your handout so you don't need my orthography right now. 08:48.529 --> 08:51.719 The Protoevangelium, which is the Greek for "the 08:51.723 --> 08:54.513 first gospel" or "the first good news," 08:54.509 --> 08:59.149 is one of the ways in which Christians refer to Genesis 3: 08:59.152 --> 09:01.972 14 and 15. It's the prophecy from the Book 09:01.965 --> 09:04.625 of Genesis that God delivers to the serpent. 09:04.629 --> 09:07.969 God prophesied that the serpent's eventual punishment -- 09:07.969 --> 09:11.669 and this is on the handout -- that the serpent eventually will 09:11.672 --> 09:15.012 be punished: "And I will put enmity between thee and the 09:15.011 --> 09:17.631 woman, and between thy seed and her 09:17.634 --> 09:19.944 seed; it shall bruise thy head, 09:19.936 --> 09:22.886 and thou shalt bruise his heel."Now, 09:22.894 --> 09:27.604 this is the anticipation of the end as presented -- as imagined 09:27.596 --> 09:30.876 in Genesis. It's this text that the New 09:30.877 --> 09:35.157 Testament uses to forge a connection between the story of 09:35.164 --> 09:38.064 Christ, which is obviously the New 09:38.063 --> 09:41.593 Testament story, and the initial text in the 09:41.593 --> 09:44.853 tradition, which is the story of Adam and 09:44.854 --> 09:46.294 Eve. For Christians, 09:46.287 --> 09:49.127 Christ of course is the woman's seed, the 09:49.134 --> 09:53.124 great-great-great-great- great-great-grandson of Adam and 09:53.119 --> 09:56.319 Eve. He will one day bruise the head 09:56.319 --> 09:59.289 of the serpent, who is interpreted by 09:59.291 --> 10:03.831 Christians to be Satan even as Satan will be dogging his 10:03.831 --> 10:07.431 steps.Now, the text of this prophecy is 10:07.431 --> 10:11.421 reproduced and reworked, I think, almost to a compulsive 10:11.423 --> 10:13.603 degree in Paradise Lost. 10:13.600 --> 10:16.680 Allusions to the prophecy in Genesis, the 10:16.677 --> 10:19.897 Protoevangelium, appear in five separate 10:19.895 --> 10:23.805 places in the last books of Milton's epic and actually in 10:23.812 --> 10:27.732 far more places than that in Paradise Regained. 10:27.730 --> 10:30.870 This prophecy is a text that has to be read and 10:30.870 --> 10:34.010 interpreted, it's mulled over and reinterpreted, 10:34.009 --> 10:38.059 and it's Michael's task in the last books of Paradise Lost 10:38.064 --> 10:40.434 to teach Adam how to read it. 10:40.429 --> 10:45.569 Adam has to figure out -- and this actually in itself requires 10:45.572 --> 10:50.382 a lot of tutelage on Michael's part -- that the serpent is 10:50.378 --> 10:53.058 actually Satan. That's nothing that comes 10:53.059 --> 10:55.779 instinctively or intuitively to Adam, he also must learn that, 10:55.779 --> 10:59.169 of course, the seed is the Messiah who Adam will eventually 10:59.173 --> 11:02.573 interpret to be the Son of God.Let's look at the end of 11:02.567 --> 11:05.607 Paradise Lost here because Michael is not only 11:05.610 --> 11:09.180 teaching Adam how to understand the Protoevangelium, 11:09.179 --> 11:13.389 but he's teaching us also I think -- preparing us to read 11:13.394 --> 11:15.014 Paradise Regained. 11:15.009 --> 11:19.359 So this is page 463 in the Hughes. 11:19.360 --> 11:24.520 It's Book Ten of -- actually, I'm going to be 11:24.523 --> 11:28.543 skipping around. The first passage that we'll be 11:28.539 --> 11:30.819 looking at is Book Ten, line 179. 11:30.820 --> 11:33.990 That's when the Son delivers the prophecy to the serpent. 11:33.990 --> 11:38.310 Then at line 500 of Book Ten, we see Satan trying to figure 11:38.309 --> 11:41.659 out what the Son could possibly have meant. 11:41.659 --> 11:44.499 In Book Eleven, line 115 -- if you can flip 11:44.499 --> 11:48.689 through pages fast enough -- God himself explains to Michael in 11:48.690 --> 11:51.530 heaven about the prophecy of the seed. 11:51.529 --> 11:56.299 Then Michael dutifully relays this message to Adam himself in 11:56.303 --> 12:00.383 Book Twelve, line 150.Now, there's obviously an excessive 12:00.378 --> 12:03.438 proliferation here of prophetic statements, so excessive that 12:03.435 --> 12:06.385 you probably weren't able to flip through your books nearly 12:06.390 --> 12:09.570 quickly enough. It's no wonder that Adam is 12:09.567 --> 12:14.357 really beside himself with such an eager desire to get to the 12:14.360 --> 12:19.230 end -- so obsessively is this prophecy of the end presented at 12:19.233 --> 12:21.873 the end of Paradise Lost. 12:21.870 --> 12:23.970 Adam has learned about the birth of Jesus, 12:23.971 --> 12:26.771 he's learned about the Messiah who will actually be born of a 12:26.773 --> 12:29.023 woman, called "the woman's seed" in 12:29.022 --> 12:31.892 the Book of Genesis, and he thinks he has this 12:31.887 --> 12:34.877 prophecy of the seed completely figured out. 12:34.879 --> 12:38.499 He thinks he understands now how the story of Christian 12:38.504 --> 12:40.254 history is going to end. 12:40.250 --> 12:53.510 So this is line 375 of Book Twelve at the top of page 463: 12:53.509 --> 12:56.929 O Prophet of glad tidings, [Adam says,] 12:56.932 --> 12:59.672 finisher Of utmost hope! 12:59.670 --> 13:02.820 now clear I understand What oft my steadiest thoughts 13:02.818 --> 13:06.138 have searcht in vain, Why our great expectation 13:06.138 --> 13:10.458 should be call'd The seed of Woman… 13:10.460 --> 13:14.160 Of course -- and we're used to this because we've read the last 13:14.157 --> 13:17.917 two books of Paradise Lost -- Adam is wrong to think that 13:17.915 --> 13:21.485 he has a clear understanding of the great expectations of the 13:21.493 --> 13:24.263 end. He imagines once again with a 13:24.258 --> 13:28.298 kind of singularly dull-witted literalism just how this 13:28.295 --> 13:31.655 prophecy of the seed is going to play out. 13:31.659 --> 13:38.069 So at line 383 Adam says, "Needs must the Serpent now his 13:38.074 --> 13:44.834 capital bruise / Expect with mortal pain: say where and when 13:44.832 --> 13:48.902 / Thir fight, what stroke shall bruise the 13:48.899 --> 13:51.339 Victor's heel." Adam, of course, 13:51.335 --> 13:55.465 had utterly imagined -- or imagined precisely the wrong 13:55.471 --> 13:58.251 kind of ending. This isn't going to be a 13:58.250 --> 14:01.920 physical fight whose victory can be pinned down to some specific 14:01.924 --> 14:06.194 time and specific place, a kind of terrifying event for 14:06.192 --> 14:11.042 which tickets could be purchased.Michael recognizes 14:11.038 --> 14:15.788 Adam's interpretation as a misinterpretation and so he 14:15.794 --> 14:19.734 corrects it. At line 386 Michael tells Adam 14:19.729 --> 14:23.419 this: "Dream not of thir fight, / As of a Duel, 14:23.424 --> 14:27.364 or the local wounds / Of head or heel…" 14:27.360 --> 14:30.870 We're not supposed to imagine some gunslinger showdown at the 14:30.874 --> 14:34.514 end of time between the Messiah and the serpent -- and remember 14:34.506 --> 14:38.076 that Adam is still imagining the serpent being a serpent; 14:38.080 --> 14:41.030 he hasn't yet figured out that the serpent is Satan. 14:41.029 --> 14:44.279 We're not going to have an actual war capable of producing 14:44.278 --> 14:46.128 actual wounds. Adam, of course, 14:46.132 --> 14:49.672 in his defense -- and I think he does need a little defending 14:49.668 --> 14:52.848 here -- has in mind the story of the war in heaven, 14:52.850 --> 14:57.930 the story of an actual fight full of local wounds that -- all 14:57.931 --> 15:01.611 two local wounds, they were healed instantly -- 15:01.614 --> 15:04.694 that Raphael had conveyed to him, of course, 15:04.690 --> 15:08.270 in Book Six and which David Currell had wonderfully 15:08.267 --> 15:11.767 explicated for our benefit.But the battle that 15:11.773 --> 15:16.353 will turn out to reconfigure all of Christian history isn't going 15:16.352 --> 15:20.502 to proceed along the vulgarly literal line set forth in the 15:20.501 --> 15:24.641 war in heaven. It's as if Michael is trying to 15:24.635 --> 15:28.715 tell Adam to forget everything that Raphael told him, 15:28.720 --> 15:32.710 to forget that monumental war that Raphael had relayed, 15:32.711 --> 15:36.701 because that kind of thing simply isn't going to happen 15:36.702 --> 15:40.212 anymore. The fight between Satan and the 15:40.208 --> 15:44.848 seed, or the serpent and the seed, is going to be a much 15:44.853 --> 15:48.543 subtler one. The Messiah will begin his 15:48.541 --> 15:54.221 destruction of the serpent by becoming a man himself just like 15:54.221 --> 15:57.761 Adam had become a man at his birth. 15:57.759 --> 16:01.909 That seems to be pretty much the gist of Michael's theology 16:01.907 --> 16:04.407 in Paradise Lost.Well, 16:04.409 --> 16:07.789 so Milton finishes Paradise Lost, evidently he begins 16:07.794 --> 16:11.244 Paradise Regained even before Paradise Lost has 16:11.236 --> 16:17.076 found its way into print, and Paradise Regained is 16:17.078 --> 16:21.928 published four years later in 1671. 16:21.929 --> 16:26.279 It's all about that redemption, that regaining of paradise that 16:26.280 --> 16:30.490 Michael had prophesied at the end of Paradise Lost, 16:30.490 --> 16:33.640 and, as you can tell from the title of the sequel, 16:33.640 --> 16:37.820 Paradise Regained is all about returning and repetition. 16:37.820 --> 16:43.000 We shouldn't think that the sequel here is simply repeating 16:42.996 --> 16:48.346 and elaborating on the ideas with which the original poem had 16:48.350 --> 16:50.920 concluded. While it's true that 16:50.922 --> 16:54.762 Paradise Regained does repeat the Protoevangelium -- 16:54.756 --> 16:58.516 that prophecy of the Son's destruction of the serpent that 16:58.524 --> 17:01.504 we finally figure out is actually Satan, 17:01.500 --> 17:05.190 and it proves to be just as obsessively interested in that 17:05.192 --> 17:09.082 bizarre prophecy as Paradise Lost was -- this new poem 17:09.079 --> 17:11.929 repeats that prophecy with a difference. 17:11.930 --> 17:16.640 I think there are all sorts of ways in which the poem is 17:16.644 --> 17:22.134 exploring and re-exploring a lot of the implications and a lot of 17:22.130 --> 17:27.100 the consequences of the very idea of repetition implicit or 17:27.102 --> 17:31.302 compacted in that prefix re- of Paradise 17:31.302 --> 17:34.862 Regained. This is a work devoted to 17:34.856 --> 17:38.906 how the lost paradise will eventually become the regained 17:38.905 --> 17:41.865 paradise.Obviously for Christians, 17:41.869 --> 17:48.239 orthodox Christians of almost any stripe, that regaining, 17:48.238 --> 17:53.468 that redemption will hinge on the atonement, 17:53.470 --> 17:56.640 on the moment of the crucifixion. 17:56.640 --> 18:00.660 Well, that's pretty much out of the question for Milton, 18:00.660 --> 18:05.120 so we have to ask the question: how does Milton account 18:05.118 --> 18:08.698 for that pivotal moment in Christian history, 18:08.700 --> 18:12.590 the turning point from the old covenant with God to the new 18:12.591 --> 18:14.831 covenant? How does Milton imagine the 18:14.833 --> 18:18.233 shift from Paradise Lost to Paradise Regained? 18:18.230 --> 18:22.310 The answer -- as we have come to recognize because these are 18:22.306 --> 18:26.656 the kinds of the answers that we get when we ask questions about 18:26.659 --> 18:29.629 Milton -- the answer is a shocking one. 18:29.630 --> 18:33.640 Milton quite simply doesn't mention -- and this is 18:33.635 --> 18:38.455 unspeakably sublime -- he just doesn't bother to mention the 18:38.458 --> 18:43.198 crucifixion in Paradise Regained.Of course, 18:43.200 --> 18:46.460 we already know that the subject of the crucifixion is 18:46.464 --> 18:49.794 one that Milton has long had an awkward relation to. 18:49.789 --> 18:53.299 He wasn't able to finish that early poem, "The Passion," that 18:53.298 --> 18:55.168 he had written as a young man. 18:55.170 --> 18:58.880 In this new poem, Paradise Regained, 18:58.882 --> 19:03.572 the story ends before the crucifixion even takes place 19:03.567 --> 19:07.137 because for Milton, in this absolutely remarkable 19:07.144 --> 19:10.294 poem, the crowning moment of Christian history and the point 19:10.286 --> 19:13.206 at which lost paradise is actually regained -- something 19:13.214 --> 19:15.894 that we are, of course, all ourselves the 19:15.886 --> 19:19.356 beneficiaries of -- it has nothing whatsoever to do with 19:19.355 --> 19:21.685 the Father's sacrifice of the Son. 19:21.690 --> 19:25.050 And it has nothing to do with the magnificent battle, 19:25.046 --> 19:28.206 for that matter, between Satan and the Messiah. 19:28.210 --> 19:32.590 It's a moment mentioned rather briefly in a couple of gospel 19:32.586 --> 19:34.956 accounts of the life of Jesus. 19:34.960 --> 19:39.880 The Gospel of Matthew and the Gospel of Luke narrate the story 19:39.881 --> 19:44.561 of Jesus fasting -- this all happens in a few verses in the 19:44.560 --> 19:49.400 New Testament -- the story of Jesus fasting for forty days in 19:49.400 --> 19:53.760 the wilderness and the three temptations to which Satan 19:53.756 --> 19:57.706 subjected Jesus during that time.Now, 19:57.710 --> 20:00.580 in the Gospel of Luke, which is the version that 20:00.578 --> 20:05.798 Milton follows most closely, Satan tempts the Son three 20:05.797 --> 20:09.447 times. He asks the Son to turn stones 20:09.452 --> 20:14.662 into bread in order to free himself, and of course the Son 20:14.664 --> 20:17.684 refuses. He asks the Son to accept all 20:17.679 --> 20:20.799 the kingdoms of the world as Satan's own gift, 20:20.796 --> 20:22.386 and the Son refuses. 20:22.390 --> 20:26.180 And he asks the Son to prove his divinity by casting himself 20:26.175 --> 20:29.635 off the pinnacle of the temple, and the Son refuses. 20:29.640 --> 20:33.970 That pretty much is it, three temptations and three 20:33.970 --> 20:38.160 acts of resistance; and it is this simple -- and of 20:38.155 --> 20:42.425 course nothing is ever that simple, but it's this more or 20:42.430 --> 20:46.250 less simple resistance of temptation in Paradise 20:46.246 --> 20:50.596 Regained that constitutes the very center of Christian 20:50.596 --> 20:54.256 history.This is an extraordinary and, 20:54.259 --> 20:59.369 for me, unbelievable way of rethinking and re-imagining 20:59.369 --> 21:05.329 Christian theology and the story of Christian history itself. 21:05.329 --> 21:09.909 The very premise of this poem is, I think, a transgressive 21:09.906 --> 21:14.316 one, utterly changing all of the emphases in traditional 21:14.323 --> 21:16.173 Christian doctrine. 21:16.170 --> 21:18.770 The focal point, of course, in Milton's poem 21:18.774 --> 21:20.414 isn't really theological. 21:20.410 --> 21:24.970 It's not mystical or sacramental: it's ethical. 21:24.970 --> 21:27.840 It's not the magic or the mysticism of the crucifixion or 21:27.844 --> 21:30.314 the resurrection that has anything to do with the 21:30.308 --> 21:31.898 regaining of paradise here. 21:31.900 --> 21:37.830 It is a simple and entirely, I think, un-miraculous action 21:37.825 --> 21:40.315 of behaving ethically. 21:40.319 --> 21:44.349 It's something that any of us could do.As I mentioned a 21:44.351 --> 21:48.661 minute ago, this poem is all about returning and repetition, 21:48.660 --> 21:53.520 and the Protoevangelium is a text to which the characters are 21:53.516 --> 21:56.346 themselves continually returning. 21:56.349 --> 21:59.429 But there there's another text that is repeated, 21:59.426 --> 22:02.896 if you can believe it, even more obsessively than that 22:02.895 --> 22:06.805 in Paradise Regained, and that's the scene in 22:06.813 --> 22:09.463 which Jesus is baptized by John the Baptist. 22:09.460 --> 22:12.140 The scene of the baptism is narrated first -- it happens 22:12.140 --> 22:14.530 right at the beginning, at line twenty-nine of the 22:14.528 --> 22:18.948 first book. This is page 483 in the Hughes. 22:18.950 --> 22:22.290 We have to look at this passage. 22:22.289 --> 22:26.549 It's narrated first in Book One, line twenty-nine and 22:26.553 --> 22:30.823 following, and then it's repeated and referred to and 22:30.816 --> 22:35.646 worried about at least four times after that over the course 22:35.654 --> 22:39.794 of the poem. This is what we first learn: 22:39.790 --> 22:42.510 [O]n him baptiz'd Heaven open'd, 22:42.505 --> 22:46.405 and in likeness of a Dove The Spirit descended, 22:46.411 --> 22:51.401 while the Father's voice From Heav'n pronounced him his 22:51.404 --> 22:55.974 beloved Son. Now, we of course read what I 22:55.966 --> 23:00.796 take to be these relatively simple and unimaginative lines, 23:00.799 --> 23:03.239 and if anything, I think, we should be 23:03.241 --> 23:06.871 overwhelmed by their exceptional straightforwardness. 23:06.869 --> 23:09.329 It's almost impossible to understand [laughs] 23:09.331 --> 23:12.741 what it is about this baptismal pronouncement that could prove 23:12.744 --> 23:15.434 so troublesome and so difficult in the poem, 23:15.430 --> 23:18.750 but no one in the poem -- and that includes, 23:18.748 --> 23:22.918 of course, the Son of God himself -- no one in the poem 23:22.916 --> 23:27.156 has anything even close to a clear idea about what these 23:27.162 --> 23:31.722 lines actually mean.This radical uncertainty at the very 23:31.715 --> 23:35.955 heart of the poem involves the fact that this incredibly 23:35.961 --> 23:40.361 important revelation is the product merely of the Father's 23:40.360 --> 23:43.670 voice. We're no longer in the world of 23:43.665 --> 23:47.495 Paradise Lost where man can commune directly with angels 23:47.495 --> 23:51.075 and even with the Son of God with some frequency and with a 23:51.078 --> 23:52.868 degree of relative ease. 23:52.869 --> 23:57.789 Nowhere in Paradise Regained is divinity actually 23:57.794 --> 24:00.254 present. Deity isn't palpable; 24:00.250 --> 24:03.180 it's not indisputably there in the world of this poem, 24:03.179 --> 24:05.389 and all we have is the Father's voice, 24:05.390 --> 24:09.540 his pronouncements, or in other words all we have 24:09.542 --> 24:14.562 is a text just like the text of scripture -- or in fact, 24:14.560 --> 24:15.770 it is the text of scripture. 24:15.769 --> 24:20.799 The Father has left us with a little trail of his presence 24:20.799 --> 24:24.239 [laughs] in the form of the words of the 24:24.240 --> 24:27.730 Hebrew Bible, and everyone in the poem is 24:27.732 --> 24:31.792 desperately scrambling to interpret this verbal trail, 24:31.789 --> 24:35.899 these words.All of this is a way of saying that the 24:35.904 --> 24:40.024 universe of Paradise Regained is essentially, 24:40.020 --> 24:43.480 to my mind, a secular one. 24:43.480 --> 24:47.110 This is essentially the world that Milton had introduced us to 24:47.108 --> 24:49.308 at the end of Paradise Lost, 24:49.309 --> 24:52.989 and in this secular world all one can really do is 24:52.986 --> 24:56.336 read the text and try to figure out what it means. 24:56.339 --> 25:01.019 This is all that Satan and the Son are in a position to do in 25:01.022 --> 25:05.242 Paradise Regained, and I think this is what gives 25:05.238 --> 25:08.118 this poem its powerfully Modernist feel. 25:08.119 --> 25:13.279 It's as skeptical and uncertain as it is possible for such a 25:13.278 --> 25:17.298 profoundly and piously religious poem to be, 25:17.299 --> 25:21.769 if that oxymoronic statement makes any sense.Look at how 25:21.767 --> 25:25.247 Satan reacts to the pronouncement of God at the 25:25.250 --> 25:32.000 baptism that we just looked at, the pronouncement that this is 25:32.000 --> 25:36.920 my beloved Son, line thirty-three: 25:36.920 --> 25:41.180 That heard the Adversary, who roving still 25:41.180 --> 25:43.050 About the world, at that assembly fam'd 25:43.049 --> 25:46.179 Would not be last, and with the voice divine 25:46.180 --> 25:48.740 Nigh Thunderstruck, th' exalted man, 25:48.741 --> 25:51.751 to whom Such high attest was giv'n, 25:51.750 --> 25:55.330 a while survey'd With wonder… 25:55.329 --> 25:58.469 Satan rushes to the congregation of angels assembled 25:58.465 --> 26:02.085 at the river Jordan because he wants to hear -- as the other 26:02.092 --> 26:05.722 angels do -- to hear the "high attest" that God is bestowing 26:05.719 --> 26:10.739 upon this man from Nazareth, this nobody who was "the Son of 26:10.738 --> 26:14.378 Joseph deem'd." It's as at his hearing of this 26:14.379 --> 26:17.929 divine voice that Satan is "Thunderstruck."Now, 26:17.928 --> 26:20.978 "thunderstruck" is a striking word here. 26:20.980 --> 26:24.640 It bursts out of this passage as a little metaphor, 26:24.639 --> 26:27.859 and we're taking whatever we can get here. 26:27.859 --> 26:31.619 We take note of it because Milton has given us so little by 26:31.621 --> 26:35.321 way of poetic metaphor in the severely restrained literary 26:35.318 --> 26:39.078 world of Paradise Regained that we're grateful. 26:39.079 --> 26:42.859 The word "thunderstruck" is, in fact, so striking and so 26:42.858 --> 26:47.048 powerful that Milton has used it only one other time in all of 26:47.049 --> 26:51.259 his poetry. It's clear here that Milton is 26:51.262 --> 26:57.312 asking us to remember that earlier occurrence so I'm going 26:57.307 --> 27:03.667 to ask you: Does anyone here remember where else in Milton -- 27:03.671 --> 27:10.041 extra credit here -- where else in Milton we have encountered 27:10.035 --> 27:13.425 the word "thunderstruck"? 27:13.430 --> 27:17.810 Okay. No one in Paradise Regained 27:17.806 --> 27:21.056 seems to have remembered the appearance [laughs] 27:21.064 --> 27:23.554 of the word either, and so you're in good 27:23.554 --> 27:26.654 company.If we can imagine the inhabitants of the world of 27:26.654 --> 27:29.604 Paradise Regained having been in a position to read 27:29.599 --> 27:32.749 Paradise Lost -- which is something I think that Milton 27:32.750 --> 27:36.260 sometimes asks us to imagine, although of course it's 27:36.261 --> 27:40.351 preposterous -- it's clear, I think, that Milton is asking 27:40.354 --> 27:43.374 us to remember that earlier occurrence, 27:43.369 --> 27:47.999 so I'm going to ask you to turn to page 343 of Paradise Lost, 27:48.001 --> 27:50.061 the Hughes edition. 27:50.059 --> 27:53.029 This is the climactic moment -- oh, 27:53.027 --> 27:57.637 and actually I have included this handily on your handout -- 27:57.635 --> 28:02.475 the moment in the war in heaven at which the Son of God assumes 28:02.478 --> 28:07.768 the chariot of paternal deity, gets in Dad's car and proceeds 28:07.774 --> 28:12.664 to put a decisive end to the battle with the rebel angels. 28:12.660 --> 28:15.400 This is what Raphael tells Adam: 28:15.400 --> 28:18.400 The overthrown he rais'd, and as a Herd 28:18.400 --> 28:21.850 Of Goats or timorous flock together throng'd 28:21.849 --> 28:24.629 Drove them before him Thunder-struck, 28:24.634 --> 28:26.024 pursu'd With terrors, 28:26.019 --> 28:29.229 and with furies to the bounds And Crystal wall of 28:29.233 --> 28:32.853 Heav'n... It's at this terrible moment of 28:32.846 --> 28:36.826 being thunderstruck by the awesome power of the Son that 28:36.832 --> 28:40.532 the rebel angels throw themselves headlong down from 28:40.528 --> 28:42.338 the verge of heaven. 28:42.339 --> 28:45.619 This is obviously an unbelievably consequential 28:45.619 --> 28:48.969 moment -- this is the moment of Satan's fall. 28:48.970 --> 28:53.860 I think there's got to be a point to Milton's recycling and 28:53.861 --> 28:57.561 repeating of this word, this striking word from 28:57.558 --> 29:00.108 Paradise Lost, in the new poem, 29:00.112 --> 29:01.772 Paradise Regained. 29:01.769 --> 29:05.159 I think he's signaling some kind of connection between the 29:05.158 --> 29:08.008 horrifying moment, from Satan's perspective, 29:08.009 --> 29:11.839 of the Son's victory over the fallen rebel angels in the 29:11.837 --> 29:14.757 earlier poem and the Son's new victory, 29:14.759 --> 29:18.469 or what's about to be his new victory, over Satan that begins 29:18.469 --> 29:20.469 at this moment, centuries later, 29:20.469 --> 29:24.209 at the Son's baptism.Milton alludes to that climactic moment 29:24.207 --> 29:27.767 in Paradise Lost but on some level this is an allusion 29:27.766 --> 29:31.066 that the later poem, Paradise Regained, 29:31.065 --> 29:34.035 doesn't know what to do with and, in fact, 29:34.044 --> 29:37.244 never really does anything explicit with. 29:37.240 --> 29:39.770 Satan is thunderstruck at the baptism just as he was 29:39.772 --> 29:41.612 thunderstruck at the war in heaven, 29:41.609 --> 29:46.429 but Satan himself is incapable -- and this is just ingenious on 29:46.433 --> 29:51.183 Milton's part -- he's incapable of understanding how these two 29:51.178 --> 29:55.538 moments might be in any way related.I don't know what 29:55.535 --> 30:00.255 kind of television, if any, you all watch. 30:00.259 --> 30:04.459 But I do know that -- not when I was an undergraduate because 30:04.460 --> 30:08.520 we got such terrible reception in the days before cable, 30:08.519 --> 30:11.269 but when I was a graduate student and living off campus 30:11.273 --> 30:14.333 and I had cable television -- I spent an inordinate amount of 30:14.334 --> 30:17.194 time watching soap [laughter] operas during the day. 30:17.190 --> 30:20.650 It was a way not to write my dissertation. 30:20.650 --> 30:26.360 If you've spent as much time as I have watching thousands of 30:26.355 --> 30:29.015 hours of soap operas, [laughter] 30:29.017 --> 30:30.847 you know what it means to be thunderstruck, 30:30.852 --> 30:33.392 which is something I take it to be closely related to being 30:33.387 --> 30:34.477 struck by lightning. 30:34.480 --> 30:37.300 At least in the 1970s and in the ‘80s, 30:37.295 --> 30:40.955 there is a point in almost every soap opera at least once 30:40.962 --> 30:44.432 every two or three years in which someone is struck by 30:44.432 --> 30:45.972 lightning, [laughter] 30:45.974 --> 30:48.054 and the consequence is invariably the same: 30:48.049 --> 30:49.679 it's the condition of amnesia. 30:49.680 --> 30:53.610 Soap operas obviously couldn't survive without some recourse to 30:53.606 --> 30:56.576 the amnesia plot, the lightning-striking plot, 30:56.575 --> 30:59.975 because it's a way to keep all of the actors intact but 30:59.979 --> 31:02.379 [laughs] reconfigure and spice up a lot 31:02.375 --> 31:05.815 of the plots, where the same actor gets to be 31:05.821 --> 31:10.221 someone completely new because he has to develop an entirely 31:10.220 --> 31:14.470 new life and new relationships with all of the preexisting 31:14.470 --> 31:18.940 actors and cast members.I think it's something very close 31:18.943 --> 31:22.903 to amnesia that Satan is struck with at this moment in 31:22.895 --> 31:25.425 Paradise Regained. 31:25.430 --> 31:30.020 It's as if Satan has at this very moment repressed any memory 31:30.016 --> 31:33.146 of his first having been thunderstruck. 31:33.150 --> 31:37.510 He has completely forgotten about the Son's role in the war 31:37.510 --> 31:42.020 in heaven, and I actually have to be more specific than that: 31:42.022 --> 31:46.382 Satan is incapable of applying to the current situation any 31:46.382 --> 31:51.272 memory of who it was who had beat him in the war in heaven. 31:51.269 --> 31:55.759 He has repressed the present significance that is significant 31:55.756 --> 31:59.716 for the present moment of the Son of God's victory, 31:59.720 --> 32:02.600 and it's the nature of this repression, I think, 32:02.596 --> 32:06.386 which is at the very center of Paradise Regained.The 32:06.392 --> 32:10.062 central advance that this poem has made over Paradise Lost 32:10.064 --> 32:13.864 is its refusal to represent traditional epic action. 32:13.860 --> 32:15.800 There's no big battle here. 32:15.800 --> 32:18.900 There's no war. There's no huge fight in which 32:18.903 --> 32:22.113 the woman's seed, Christ, bruises Satan's head. 32:22.109 --> 32:25.349 There's really actually no overt action at all. 32:25.349 --> 32:29.839 The hero quite simply does nothing and he just keeps saying 32:29.842 --> 32:31.882 no. Whatever action this text 32:31.875 --> 32:34.435 presents to us is clearly psychological, 32:34.442 --> 32:38.332 and the psychological problem that I think overwhelms all of 32:38.325 --> 32:42.265 the characters in Paradise Regained is the simple fact 32:42.274 --> 32:45.894 that they cannot [laughs] manage for the life of them to 32:45.894 --> 32:49.914 relate the current story that they're inhabiting to the events 32:49.909 --> 32:51.949 of Paradise Lost. 32:51.950 --> 32:56.480 They have forgotten Paradise Lost.Now, 32:56.478 --> 33:01.618 let me ask you to think about the dramatic situation of this 33:01.616 --> 33:04.666 poem. Satan knows perfectly well that 33:04.669 --> 33:08.989 God has prophesied that one of his sons will rise up one day 33:08.988 --> 33:12.368 and destroy him. He knows that this is going to 33:12.368 --> 33:15.878 happen, and he's very clear about the certainty of the 33:15.881 --> 33:17.871 prophecy from Genesis 3:15. 33:17.869 --> 33:22.299 Satan even knows that it is this man named Jesus who's being 33:22.296 --> 33:26.866 baptized now who will one day destroy him and who will one day 33:26.873 --> 33:29.953 be responsible for bruising his head; 33:29.950 --> 33:33.970 but Satan seems for some reason to have no way of knowing that 33:33.969 --> 33:36.829 the Son of God, who will at some point in the 33:36.832 --> 33:40.502 future be responsible for his doom, is the same Son of God who 33:40.496 --> 33:43.016 had devastated all of the rebel angels, 33:43.019 --> 33:45.549 and Satan himself of course, in the war in heaven. 33:45.549 --> 33:48.849 Satan has no way of knowing that the prophesied Messiah that 33:48.849 --> 33:52.149 he's dealing with now will turn out to be the Son of God, 33:52.150 --> 33:55.590 the first begotten.He has no way of knowing that the 33:55.588 --> 33:58.958 Messiah will be that same absolutely insufferable angel 33:58.963 --> 34:02.593 whom the Heavenly Father had promoted so arbitrarily and so 34:02.589 --> 34:06.279 ostentatiously above all of the other angels in Book Five of 34:06.277 --> 34:07.837 Paradise Lost. 34:07.839 --> 34:12.239 The traumatic scene of that exaltation, "This day I have 34:12.241 --> 34:15.481 begot… / My only Son," "[T]o him shall 34:15.477 --> 34:18.547 bow / All knees in Heav'n…," "[H]im who 34:18.550 --> 34:22.850 disobeys / Mee disobeys" -- you remember all of those thundering 34:22.852 --> 34:24.562 words of the Father. 34:24.559 --> 34:28.529 Satan is incapable of relating that traumatic scene to this 34:28.528 --> 34:31.538 traumatic scene, the traumatic scene that he's 34:31.535 --> 34:34.345 witnessing now, the "this is my beloved Son" at 34:34.352 --> 34:37.972 the baptism.Look at what Satan says -- it's excruciating 34:37.965 --> 34:42.385 and it makes us squirm, I think -- at the top of page 34:42.392 --> 34:44.522 485. This is Book One, 34:44.521 --> 34:46.281 line eighty-nine. 34:46.280 --> 34:50.670 Satan is trying to figure out what God meant by his strange 34:50.674 --> 34:52.724 utterance at the baptism. 34:52.719 --> 34:56.239 You can see Satan coming so close to an understanding, 34:56.241 --> 34:59.631 but he can't seem to make the final logical leap, 34:59.630 --> 35:02.370 and it's a leap, of course, that I think we all 35:02.368 --> 35:06.058 feel confident that we would have made or been able to make. 35:06.060 --> 35:07.760 Line eighty-nine; this is Satan: 35:07.761 --> 35:10.661 "His first-begot we know, and sore have felt, 35:10.657 --> 35:12.957 [laughs] he's remembering the war in 35:12.960 --> 35:15.460 heaven] / When his fierce thunder drove 35:15.462 --> 35:19.452 us to the deep; / Who this is we must 35:19.449 --> 35:21.979 learn…" So he's able to remember the 35:21.975 --> 35:24.385 sensation of being thunderstruck in Paradise Lost, 35:24.389 --> 35:28.789 but he can't connect it with the thunderous proclamation 35:28.786 --> 35:30.736 of the Son at the baptism. 35:30.739 --> 35:35.989 It's as if we have a failure of the synaptic nerves in Satan's 35:35.992 --> 35:40.902 brain and he can't make what seems to be to us the obvious 35:40.900 --> 35:46.070 cognitive link.I think his inability to make that link is 35:46.066 --> 35:49.246 surprising, but we have to understand that 35:49.252 --> 35:50.862 Satan has been traumatized. 35:50.860 --> 35:53.540 It's as if the war in heaven had produced in Satan something 35:53.535 --> 35:55.345 like a post-traumatic stress disorder, 35:55.349 --> 35:59.379 and the nature of this disorder is his -- well, 35:59.379 --> 36:03.849 I think it's perfectly understandable in just simple 36:03.847 --> 36:05.947 psychological terms. 36:05.949 --> 36:09.649 You'll remember that the original motive for Satan's fall 36:09.649 --> 36:13.349 was the Father's exultation of his beloved Son -- his now 36:13.348 --> 36:17.048 beloved Son above all of the other angels -- and that the 36:17.047 --> 36:20.747 resulting sibling rivalry was the spur for all of Satan's 36:20.746 --> 36:24.686 later actions. The dilemma of sibling rivalry 36:24.686 --> 36:29.076 is at the heart of Paradise Regained as well, 36:29.079 --> 36:32.829 but sibling rivalry in this poem exists solely as a 36:32.829 --> 36:35.679 phenomenon that has to be repressed. 36:35.679 --> 36:39.299 Satan simply cannot and will not make the cognitive 36:39.299 --> 36:42.919 connection between the rivalry he feels now to this 36:42.918 --> 36:46.608 Messiah-character and the one that he had felt, 36:46.610 --> 36:48.720 that primal, originary rivalry that had 36:48.724 --> 36:51.844 proven so devastating in Paradise Lost.Now, 36:51.840 --> 36:54.580 we may feel that we can understand on psychological 36:54.577 --> 36:57.637 grounds the reason for Satan's inability to read the full 36:57.642 --> 37:00.382 meaning of God's pronouncement at the baptism, 37:00.380 --> 37:07.790 but I think the true genius of Milton's poem is the fact that 37:07.792 --> 37:12.612 the Son is just as clueless as Satan. 37:12.610 --> 37:17.140 The Son has even less memory, in fact, than Satan about his 37:17.137 --> 37:19.477 former activities in heaven. 37:19.480 --> 37:22.880 The Son can't even begin to reconstruct what had happened in 37:22.883 --> 37:26.463 Paradise Lost because in assuming his earthly mantle, 37:26.460 --> 37:30.920 he seems to have suffered a much greater and much more 37:30.916 --> 37:34.276 severe case of amnesia than Satan had. 37:34.280 --> 37:37.630 I think it's this image of amnesia, or of some kind of 37:37.625 --> 37:40.965 repression or some sort of pathological forgetting, 37:40.969 --> 37:43.539 that may provide the most useful way of thinking about the 37:43.544 --> 37:46.214 relation of Paradise Regained to the earlier poem, 37:46.210 --> 37:49.680 Paradise Lost.Now, let's think about it from 37:49.677 --> 37:51.087 another perspective. 37:51.090 --> 37:53.500 In writing Paradise Regained, 37:53.496 --> 37:57.406 Milton has clearly had to repress everything that had been 37:57.414 --> 37:59.764 -- well, not everything but pretty much 37:59.756 --> 38:02.836 everything -- that had been so liberating, so revolutionary, 38:02.840 --> 38:06.630 and so remarkable about Paradise Lost. 38:06.630 --> 38:10.510 Now it might be tempting to argue, and it of course has been 38:10.506 --> 38:13.886 argued, that Milton is just getting old and he's getting 38:13.891 --> 38:17.031 tired and he's not up to all those similes now, 38:17.030 --> 38:20.720 but Milton has severed from his verse all of that luxuriant 38:20.717 --> 38:23.067 ornamentation for a deliberate and, 38:23.070 --> 38:25.210 I think, a very important reason. 38:25.210 --> 38:29.130 He's purging his verse of what we now take to be its 38:29.129 --> 38:31.819 characteristic beauty because he, 38:31.820 --> 38:37.060 too, like Satan and like the Son, is struggling to forget 38:37.058 --> 38:39.208 Paradise Lost. 38:39.210 --> 38:41.760 I think there's an important sense in which Milton is 38:41.757 --> 38:44.837 thinking of the beautiful verse style of Paradise Lost as 38:44.844 --> 38:47.054 something like a temptation in this poem, 38:47.050 --> 38:49.610 and it's a temptation that he has to resist. 38:49.610 --> 38:52.550 Look at the scene of the second temptation in Paradise 38:52.550 --> 38:55.110 Regained. This is page 500 of the 38:55.107 --> 39:02.007 Hughes. This is Book Two, line 289. 39:02.010 --> 39:05.730 The Son is beginning to get hungry, understandably, 39:05.733 --> 39:09.753 after his forty days in the wilderness, and he enters a 39:09.754 --> 39:13.184 pleasant grove where he encounters Satan: 39:13.179 --> 39:16.939 Only in a bottom [this is line 289 of Book Two] 39:16.944 --> 39:20.624 saw a pleasant Grove, With chant of tuneful Birds 39:20.622 --> 39:23.952 resounding loud, Thither he bent his way, 39:23.950 --> 39:27.160 determin'd there To rest at noon, 39:27.155 --> 39:32.325 and enter'd soon the shade, High rooft, and walks beneath, 39:32.329 --> 39:35.829 and alleys brown That open'd in the midst a 39:35.829 --> 39:39.069 woody Scene; Nature's own work it seem'd 39:39.071 --> 39:42.361 (Nature taught Art) And to a Superstitious eye the 39:42.361 --> 39:45.211 haunt Of Wood Gods and Wood 39:45.210 --> 39:49.110 Nymphs… I think this pretty little 39:49.105 --> 39:52.425 landscape that we have here is rather jarring in the context of 39:52.431 --> 39:53.961 the reserved, the sparing, 39:53.955 --> 39:57.335 pleasures typically afforded us in Paradise Regained. 39:57.340 --> 40:01.260 It's jarring because this pleasant grove reminds us, 40:01.261 --> 40:06.031 I think, in so many ways of the Garden of Eden from Paradise 40:06.028 --> 40:08.528 Lost. Milton's description here 40:08.526 --> 40:12.256 is, in fact, a tissue of echoes from Book Four of Paradise 40:12.264 --> 40:15.384 Lost where Eden opens onto a woody theater, 40:15.380 --> 40:19.540 just as this grove opens onto a woody scene. 40:19.539 --> 40:23.459 This grove seems to appear to possess wood gods and wood 40:23.455 --> 40:27.575 nymphs much as the verse of Paradise Lost was filled 40:27.583 --> 40:31.713 with the allusions to all of those classical presences that 40:31.712 --> 40:35.632 Milton had culled from his lifetime of reading classical 40:35.627 --> 40:39.017 literature. But here the deities of pagan 40:39.015 --> 40:42.595 literature are branded as superstition -- "thus they 40:42.596 --> 40:45.566 relate, erring." All of those elements, 40:45.572 --> 40:50.132 those aesthetic elements that had made Paradise Lost so 40:50.128 --> 40:51.768 lovable, so engaging, 40:51.774 --> 40:55.964 and so enticing are now branded as a temptation.It's as if 40:55.964 --> 41:00.294 the Son were being tempted with something like the literature of 41:00.291 --> 41:04.481 Paradise Lost when he's presented with this opportunity 41:04.481 --> 41:07.971 -- that he takes, by the way -- to enter this 41:07.972 --> 41:10.652 grove. It's important that the Son 41:10.647 --> 41:15.687 willingly enters this pleasant grove that has been so carefully 41:15.693 --> 41:18.463 fashioned, of course, by Satan. 41:18.460 --> 41:22.210 Readers of this poem rightly are always shocked by this 41:22.212 --> 41:25.342 moment because this is the Son of God here, 41:25.340 --> 41:28.760 after all, and he's the very picture of virtue and of perfect 41:28.758 --> 41:32.118 reason -- and he's made this unbelievably stupid mistake. 41:32.119 --> 41:34.989 This is like the mistake that the Red Cross Knight makes in 41:34.993 --> 41:38.163 the first canto of The Faerie Queene, entering the wood of 41:38.164 --> 41:40.194 error. The beauty of paradise, 41:40.190 --> 41:43.320 and by extension the beauty of Paradise Lost, 41:43.316 --> 41:45.906 is so tempting, we could say, 41:45.905 --> 41:50.665 that even the Son of God feels its overwhelming magnetic 41:50.668 --> 41:54.748 pull.Yet Milton, I think, is still working 41:54.746 --> 41:59.756 consciously here to renounce all of that extraordinary poetic 41:59.755 --> 42:04.175 license that he had taken in Paradise Lost. 42:04.179 --> 42:09.789 This new poem explores in more depth and with more insight the 42:09.791 --> 42:15.491 merit and the beauty of poetic renunciation than any other poem 42:15.494 --> 42:17.914 ever has. I'm convinced of that. 42:17.909 --> 42:21.069 This is a poem all about denial and repression, 42:21.068 --> 42:24.638 and its deepest and most powerful meanings emerge not 42:24.639 --> 42:28.149 through our sense, I think, of what the poem 42:28.147 --> 42:32.617 offers but our sense of what it's not offering or what it 42:32.623 --> 42:35.823 won't permit itself to offer.Now, 42:35.820 --> 42:38.310 there's an obvious and explicit way in which Paradise 42:38.308 --> 42:40.388 Regained is about this kind of negation, 42:40.389 --> 42:43.779 or this renunciation, of Paradise Lost. 42:43.780 --> 42:46.730 Paradise Lost was about man's first disobedience and the 42:46.730 --> 42:48.580 new poem, Paradise Regained, 42:48.579 --> 42:53.269 reverses that situation and treats another man's unswerving 42:53.272 --> 42:56.872 obedience to God, an obedience so severe that at 42:56.872 --> 43:00.932 times I think it strikes us as unthinking or unreflective. 43:00.929 --> 43:04.009 That's just the obvious way in which Paradise Regained 43:04.005 --> 43:07.625 works to negate or undo the effects of Paradise Lost, 43:07.630 --> 43:10.440 but there's another, there's a more significant, 43:10.443 --> 43:13.983 way in which Milton's later poem attempts to forge some kind 43:13.975 --> 43:16.305 of connection with the earlier one. 43:16.309 --> 43:21.259 Milton in the new poem is acutely aware of his already 43:21.260 --> 43:26.680 having written the great epic Paradise Lost and with 43:26.677 --> 43:30.037 this intense self-consciousness. 43:30.039 --> 43:34.509 It's an entirely new neurotic burden for Milton. 43:34.510 --> 43:38.270 Paradise Regained takes up the problem that had proven 43:38.267 --> 43:41.647 so difficult and so troubling to the younger Milton, 43:41.650 --> 43:43.640 and he takes it up once again but, of course, 43:43.640 --> 43:46.490 with a twist -- and this is the problem of the poet's career. 43:46.489 --> 43:49.149 It's as if Milton can stand back now and review the 43:49.146 --> 43:52.166 autobiographical narrative he had written for himself as a 43:52.174 --> 43:55.474 young man and take stock in what he's accomplished.So think 43:55.468 --> 43:58.548 of the basic situation that the Son of God finds himself in 43:58.549 --> 44:00.089 Paradise Regained. 44:00.090 --> 44:03.780 Even before the remarkable moment of God's pronouncement at 44:03.776 --> 44:07.516 the baptism, Jesus had grown up with the knowledge of his future 44:07.522 --> 44:08.952 role as the Messiah. 44:08.949 --> 44:14.429 His mother had told him, Mary had told him when he was a 44:14.431 --> 44:17.721 young boy of what he was to be. 44:17.719 --> 44:21.209 He had at a very early age a sense of the important work that 44:21.208 --> 44:23.998 he would perform at some future point in time, 44:24.000 --> 44:27.000 but he didn't know exactly what that work was going to look 44:26.998 --> 44:29.348 like. He didn't have a clue as to 44:29.353 --> 44:32.973 when he was actually supposed to begin his work. 44:32.969 --> 44:37.669 In short, the Son of God had before him a narrative of his 44:37.669 --> 44:42.119 career long before he was able to imagine just how that 44:42.120 --> 44:46.740 narrative was going to be fleshed out.If this problem 44:46.737 --> 44:51.457 sounds a little familiar to you, that's of course because it is 44:51.460 --> 44:54.240 familiar. This is precisely the position 44:54.235 --> 44:57.525 that the young Milton had found himself in. 44:57.530 --> 45:01.490 He had declared at a very early age that he was chosen by God to 45:01.485 --> 45:05.435 write a poem that his countrymen would not willingly let die. 45:05.440 --> 45:08.590 He was going to be England's literary Messiah, 45:08.587 --> 45:12.707 but that was years before he knew what he was supposed to be 45:12.713 --> 45:17.193 writing about or even when he was supposed to begin writing. 45:17.190 --> 45:20.670 As he says in Paradise Lost, he was "long in 45:20.674 --> 45:22.574 choosing and beginning late." 45:22.570 --> 45:28.120 This is exactly the position that the Son of God finds 45:28.116 --> 45:34.076 himself in in Paradise Regained.Look at the top 45:34.082 --> 45:37.852 of page 487, Book One, line 183. 45:37.849 --> 45:43.529 This is the Son of God trying to figure out what the Father 45:43.530 --> 45:48.610 must have meant at the baptism: Meanwhile the Son of God, 45:48.612 --> 45:51.022 who yet some days Lodg'd in Bethabara, 45:51.015 --> 45:55.115 where John baptiz'd, Musing and much revolving in 45:55.115 --> 45:58.045 his breast, How best the mighty work he 45:58.050 --> 46:00.960 might begin Of Savior to mankind, 46:00.955 --> 46:05.785 and which way first Publish his Godlike office now 46:05.789 --> 46:09.759 mature… Now, if we read this passage 46:09.761 --> 46:12.891 with any sense at all, or with any knowledge, 46:12.890 --> 46:16.810 of its author, I think that this moment as 46:16.807 --> 46:21.417 seen from the life of Christ -- I don't know. 46:21.420 --> 46:22.660 It's completely absurd. 46:22.660 --> 46:24.790 It's a ridiculous situation. 46:24.789 --> 46:29.039 You have Jesus thinking: "I'm supposed to be the savior 46:29.037 --> 46:30.807 of mankind. Let me think. 46:30.810 --> 46:31.810 What should I do first? 46:31.810 --> 46:34.290 I'm really confused here." 46:34.289 --> 46:40.329 No one else has ever and would ever imagine such a scene of a 46:40.334 --> 46:46.484 kind of career anxiety in some sort of narrative involving the 46:46.478 --> 46:50.128 Son of God. It's laughable to think of the 46:50.132 --> 46:53.922 Son of God as undergoing something like a career panic 46:53.918 --> 46:58.488 attack.But this passage is very different and it assumes, 46:58.489 --> 47:02.159 I think, an extraordinary degree of significance when it's 47:02.161 --> 47:05.771 placed in the context of Milton's own ongoing ruminations 47:05.769 --> 47:07.379 about his own career. 47:07.380 --> 47:11.230 The Son is asking himself how he should publish, 47:11.226 --> 47:15.726 how he should make public, the godlike office into which 47:15.727 --> 47:17.607 he has now matured. 47:17.610 --> 47:21.660 I think it's impossible not to hear in these lines the 47:21.657 --> 47:25.927 analogous concern that Milton had himself revolved in his 47:25.933 --> 47:30.443 breast when he was pondering when he should publish or bring 47:30.439 --> 47:34.949 into print the fruits of what he knew was his godlike poetic 47:34.945 --> 47:39.675 talent.So I want to conclude with this suggestion, 47:39.679 --> 47:43.909 the suggestion that Milton has transposed the narrative -- this 47:43.911 --> 47:48.141 is only one of the myriad things that he's doing in Paradise 47:48.143 --> 47:52.383 Regained -- he's transposed the narrative of his own poetic 47:52.375 --> 47:56.535 development onto the development of the Son's sense of his own 47:56.539 --> 47:58.579 identity. By saying this, 47:58.580 --> 48:02.050 I don't want to suggest that all Paradise Regained is 48:02.045 --> 48:03.685 an autobiographical poem. 48:03.690 --> 48:05.540 I'm convinced, of course, that it is an 48:05.540 --> 48:08.860 autobiographical poem; but it is first and foremost, 48:08.857 --> 48:12.927 I think, a meditation on the problem of autobiography. 48:12.929 --> 48:17.219 Milton is in the amazingly peculiar position of having 48:17.221 --> 48:22.081 written his autobiography long before he'd actually lived the 48:22.079 --> 48:23.779 bulk of his life. 48:23.780 --> 48:27.860 That's what all those career narratives were doing that he 48:27.859 --> 48:30.149 had penned in the early 1640s. 48:30.150 --> 48:34.780 How do you actually live a life, the end of which you 48:34.775 --> 48:38.185 already know? What's the relation of the 48:38.190 --> 48:43.230 anticipated life narrative to the actual experience of living? 48:43.230 --> 48:46.430 These are, of course, the questions that plague Adam 48:46.432 --> 48:49.952 and Eve in the last books of Paradise Lost as they 48:49.948 --> 48:53.648 learn the future history of their descendants but still have 48:53.652 --> 48:56.982 to go about the business of living their lives. 48:56.980 --> 49:00.920 These are clearly questions that get to the very heart of 49:00.923 --> 49:04.453 Milton's relation to the prophecy of his own poetic 49:04.445 --> 49:08.315 talent, and they're questions that we 49:08.321 --> 49:14.741 will continue throughout this week as we approach the problem 49:14.738 --> 49:21.688 that Milton confronts when he writes Paradise Regained. 49:21.690 --> 49:25.380 That's this question: what does it mean, 49:25.384 --> 49:31.164 after all, to write a sequel to the poem that "aftertimes will 49:31.162 --> 49:33.722 not willingly let die"? 49:33.720 --> 49:35.950 Okay. I'm going to end there. 49:35.949 --> 49:40.399 I'm going to ask you to make sure you will have read all of 49:40.402 --> 49:43.552 Paradise Regained for Wednesday. 49:43.550 --> 49:45.000 Okay.