ENGL 3290

Losing Paradise: Milton's Great Epic

Course Description

Course information provided by the 2016-2017 Catalog.

Whose story is the story of the fall? Milton's poem about "man's first disobedience" begins, in fact, with a story about an earlier act of falling, that of Satan, and inserts the human perspective in a larger drama of which Adam and Eve are at first largely unaware. Why can't the story of falling be told as a single plot or from a single perspective, and what does this tell us about the human, about history, and about (poetic) narrative? How does the poem's echoing of earlier texts raise questions (literary, political, philosophical) about the problem of finding a single voice with which to tell this story? We will read Paradise Lost in full, with attention to excerpts from biblical, theological, political, and classical texts.

Distribution Category (LA-AS)

When Offered Fall.

Breadth Requirement (HB)

Satisfies Requirement This course may be used as one of the three pre-1800 courses required of English majors.

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