How Does Milton Develop Eve’s Character in Paradise Lost from Creation to the Fall?
Author: MARTIN MUNYAO MUINDE
Email: Ephantusmartin@gmail.com
Introduction
John Milton’s Paradise Lost (1667) presents one of the most complex and controversial female characters in English literature: Eve, the first woman and mother of humanity. Milton’s development of Eve’s character from her creation in Book IV through her temptation and fall in Book IX has generated extensive scholarly debate, with readers disagreeing about whether Milton portrays Eve as a weak, inferior being or as a character possessing agency, intelligence, and moral complexity. Understanding Eve’s character development is essential for comprehending Milton’s exploration of gender, free will, marriage, and the nature of sin in his epic poem. Milton develops Eve’s character through several distinct stages: her creation and first awakening, her relationship with Adam, her intellectual and spiritual growth, her separation from Adam before the Fall, and finally her temptation and decision to eat the forbidden fruit. Each stage reveals different facets of Eve’s personality and raises important questions about innocence, knowledge, autonomy, and responsibility. This essay examines how Milton develops Eve’s character throughout Paradise Lost, analyzing her creation narrative, her psychology and motivations, her relationship dynamics with Adam, her intellectual capacities, and the factors contributing to her fall. By tracing Eve’s development from creation to the Fall, we can better understand Milton’s complex treatment of the first woman and the theological, moral, and gender implications embedded in his characterization.
Eve’s Creation and First Awakening
Milton’s account of Eve’s creation and awakening in Book IV establishes fundamental aspects of her character that influence her later development and ultimate fall. Unlike Adam, who awakens alone and must discover his identity through conversation with God, Eve’s first conscious experience involves gazing at her own reflection in a pool of water, an episode that has sparked considerable critical interpretation. Eve narrates her own creation story to Adam, recalling how she was “led by her heavenly Maker” to a clear pool where she saw “a shape within the watery gleam” and immediately felt drawn to it (Milton IV.460-465). This moment of narcissistic fascination with her own image has been interpreted variously as evidence of Eve’s vanity, as an innocent and natural response to beauty, or as a symbol of self-knowledge and identity formation. Milton’s choice to have Eve attracted to her own reflection before she meets Adam establishes a pattern of Eve preferring immediate sensory experience over abstract reasoning, a characteristic that later contributes to her susceptibility to Satan’s temptation (Froula, 1983). The narrative also introduces the theme of guidance, as a divine voice redirects Eve from self-contemplation toward Adam, establishing the hierarchical structure that governs prelapsarian Paradise.
The circumstances of Eve’s creation—formed from Adam’s rib while he sleeps—position her as secondary and derivative in the cosmic order, a point Milton emphasizes through both narrative structure and explicit theological commentary. Adam’s account of Eve’s creation in Book VIII presents her emergence as the fulfillment of his desire for companionship, describing how he watched God fashion Eve from his own substance. When Adam first sees Eve, he recognizes her as “bone of my bone, flesh of my flesh” (Milton VIII.495), establishing both their essential unity and his priority in creation. However, Milton complicates this hierarchical relationship by depicting Eve as Adam’s aesthetic and emotional superior in certain respects. Adam himself admits that Eve’s beauty and grace overwhelm his reason, that her presence affects him in ways that suggest her power over him despite her supposed subordination (Nyquist, 1987). This tension between formal hierarchy and practical dynamics characterizes the relationship throughout the poem and contributes to the complexity of Eve’s character development. Milton thus establishes Eve from her first moments as a figure of beauty, sensory engagement, and emotional intelligence, qualities that distinguish her from Adam’s more rational and abstract approach to existence but that also make her vulnerable to deception through appeals to these very characteristics.
Eve’s Relationship with Adam: Equality and Hierarchy
The relationship between Adam and Eve in Milton’s Paradise Lost embodies a complex interplay of equality and hierarchy that shapes Eve’s character development and influences her ultimate decision to eat the forbidden fruit. Milton explicitly endorses the theological doctrine of wifely subordination, having God establish that Adam is “for God only, she for God in him” (Milton IV.299), indicating that Eve’s relationship to God is mediated through Adam rather than direct. This hierarchical arrangement reflects seventeenth-century Protestant theology and social structures, yet Milton simultaneously presents Eve as Adam’s intellectual companion and emotional equal in many respects. Their conversations reveal Eve’s capacity for theological reasoning and moral discernment, challenging simplistic readings of her as merely passive or inferior. When Eve questions aspects of their existence, such as the purpose of the stars shining at night when they are asleep, Adam responds with patient explanation, establishing a pedagogical dynamic where he serves as teacher and she as student, yet her questions demonstrate genuine intellectual curiosity rather than deficiency (McColley, 1983).
The emotional dynamics of Adam and Eve’s relationship further complicate the formal hierarchy. While Adam technically holds authority, his overwhelming love for Eve gives her considerable practical influence over him, a point Milton emphasizes through Adam’s own admissions in Book VIII. Adam confesses to the angel Raphael that Eve’s beauty and companionship affect him so powerfully that he sometimes seems to lose his rational judgment in her presence, leading Raphael to warn him against allowing passion to override reason. This admission reveals a paradox in the prelapsarian relationship: Eve is theoretically subordinate, yet Adam’s emotional dependence on her grants her significant power. Milton develops Eve’s character partly through this relationship dynamic, showing how she navigates the tension between her formal subordination and her actual influence. Her awareness of Adam’s love for her affects her decision-making process, particularly when she considers eating the fruit and realizes that if she dies, Adam might be given a new companion, a thought she finds unbearable (Guillory, 1983). Thus, Milton develops Eve not as a simple subordinate but as a complex partner in a relationship marked by genuine affection, intellectual companionship, and subtle power dynamics that will ultimately contribute to humanity’s fall when both partners fail to maintain proper relationships with God and with each other.
Eve’s Intellectual Capacity and Spiritual Development
One of the most important dimensions of Milton’s development of Eve’s character involves her intellectual capacity and spiritual understanding. Contrary to interpretations that present Eve as intellectually inferior or incapable of rational thought, Milton depicts her engaging in theological reasoning, asking probing questions, and demonstrating spiritual awareness throughout the poem. In Book IV, Eve and Adam offer their morning prayer together, with Eve’s portion demonstrating her understanding of divine providence and her place in the created order. Her prayer reveals awareness of theological concepts and ability to articulate religious devotion in eloquent language, suggesting that her subordination to Adam is not based on intellectual deficiency but on divine decree regarding order and hierarchy. Eve’s conversations with Adam about astronomy, theology, and their duties in Paradise further establish her as a thinking being capable of abstract reasoning, not merely a creature of sensory experience and emotion (Lewalski, 1985).
However, Milton also develops Eve’s character by distinguishing her intellectual style from Adam’s, a distinction with significant implications for the Fall. Where Adam engages in abstract theological speculation and seeks knowledge for its own sake, Eve tends toward practical wisdom and focuses on immediate duties and experiences. This difference appears clearly in Book VIII, when Eve chooses to leave while Raphael discusses complex astronomical theories with Adam, explaining that she prefers to learn such matters later from Adam rather than directly from the angel. Some critics interpret this departure as evidence of Eve’s intellectual limitations, while others read it as demonstrating her practical wisdom in recognizing that her presence enables Adam to display his knowledge, which pleases him, or that she prefers Adam’s teaching style to Raphael’s more technical discourse (Walker, 1988). Milton’s development of this distinction between Eve’s practical, relational intelligence and Adam’s abstract, theoretical reasoning patterns becomes crucial in understanding the Fall, as Satan exploits specifically Eve’s mode of thinking through empirical demonstration and appeal to experience rather than abstract theological argument. Milton thus develops Eve as intellectually capable but with a different cognitive style from Adam, a difference that reflects seventeenth-century gender assumptions while also providing psychological realism and complexity to his characterization. Her intelligence makes her a genuine moral agent responsible for her choices, while her particular intellectual approach makes her vulnerable to specific types of deception.
The Separation Scene: Eve’s Desire for Independence
Book IX of Paradise Lost opens with a pivotal scene that crystallizes many aspects of Milton’s development of Eve’s character: her proposal to work separately from Adam in the Garden. This separation scene has generated more critical commentary than perhaps any other moment in the poem regarding Eve’s character, as it reveals her desire for independence, her self-confidence, her reasoning abilities, and the tensions in her relationship with Adam. Eve proposes the separation for ostensibly practical reasons, arguing that they will be more productive working apart because they currently distract each other with conversation and mutual admiration, causing their work to go more slowly. This practical argument demonstrates Eve’s attention to efficiency and her awareness of how their relationship affects their productivity. However, the proposal also reveals deeper psychological dimensions: a desire for autonomy, perhaps some impatience with constant supervision, and confidence in her own abilities to resist temptation independently (Revard, 1980).
Adam’s response to Eve’s proposal and the ensuing debate between them further develop both characters while highlighting the tragic irony of their situation. Adam argues against separation not by asserting his authority but by reasoning with Eve about the danger of Satan, who has been reported in the Garden. He suggests that they are safer together, that their union strengthens them against temptation. Significantly, Adam does not forbid Eve to leave but rather tries to persuade her through argument, respecting her rational agency even while disagreeing with her proposal. When Eve responds with apparent hurt that Adam seems to doubt her steadfastness, suggesting that his lack of trust wounds her, Adam relents and allows her to go, prioritizing her happiness and autonomy over his judgment about safety (Froula, 1983). This exchange reveals Milton’s sophisticated understanding of relationship dynamics and moral psychology. Eve’s desire for independence is not itself sinful, nor is Adam’s concern unreasonable, yet both make choices that contribute to the Fall: Eve insists on separation despite warnings, and Adam yields against his better judgment out of love and respect for Eve’s autonomy. Milton develops Eve’s character through this scene as possessing agency, self-confidence, and desire for independence—qualities that in themselves are not evil but that, in the context of an imminent supernatural threat, lead to vulnerability. The separation represents Eve’s assertion of her own judgment against Adam’s advice, establishing her full moral responsibility for what follows while also showing the complex motivations underlying her decision.
Eve’s Temptation: Psychology and Rhetoric
Milton’s account of Eve’s temptation by Satan in Book IX represents the climax of his development of her character, revealing how her particular qualities—her sensory engagement with the world, her intellectual curiosity, her desire for advancement, and her love for Adam—all contribute to her decision to eat the forbidden fruit. Satan approaches Eve through the serpent, having observed her and crafted his temptation specifically to exploit her characteristics. He begins with elaborate flattery, praising her beauty in language that recalls Eve’s first narcissistic attraction to her own reflection, appealing to her susceptibility to aesthetic appreciation and admiration. Satan’s rhetoric employs multiple sophisticated strategies: he claims to have eaten from the Tree of Knowledge and gained speech, providing empirical “evidence” for the fruit’s transformative power; he questions God’s prohibition as arbitrary and envious, reframing obedience as servile submission; he appeals to Eve’s desire for knowledge and advancement; and he suggests that eating the fruit will make Eve and Adam “as gods,” addressing her ambition (Schwartz, 1988).
Milton develops Eve’s response to this temptation with psychological nuance, showing her internal deliberation and the various factors influencing her decision. Eve notices the serpent’s ability to speak and reasons that if the fruit gave the serpent such capacity, it might elevate humans similarly. She examines the fruit’s appearance, finding it beautiful and desirable, allowing sensory appeal to influence her judgment. Satan’s argument that God forbids the fruit precisely because He envies humanity and wants to keep them inferior resonates with Eve’s desire for advancement and her incomplete understanding of divine justice. Significantly, Eve’s decision involves reasoning, not just emotional or sensory response; she constructs arguments for eating the fruit, demonstrating her rational capacity even as she misapplies it (Evans, 1968). Milton shows how pride gradually infiltrates Eve’s thinking as she imagines the glory of becoming god-like and considers whether she should share the fruit with Adam or keep its benefits for herself. This moment of considering whether to share the fruit reveals the moral corruption already taking place in Eve’s mind: her love for Adam wars with her ambition and fear that he might be given a new partner if she dies. Ultimately, Eve decides to share the fruit with Adam, a decision motivated partly by love but also by her refusal to lose him to another. Through this detailed psychological portrait of Eve’s temptation and fall, Milton develops her character as complex and tragic: she possesses genuine agency and intelligence, yet these very qualities enable her deception when pride and desire distort her judgment.
Eve’s Agency and Moral Responsibility
Central to Milton’s development of Eve’s character is the question of her agency and moral responsibility for the Fall. Unlike interpretations that present Eve as passive victim of Satan’s deception or as simply weak and inferior, Milton portrays Eve as a genuine moral agent who makes choices and bears responsibility for their consequences. Throughout the poem, Milton emphasizes that both Adam and Eve possess free will, the capacity to choose between obedience and disobedience without predetermination or compulsion. Eve’s intellectual capabilities, demonstrated through her conversations, prayers, and reasoning, establish her as a responsible moral being capable of discerning right from wrong. God’s prohibition regarding the Tree of Knowledge applied equally to both Adam and Eve, and both received clear instruction about the consequences of disobedience. The fact that Raphael’s warnings about Satan’s presence in the Garden were directed primarily to Adam, who was then expected to convey them to Eve, reflects the hierarchical structure of Paradise but does not diminish Eve’s responsibility to heed those warnings once conveyed (McColley, 1983).
Milton’s emphasis on Eve’s agency serves his larger theological purpose of justifying God’s punishment of humanity for the Fall. If Eve lacked genuine free will, intelligence, or moral capacity, then her punishment would seem unjust, making God appear tyrannical rather than just. By developing Eve as intelligent, spiritually aware, and capable of moral reasoning, Milton ensures that her sin results from choice rather than deficiency or compulsion. Eve’s deliberation before eating the fruit, her internal debate about its consequences, and her decision to share it with Adam all demonstrate conscious agency. Even after eating the fruit, Eve exercises agency in deciding to bring Adam into her fallen state, a decision motivated by complex factors including love, fear, and unwillingness to be replaced (Guillory, 1983). This emphasis on Eve’s moral responsibility has generated feminist criticism of Milton, with scholars debating whether his portrayal of Eve as responsible agent empowers her or merely provides theological justification for blaming women for humanity’s fallen condition. Nevertheless, Milton’s development of Eve as a character with genuine agency, whatever his intentions or cultural limitations, provides the foundation for reading her as a complex, tragic figure whose choices matter and whose character develops meaningfully across the poem’s narrative arc from creation to Fall.
Gender Dynamics and Seventeenth-Century Context
Understanding Milton’s development of Eve’s character requires attention to the gender ideologies and social contexts of seventeenth-century England. Milton wrote Paradise Lost within a Protestant theological tradition that emphasized wifely subordination and male headship in marriage, doctrines derived from biblical texts and reinforced by social practice. The concept that Eve was created as a “help meet” for Adam, that she was formed from his rib, and that her relationship to God was mediated through her husband reflected mainstream religious teaching of the period. Milton’s explicit statements about hierarchy—that Adam is “for God only, she for God in him”—align with these conventional beliefs and have led many modern readers to view the poem as misogynistic, presenting women as inherently inferior to men (Nyquist, 1987). The fact that Eve falls first and then leads Adam into sin follows the Genesis narrative but also reflects cultural anxieties about female influence and the dangers of men allowing women too much power in the domestic sphere.
However, Milton’s development of Eve’s character also reveals tensions and complexities within seventeenth-century gender ideology that make simple judgments about his misogyny or feminism anachronistic. Milton lived through the English Civil War and Interregnum, periods of significant social upheaval that included debates about women’s roles and rights. His writings on divorce argued for greater mutuality in marriage than was conventional, emphasizing companionship and intellectual compatibility as essential to successful unions. In Paradise Lost, Milton develops the relationship between Adam and Eve as genuinely companionate in many respects, with mutual affection, intellectual exchange, and emotional interdependence that goes beyond simple hierarchy. Eve’s intelligence, spiritual awareness, and moral agency in the poem grant her a dignity and complexity that exceed many contemporary representations of women. The fact that Adam falls knowingly, choosing Eve over obedience to God, suggests the inadequacy of simple male superiority, as the supposedly rational, superior male proves unable to resist his love for the supposedly inferior female (Walker, 1988). Milton’s development of Eve thus reflects both the limitations of seventeenth-century gender ideology and some capacity to imagine female character with complexity, agency, and dignity, even within a framework that modern readers find deeply problematic. Understanding this historical context helps readers appreciate both Milton’s achievement in developing Eve as a complex character and his limitations in imagining gender relations beyond his cultural moment.
Eve After the Fall: Shame, Blame, and Reconciliation
Milton’s development of Eve’s character continues after the Fall, as he depicts her responses to sin and its immediate consequences. The transformation in Eve’s consciousness and relationship with Adam following her eating the forbidden fruit reveals the moral and spiritual corruption that sin produces. Immediately after eating, Eve experiences a kind of intoxication, feeling exhilarated by what she imagines as her new god-like status and debating whether to share the fruit with Adam. When she decides to bring Adam into her fallen state, her motivations mix love with selfishness, genuine affection with manipulation. Eve’s speech to Adam urging him to eat employs rhetoric similar to Satan’s, including false claims and twisted logic, demonstrating how sin corrupts not only moral character but also reason and communication (Evans, 1968). Adam’s decision to eat knowingly, choosing Eve over obedience to God, initially seems to validate their love, but Milton shows how sin immediately corrupts even this bond.
After both have eaten, Adam and Eve experience shame, conflict, and mutual recrimination, revealing how sin destroys the harmony that previously characterized their relationship. Their first actions after eating involve sexual passion now corrupted by lust rather than pure love, followed by sleep and awakening to shame and guilt. The couple begins to blame each other, with Adam accusing Eve of causing their fall and Eve responding defensively, arguing that Adam could have forbidden her more strongly or accompanied her to prevent temptation. This scene of mutual blame represents the nadir of their relationship, showing how sin isolates individuals and destroys fellowship even between those who love each other most deeply (Lewalski, 1985). However, Milton does not end Eve’s character development with this degradation. In Book X, after the Son pronounces judgment on them, Eve takes the initiative in reconciliation, humbling herself before Adam and offering to bear the full weight of God’s punishment herself if possible. This moment reveals Eve’s capacity for repentance, sacrifice, and moral growth even in her fallen state. Her proposal that they refrain from procreation to prevent their offspring from inheriting their cursed condition demonstrates her willingness to accept consequences and her concern for future generations. Adam eventually guides Eve toward a more theologically sound response of repentance and faith in God’s promised redemption, but it is Eve who initiates their reconciliation and first suggests accepting responsibility for their sin. Milton thus develops Eve’s character beyond the Fall, showing her capacity for both degradation and redemption, for selfishness and sacrifice, completing a character arc that moves from innocent creation through prideful rebellion to penitent acceptance of consequences and hope for divine mercy.
Critical Interpretations: Feminist Readings of Eve
Milton’s development of Eve’s character has generated substantial feminist literary criticism, with scholars offering sharply divergent interpretations of whether Milton’s portrayal empowers or diminishes women. Early feminist critics often viewed Paradise Lost as profoundly misogynistic, arguing that Milton portrays Eve as intellectually inferior, morally weaker, and responsible for humanity’s fall in ways that reinforce patriarchal ideology and blame women for human suffering. These readings emphasize the hierarchical structure Milton endorses, with Eve subordinated to Adam and her relationship to God mediated through her husband, as evidence of the poem’s anti-feminist ideology. Critics note that by having Eve fall first and then tempt Adam, Milton follows a pattern of blaming women for male sin and social disorder, a pattern with deep roots in Christian tradition and with harmful consequences for women throughout history (Froula, 1983).
However, more recent feminist criticism has offered more nuanced readings of Milton’s development of Eve, finding possibilities for feminist interpretation even within the poem’s patriarchal framework. These critics argue that Milton’s portrayal of Eve as intelligent, morally responsible, and possessing genuine agency paradoxically empowers her, granting her a subjectivity and significance that many female characters in seventeenth-century literature lack. Eve’s capacity for reasoning, her theological awareness, and her moral responsibility for her choices present her as a full human being rather than merely as an appendage to Adam. Some feminist scholars have argued that Eve’s desire for knowledge, her assertion of independence in the separation scene, and her initiative in reconciliation after the Fall present her as more dynamic and interesting than Adam, who often appears passive by comparison (McColley, 1983). These readings suggest that while Milton worked within a patriarchal theological and social framework, his poetic imagination and commitment to character complexity allowed him to create in Eve a figure who exceeds and sometimes subverts the ideological constraints of his cultural moment. The ongoing feminist debate about Eve demonstrates the richness and ambiguity of Milton’s characterization, his capacity to develop a female character complex enough to sustain contradictory yet compelling interpretations, and the continued relevance of Paradise Lost to contemporary discussions about gender, power, agency, and moral responsibility.
Eve as Literary Creation: Milton’s Artistic Achievement
Assessing Milton’s development of Eve’s character requires recognizing his artistic achievement in creating a psychologically realistic and morally complex female character within the constraints of biblical narrative and seventeenth-century theology. Milton faced the challenge of developing a character whose basic story was predetermined by Genesis: Eve must be created from Adam, must eat the forbidden fruit, must tempt Adam, and must be punished for her disobedience. Within these narrative constraints, Milton manages to create a character with interiority, motivation, and development that make her believable and compelling. His depiction of Eve’s first awakening, her attraction to her own reflection, provides a psychologically acute portrait of self-discovery and identity formation. Her conversations with Adam reveal a thinking, feeling person negotiating the complexities of relationship, not merely a theological abstraction or symbolic figure (Lewalski, 1985).
Milton’s use of Eve’s own voice to narrate key portions of her story represents another significant artistic choice that develops her character. Unlike many epic poets who rely primarily on third-person narration, Milton allows Eve to tell Adam (and thus readers) about her creation and first experiences, granting her narrative authority and subjective perspective. Her soliloquies, particularly her internal debate about eating the fruit and her later speech to Adam urging him to eat, reveal her thought processes and emotional states with dramatic immediacy. Milton’s development of the relationship between Adam and Eve, with its mixture of hierarchy and mutuality, formal subordination and practical influence, genuine affection and subtle power dynamics, demonstrates sophisticated understanding of human psychology and relationship patterns that transcends his historical moment (Walker, 1988). Even readers who object to the theological framework or gender ideology of the poem often acknowledge the artistic power of Milton’s characterization of Eve, his ability to make this mythical first woman seem psychologically real and morally complex. This artistic achievement ensures that Eve remains a compelling and controversial figure in literary history, a character who continues to generate interpretation, debate, and emotional response more than three centuries after Milton first developed her character in Paradise Lost.
Conclusion
John Milton’s development of Eve’s character in Paradise Lost from her creation to the Fall represents one of the most complex and controversial achievements in English literature. Through careful attention to narrative structure, psychological realism, theological doctrine, and poetic language, Milton creates in Eve a character who embodies multiple tensions: between hierarchy and equality, between subordination and agency, between innocence and knowledge, between obedience and independence. Eve’s character develops across several distinct stages, each revealing different dimensions of her personality and preparing for her ultimate fall. Her creation narrative establishes her as a being oriented toward sensory experience and immediate beauty, characteristics that distinguish her from Adam’s more abstract rationality. Her relationship with Adam demonstrates genuine intellectual and emotional companionship within a framework of formal hierarchy, creating complex dynamics that influence both characters’ decisions. The separation scene reveals Eve’s desire for autonomy and her confidence in her own judgment, while her temptation by Satan exposes how her particular qualities—sensory engagement, intellectual curiosity, desire for advancement—can be exploited by sophisticated deception.
Milton’s development of Eve raises important questions about agency, moral responsibility, gender relations, and the nature of sin that continue to resonate with contemporary readers. By portraying Eve as intelligent and morally responsible, Milton ensures that her fall results from genuine choice rather than deficiency, justifying divine punishment while also making her a tragic rather than merely pitiable figure. The ongoing debates about whether Milton’s portrayal of Eve is misogynistic or contains elements that empower women testify to the richness and ambiguity of his characterization. Modern readers inevitably approach Eve through lenses shaped by feminist thought and contemporary gender ideologies, often finding Milton’s subordination of Eve to Adam deeply problematic while simultaneously recognizing the psychological complexity and moral significance he grants her character. Understanding Milton’s development of Eve requires attention both to his seventeenth-century context, with its particular theological doctrines and gender assumptions, and to his artistic achievement in creating a character complex enough to sustain multiple interpretations across centuries. Eve’s journey from creation to Fall, from innocent awakening to prideful rebellion to penitent reconciliation, represents a tragic arc that explores fundamental aspects of human nature, moral choice, and the consequences of sin, making her character development central to Paradise Lost‘s enduring power and continued relevance as a literary and theological work.
References
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Milton, J. (1667). Paradise Lost. London: Samuel Simmons.
Nyquist, M. (1987). The Genesis of Gendered Subjectivity in the Divorce Tracts and in Paradise Lost. In M. Nyquist & M. W. Ferguson (Eds.), Re-membering Milton: Essays on the Texts and Traditions (pp. 99-127). New York: Methuen.
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Schwartz, R. (1988). Remembering and Repeating: On Milton’s Theology and Poetics. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Walker, J. C. (1988). Milton and the Idea of Woman. Urbana: University of Illinois Press.
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