Guibbory masterfully explores the friction between carnal desire and divine holiness, revealing how Donne and Milton’s poetic tensions still define our modern understanding of love. This lecture provides a sharp, scholarly bridge between the physical body and the spiritual soul.
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Eden Fell Before the Fall | Donne, Milton and the Theology of Desire with Achsah Guibbory
Added:One of the reasons Dun's poetry wasn't published except it was circulated in manuscript. it wasn't published till after he dies is it was very um naughty that's not the word I'm looking for but it went against I mean there was such a long tradition from Augustine on about associating sex with sin that sexual love [music] you know wasn't really love for God but you had to procreate [music] because otherwise there wouldn't be any people left but actually the first centuries of the church a lot of Christians thought there was no need to procreate cuz if you expecting the second coming of Christ. Why would you want to perpetuate the Roman society?
>> So, chastity, virginity becomes the model. But Augustine then associates sex with sin. And in fact, one of the things that I love to tell my students, although they're quite horrified and embarrassed by it, especially if they're guys in the class, that Augustine says that the first sign of sin for Adam was that he had an unwilled erection. Okay, sorry guys. [laughter] um that showed the loss of control of the will and reason over his body.
[music] >> Solomon and Smith. I am Jack Truck and Ped. That is Milo Garner. Neither one of us is Solomon or Smith, but we are Solomon and Smith. You're about to listen to a conversation between us and Assaur Gibbururi, the uh daughter of the Messiah and uh a [laughter] former president of the Milton Society of America, Big Milton Head, Big John Don Head, professor of English literature at Bernard. Is it Bernard?
What's the name? Yeah, I believe that's >> Bernard. Bernard.
Bernard. And um [laughter] and great fun to have around. If you throw in a shindig, it ain't no shindig until Gibbori arrives. Tell you that for free.
Uh we >> What do we talk? Yeah. What do we talk to her?
>> What do we talk about? Um love.
What is love? Question one. Question two.
Love question three love [laughter] we talk about love John and in John Milton particularly os erotic love romantic love how's it different in grimy puritan argument bag John Milton and fun sexy good times John done how How do they write differently about love? What does it mean to each of them? What did love mean in general back in the olden days, which is how we refer to the 17th century on this channel, the olden days.
And it's it's interesting. You might be asking, hang on, fine. This whole love thing, great. But why on earth would you be comparing John Milton, John Dunn?
These guys got nothing to do with each other. Well, interestingly enough, Asar Gibbori is one of very few experts in both. Her specialty is both of these contrary figures. And so, no one better to throw this question of love at. We've got blind Milton lying on his bed reading out Paradise Lost to his his many daughters. And we've got John Dunn probably a strider stallion somewhere in a very impressive sort of vista calling out his poems.
>> A constantly winninging stallion has to he sort of has to hop around on >> and a tall hat. Imagine what but they were in in style at the time. It's not silly.
>> No. No.
>> So very it's a tall with a big brim.
>> Very large like irrespective of how uh much you zoom out the frame. The hat is outside of it. fairly odd parents like Texan and that >> died too soon to die heroically as a cavalier. That would have been a good death for John Dunn.
>> He could have in fact been killed by Milton in the Civil War.
>> He was killed by Milton during the Civil War and will never forgive him.
[laughter] >> That's how it went down. God, I just >> Or another um another fan theory, >> John Dunn faked his death and became John Milton. Some peasants would argue the the birth dates don't match up and John Dunn would be an extraordinarily old man at the time that he's um dictating Paradise Lost, which he was.
If you uh if you sort of play uh all of Gibbori as Arbor's answers backwards, you do get this elucidated in great detail on the Snapers.
>> Yeah, it's it's in there. Could any two men be called John at the same period?
I've never heard of such things.
>> It's a little bit coincidental, is it?
Little bit. Okay.
>> Oh, and they both do poetry.
>> What are the odds?
>> Both great at it. Not that many great poets really.
>> And they both write about love apparently. We discussed in great detail in fact. Shared theme, shared form, shared country, shared name. When do we start asking questions here?
>> Right now on Solomon and Smith.
>> Leave a comment. Who's better, John Don or John Milton? And you can say both because they're the same man.
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Without any further ado though, here it is. As a Gibbori, what was that? A seminar of um that was about every single woman in the Bible. And uh your name was pronounced Axa.
>> Yeah, but I don't pronounce it that way.
Actually, it should be oxo with a soft ch.
>> Yes.
>> And I hate oxo when people say that. It sounds like they're [ __ ] throwing up.
Excuse me. Take that word out of this.
[laughter] >> Yeah. The daughter of Caleb. I I believe >> indeed it is. It is. I mean, >> it is not a common name. That's all [laughter] I can say.
>> Was it Was it from the Bible? Was were your parents thinking of Yeah. judges open on a random page. Yeah.
>> Uh no, it wasn't a random page. Um there was a whole story behind that. But um I was [snorts] born after my father had come over here from at that time mandate Palestine. And I think that he thought America in some ways was a promised land. And he probably thought, you know, Caleb, daughter of Caleb, one of the only two of Joshua and Caleb are the only ones who go into Canaan. And I think that's how we got this name. I don't know.
>> But I've only recently grown into it.
[laughter] It's like I mean when I was in um when I was in grade school I mean I was spent a whole life having my nails pron my name pronounced in horrible horrible ways which I mean seriously like when I was in grade school >> and um at that time I think I was the only Jewish kids in class and everybody had names like Smith and Brown and you know you know like that and uh uh my my teacher in third grade hated me and she kept calling me Assa and they took [laughter] they took role every day.
Every day. So every day the students would all howl with laughter, you know.
>> Yeah.
>> It never got old. The joke it remained it remained hilarious to them. Yeah, [laughter] >> I know. I know. Okay. So I also have a married name of Kaufman which I never use. And I was I was at a Milton conference last week and in Toronto and I was waiting to get my plane back and suddenly the guy you know whatever they are you know who calls people out he says Ashawa Kman.
[laughter] Oh my god. Oh my god.
Um, so anyhow, so the introduction is how I really say my name. It's Assa Gabbori.
>> Asa Gabbori.
>> Asa Gabbori.
>> So actually if you never saw it and just heard it, you would be fine.
>> Yes. Very much. Yeah. Yeah.
>> It's like even babies can say my name.
>> It's easy. You just don't see it. Don't look at it.
>> Yeah. Yeah. This c this cursored Germanic alphabet gives people all sorts of crazy ideas. [laughter] Yeah, >> I know.
>> And Gibbori, it's the nicest place to put the emphasis. Gabbor has it has a it has a nice bounce with the emphasis.
>> It does. It does. And it that actually I hated that name for a long time cuz people call me Gibbery and you know I mean it's like >> Yeah. Gibbery. Awful. Gabbori. One of the best names in English, you know.
Thank you. [laughter] Now I'm finally feeling better.
>> Jack and Milo.
>> Exactly. Yes.
>> Easy to pronounce names. You got it first try.
>> Shoot. Wait a minute. I've got this problem with my stupid computer.
Okay. Use God. I don't >> give it a whack. Just >> Oh [ __ ] Sorry. I hope this is not all getting recorded.
>> Well, it is, isn't it? [laughter] We cut everything except the swearing and it's just a long listed exclusive.
[laughter] >> Oh [ __ ] Sorry. God, it's getting worse now. It tells me this is not actually my username, which is [ __ ] Oh god.
Come on. It is not invalid. They have set up so much um security for me that I can't even get in myself.
[laughter] Okay, >> that's the optimal.
The gates of Eden shut on you.
[laughter] >> Yay. Connection is complete. Okay. So, I should be okay now. Okay. All right. All right.
>> Yeah. I'll send it over to Milo for the poetic epigraph. Did you go for did you go for a usual suspect or are we about to get something really weird?
>> No, we're get we're getting Milton indeed. We're getting Milton [clears throat] >> Latin Milton translated into English because I'm not going to risk the uh >> You're going to do Latin Milton? Oh my god. my life >> in English. In English. In English. Fear not.
>> Yeah. No, >> I'm really relieved. [laughter] >> We all are. We all are.
>> Well, you guys are fun actually.
[laughter] >> We're gonna take it's going to be allergy number seven, but not all of it because it goes on a bit.
>> Don't ask me because I can't even remember it, you know? It's like I don't teach it all the time. Like never.
>> Yeah. We're gonna go from the the final sort of stanzard, but it it is in my translation.
>> Let's see.
>> Um, let's see something here. Here's my very very old Milton book from when I was >> and it's all together by um tape, you know, duct tape. It's from when I was a first semester sophomore. [laughter] >> It has notes from my first teacher and everything.
>> Oh, that is so many notes. That's like goodness me. That's like the Talmud.
It's insane. [laughter] >> And it has notes from centuries of me.
God. [laughter] God. No. Okay. Uh, let's see. Where the hell is this? No. Wait a minute. This one doesn't even have LG.
Shoot.
It didn't even put LG7 in here. It has LG4.
>> Well, we'll do you. We can all absorb seven together.
>> Okay.
>> Okay. All right.
>> Yeah. Okay. And this >> this will be a new experience. Okay.
>> From the end. Wret that I am. What hopes for me remain? Who cannot cease to love yet love in vain. Oh, could I once once more behold the fair, speak to her, tell her of the pangs I bear. Perhaps she is not adamant, would show perhaps some pity at my tale of woe. Oh inospicious flame it is mine to prove a matchless instance of disastrous love. Oh spare me gentle power if such thou be. Let not thy deeds and nature disagree. Now I rever thy fires, thy bow, thy darts. Now own thee sovereign of all human hearts.
Spare me and I will worship at no shrine with vow and sacrifice. Save only thine.
Remove no. Grant me still this raging woe. Sweet is the wretchedness that lovers know, but pierce hereafter should I chance to see one destined mine at once both her and me. Such were the trophies that in earlier days by vanity seduced I toiled to raise studious yet indolent and urged by youth that worst of teachers from the ways of truth. Till learning taught me in his shady bower to quit love's survile yoke and spurn his power. Then on a sudden the fierce flame suppressed a frost continual settled on my breast whence Cupid fears his flames extinct to see and Venus dreads a diamedi in me written apparently in Milton's 19th year but an interesting insight in Milton in love and then deciding never again >> an interesting introduction.
>> Yeah. Okay, one reason it's bizarre is I don't even know that poem. It's not even printed in Hughes and it just it's surreal. Okay, [laughter] I mean I don't know what can I say about it. It's >> utterly bizarre. Milton was never in love then. I mean, obviously this is, you know, a kind of imitation of some poem.
>> And if he was ever in love with anybody early on, it was Charles Doddi, his male friend. I mean, I I guess he's just, you know, exercising his poetic classical chops or something.
>> Yeah. Well, like the classical like pop song, you know, you're, you know, like Lennon McCartney probably weren't in love, you [laughter] know, for I want She loves you. I want to hold your hand.
But it sells, but it sells. The kids, they love it. [laughter] >> I know.
>> Interesting. The epilogue, which is meant to be the epilogue to all of the allergies, then sort of throwing it away and saying, "But then I I grew up and love Frosted and and everything was fine."
Yes, it is really an interesting way to end it. Really is.
>> Um, there's just a whole question about love and Milton, you know, because I've been thinking about this a lot and you know, I wanted to talk about both Dun and Milton. You can do whatever you want, but I mean, one of the reasons is because they are so different. They're just such totally different poets.
>> And >> and probably people as well. I mean, there's [laughter] Yeah. the personalities that come across and Yeah.
>> Can you imagine them sitting and having a conversation? No, >> you know, [laughter] I mean, and then I think to myself, who would I want to hang out with?
>> Yeah.
>> Not a question. [laughter] Not a question in my mind.
>> Yeah.
>> You know, >> right. [laughter] >> Oh, absolutely.
>> Absolutely.
>> I mean, why [laughter] Milton? Yeah. I mean, >> seriously, >> he's the worst kind of kind of like I think Milton in person the kind of worst kind of nononsense.
>> Oh god. Yes.
>> Yeah. No. No fun. I [laughter] I don't know. Like um >> no sense of humor, no sense of wit.
Although I do remember somebody, oh god, somebody I knew years ago, I think his name was Roger Rollin, I don't know, wrote an essay, published an essay on humor in Milton, but it didn't convince me. I mean, [clears throat] I mean, it's it might be kind of humor, but he's not funny, you know. [laughter] >> Darkness visible.
>> Darkness visible indeed. [laughter] >> Yeah. I mean, it's it's a kind of it's, you know, It's the kind of uh humor that Becket or CFA, you know, like they're kind of it's the kind of humor that maybe makes a very very strange kind of person laugh. Um but um but even then I find Kfka and Becket funnier than Milton's hysterical.
>> No, no. Yeah. Yeah. Becket was unfair. I was thinking Yeah. I I immediately remembered Oh, yeah. All the hilarious stuff as I was saying it. I [laughter] >> I mean, but that's true. Becket and Kafka. Seriously, >> but I I mean like when Kafka was writing the the Metamorphosis, he he was, you know, laughing so loudly that neighbors would complain. And although someone would maybe read the Metamorphosis today and and like chuckle a little bit, you wouldn't laugh so loud that a neighbor would complain. It's a very strange kind of humor. Amazing.
>> I did not know that. That's hysterical.
[laughter] >> I love it. I love it. Did you make that up?
>> No, no, no. You can read the um the correspondences between him and the neighbor as well, which are also very funny. Um a Czech friend of mine uh drew attention to them. Lots of the Czech Kafka stuff is untransated. Lots of letters and or or less known at least in English.
>> Oh god, I love Kafka. Oh my god.
>> Just when reading the trial, he would also be cackling with laughter and it's you know where's the joke? But he found the whole thing just just hysterical.
>> Yeah.
>> But it's true. I mean, there's this totally dark humor, but it's different from Milton. Milton's humor is like, you know, angels, you know, fallen angels or whatever before they fallen throwing mountains, you know. I mean, sorry.
>> It's just it's not the same kind of dark. It's dark humor with Kafka.
Twisted and good Jewish humor, you know.
I mean, [laughter] >> yeah.
>> Whatever. you know, a suffering humor and I don't know.
>> Yeah. And and Milton Yeah. It's it's hard to imagine him there lying in bed dictating it and like holding back a chuckle. [laughter] >> Well, wait. But wait a minute. Um, God, I'm thinking my husband used uh he used to run on Barbara Py and I think there was something about something that Barbara Py wrote about lying in bed with somebody reading, you know, I mean a man um reading Samson agonist of Paradise Lost Paradise Regained and I thought how pathetic, you know, I mean couldn't she think of anything better to do? I mean, okay, you're going to have to edit this obviously.
>> Yeah. [laughter] I thought like maybe actually a good place to start would be on on the word love. So it's a bit of a cliche but the English word love it's got this big burden of meaning placed on its shoulders. I mean in Greek you've got keratas and agapee and filier and stogy and ros all stuffed into this one English mono syllable. You know someone says I love pizza. I love my neighbor. I love hot women. I love my family. I love my country. I love God. They seem to be talking about completely different things, different emotional states.
>> How do you think so much meaning piled up on the English word love?
>> Oh man, that's an impossible question. I don't know. I think I mean I would want for one thing I'm thinking like what would I do if I looked at the Oxford English dictionary of what happened to the meaning of the word over years?
um which is something that I usually ask my students to do, you know, when they're reading older literature and they're going to have to write something about it. They just look and see when did these meanings change, you know, what meanings were at this time? And that's not going to answer your question. But my guess is that the word love has over the centuries totally expanded in meaning. And now at this point some words become almost worthless because like you say the way in which that's not I mean I remember a friend of mine saying to me I am very careful with that word >> you know as if you don't say that unless you mean it in a very serious and very specific way that's actually almost exclusive you know not totally but I mean that's not just this general I love everything, you know, where once it becomes so generalized, it becomes meaningless.
And I suppose, you know, I'm guilty of that, too. I'll say, "God, I love my wine." You know, do I really love my wine? It's not human. It's not animate.
You know, I love my dog. That's better.
Yeah.
>> But I mean, I just I think maybe it's part of the whole degeneration of language in some ways.
And maybe it's probably flying off my head here. That's probably not a real metaphor, but I mean, I'm just just kind of thinking about how we use words with so little precision.
[snorts] And there's a difference, for example, between the way I might talk and the way in which I might write, you know, and so we distinguish that way.
But in some ways, some of these things just become meaningless.
Um, but it's also, and so now I'm thinking about the other side.
It's also maybe a sense that our sense of liking something or appreciating something expands.
[snorts] And so it's not just focused on a person or on God, but on maybe like an emotional reaction and appreciation of a lot of different things. And so for me, the word can mean different things. Like I'm sitting in this apartment. I love my apartment. It's not a human being, but I somehow sort of created it by, you know, putting something I like love. I I'm going to say it again. You know, pictures, color, paintings, a chair, something from the past and all those things I have some kind of emotional or intellectual attachment to.
And that's very different from a kind of standing away in a rejection of something.
>> So, I I don't know. I'm not, you know, I don't I'm not in neurology or anything, but I don't know. I'm just kind of like thinking.
>> Yeah. Yeah. Thinking loud. I mean, I I'm while while rereading the sort of um all the the love scenes in in Paradise Lost.
Um u and you know, the word is used in in lots of different ways. Even then, in the 17th century, we have we have the the love of God. we have the the love of, you know, Christ and the self-sacrifice um for humankind. Um but then also also the erotic love in there.
And um it it it strikes me though that there are a few spaces, a few uses of it that I can't really imagine being used as much today. I mean, when I hear the word love today, it seems like the the the erotic or romantic version of that word has sort of dominated the others, sort of colonized lots of the space belonging to the others. Um certainly with the secular secularization of society, the the um >> the you know the the the holy love is has um diminished somewhat. But even but even taking that out of account, it just strikes me how kind of I suppose pre-darwinian the erotic love is. Um I I wonder another interesting question. How did people think about erotic love in this context in the 17th century in this resolutely pre-darwinian zeitgeist? What were these feelings? How did people >> That's why I really wanted to talk specifically about Dunn and Milton and their poetry because that's one of that's maybe the thing that interests me the most is that relationship between erotic and spiritual love.
And I think that Dun and Milton are very very different about that. I'm not sure what you mean about how Darwinian post Darwinian changes that though.
>> Um I I would like the the sex drive the sex impulse >> can be can be reduced to an evolutionary drive to to survive like there's there's a genetic justification for it. I'm curious in the 17th century you feel sexual attraction or intense sexual longing or connection with another person. I'm curious how people thought about that feeling in the 17th century.
>> I can't completely I wouldn't want to generalize about that. Sure. Because in some ways um I mean one of the reasons Dun's poetry uh wasn't published except was circulated in manuscript wasn't published till after he dies is it was very um naughty that's not the word I'm looking for but it went against I mean there was such a long tradition from Augustine on about associating sex with sin and you know cupiditas or whatever you know love of self that sexual love, you know, wasn't really love for God, but you had to procreate because otherwise there wouldn't be any people left. But actually, the first centuries of the church, it was really uh in the very beginning, I mean, not that I'm an expert on everything, but um there was no need there. A lot of Christians thought this is I think Peter Brown's book a long time ago. There was no need to procreate because if you were expecting the second coming of Christ, why would you want to perpetuate the Roman society?
>> So chastity, virginity becomes the model. But Augustine then associates sex with sin. And in fact, one of the things I love to tell my students, although they're quite horrified and embarrassed by it, especially if they're guys in the class, that Augustine says that the first sign of sin for Adam, was that he had an unwilled erection. Okay, sorry guys.
>> Um, that showed the loss of control of the will and reason over his body.
So right from the beginning he's identifying sexual desire or you know and yes sex um with sin and Elaine Pagels has a wonderful book published a long time ago about the whole influence of Augustine on the ideas about sex and so when Dun is sort of and I think sometimes um and I've written you know a fair amount about this he I mean Dun's poetry is very Um it's not all the same. It's very vary variety varied. Very varied. I can't even say that. Um because he has these libertine poems which are all about kiss, you know, as many as you can have. No faithfulness. But then on the other hand he has these poems like the good marorrow uh the sun rising validiction forbidding morning the ecstasy especially that all are about the connection of body and soul and sexuality and spirituality. So we've got you know really different views of this at the time. And then also there were people who thought well you have to have sex for marriage to reproduce but sex outside of marriage was different. I mean there's there's so much involved Catholicism you know Protestantism or whatever. In other words sex and love was thought of differently and in multiple ways.
>> And there could be spiritual love but that's all directed to God. But then what about if you have desire for your partner? Now marriage at this time though was not based on I'm in love with somebody. It was a social, economic, political arrangement.
So a lot of erotic love happened outside of marriage.
But Dun's poems did something different. And there's a reason why I think his poetry has been more influential up until now. Milton, we still have this problem of what is the relationship between desire and love. And I do want to talk later about um I've got a couple of passages I want to look at. You know, what is sex like before the fall?
>> What is sex like after the fall?
>> Exactly. Yeah.
>> What are Adam and Eve like before the fall? What is after?
He tries to find a way, but it is so different from done. Both of them at some point have this idea that making love can be holy, but they're totally different.
>> Well, an interesting survival just while we're on this point, and you see it in love's alchemy, but in a very sort of cynical region.
>> Absolutely. is the uh the Socratic or Platonic version, the symposium version of love where beauty and erotic love are the window to this kind of higher transcendent vision of reality. And this is sort of a pre-Christian way of thinking about love. It's and you sort of almost re redirect yourself. You use wow beauty and then bounce off the beauty because the Socratic ideal, the Platonic ideal was to not actually consummate it but to use that energy and to find you know the cloud spun rim.
>> Exactly. But not consummated then that's the big difference with don.
>> Yeah. It has to be consummated and that is that's you know the because Paul also is very he's got a lot of the Greek you know platonism in him too you know spirit flesh and all this stuff but you're absolutely right with the platonic and then and the renaissance is what castigleion who I haven't read the cord who I haven't read for a long long time but again it's like you start with loving the person the woman and then you go up higher higher and then you can go to the highest Um, but for done in some of those poems, you get to the highest through sex >> with the person that you are committed to, you know what I mean? So, it's it's it's just different. It's you can see why you would want to kind of hide that a little bit and it becomes almost an alternative religion for some, not for anybody. I'm curious in in the way that like in the Genesis narrative that Milton Milton's pacing on the it's >> it's not necessarily spelled out that Adam and Eve noticing their nakedness is them noticing sexual desire for the first time.
>> Um you know the genesis is very it's very flat. You don't learn that much about their prelapsian state whatsoever.
It's just it's it's very very concise.
Um and uh but there is this whole Christian tradition that them noticing their nakedness is the first time that sexual desire is introduced into the equation and they can only conceive Cain and Abel after they know that they are naked. Um, and you know, this is like the interpretation in that Philip Pullman is bouncing off in his his Dark Materials books. Um, where sexual desire is kind of the only sin.
>> Um, and is also dark.
>> I think that's so wrong.
>> Yeah. No, no. I mean, yeah, >> but I mean I mean in the sense that >> because like you say, um, Genesis doesn't actually say that.
>> No, absolutely.
>> It says nothing. And I think Austin and his own, you know, Austin's own like sexual issues have been mapped onto the entire Christian tradition. I think like this is one of those cases and lots of people like blaming everything on Augustine, but I think this is one case where you really can blame the church's subsequent sexual ethics on on Augustine. Partly because of just how interesting um his writing is. I think [laughter] >> it's extremely I love it. I love it.
>> I know. Exactly. And um he can really portray this world where where life is this sort of sexually transmitted disease. Um he >> I think that's how original sin is transmitted.
>> Yeah. It's exactly and um and you know and and and greed and murder and all of that's just a a side thing. the sort of the core um trial for for the human race and the thing that mires them in sin for Austin seems yeah be sex foremost but um in in Paradise Lost um telling the same story as you say Milton doesn't um doesn't see sex as something and sexual desire introduced after the fall it's very much there beforehand um I thought we might look at book four, the >> that's what I wanted to look at >> the the bower scene and um could could you just like have a little like um read through some of this Bower scene and maybe we could talk a bit about how does prelapserian sexual love look in Milton.
>> Yes. Although not I don't not everybody agre agrees with my reading of things.
Okay. And I'll show you why.
>> Okay. But for Yeah. And I want to like contrast book four then with what happens after the fall which I figured that you wanted to woo right.
>> Yeah. Yeah.
>> Okay. So this is what I was thinking of and I think it I'm not going to read through all this but I think um as a preface to that we have to see how Milton's introduces Adam and Eve the description of them. And people argue about the description of this. Is this Milton describing them? Is it the narrator? Or is this what Satan sees?
>> Okay.
>> The description of the difference between them. You know, when it says cuz Satan saw undelighted, the fiend saw undelighted all delight. All kind of living creatures new in sight and strange. Two of nobler shapes erect and tall godlike erect and so forth. In naked majesty, nakedness is fine. the image of their glorious maker shown both of them um blah blah not equal as their sex not equal scen >> so they're not the same they're not equal and then he his looks show absolute rule >> over what you know again there's a difference over Eve Eve um she has her wanting ringlets waved and her golden treses are disheveled as the vine curls through tendrils. Vine needs something to support it, the tree. So already we have that idea that you know Eve is dependent and is created dependent on Adam who she's not equal to. But and it says then was not guilty of shame. But what happens right after that is well it's not exactly right after that.
Eve tells her story and she looks in the lake and she sees her reflection. I don't think it's narcissistic. She doesn't know it's her, but she's attracted to it. She is not attracted to Adam. She has to be led to Adam and told your desire is going to be for him God.
And that is a punishment. That will be a punishment after the fall. your desire will only be for your husband. In other words, you won't want anybody else or anything else. But in other words, so heterosexuality is just not instinctive right there for her >> or even sexuality outside of the self.
That mono sexuality or whatever it's called.
>> Yes.
>> Yes. It's not even tied to a self. It's like really weird. But so and that's why then I wanted to Okay. So the scene you wanted to look at is when they make love, right?
>> In the bower. Yeah. Yeah.
>> In the bower. Okay. But again, there these things that precede it. When they make love, they first pray.
>> Mhm.
>> And so that suggests that making love is going to be something which is like a holy ritual. It's something holy. It's sacred. The bower is also described as a place that is cut off from everything else. No insects, no animals, nothing will intrude in it. It's like the holy of holies in the temple. It's something nothing can enter into. And so, okay.
So, Eve has been told now that, you know, she it's Adam that she has to love. So, h [clears throat] wait a minute. I've got all my notes here. I can't read my look look at this book.
Look at this. How [laughter] can I read anything in it? How can I find anything in it? Okay. Um, thus talking hand in hand alone, they passed on to their blissful bower. It was a place chosen by the sovereign planter. This chosen by God, but it becomes decorated by Eve.
[clears throat] Um when he framed all things to man's delightful use, the roof of thickest cover was inwroven shade laurel and myrtle. And what higher grew a firm and fragrant leaf? Notice all the senses, its visual smell on either side of campus. And each odorous bushy shrub fenced up the verdant wall. It's protected. It's fenced kind of like Eden is. It's like the center of Eden, but it's also an >> Eden within Eden.
Yeah.
>> Yeah. And then all the colors, iris, all hues, roses, jasmine.
Then um all these more colored with the stone of costliest emblem. Other creature here, beast, bird, insect or worm, dur none. Such was there a man. So this is the most sacred place. Enclosed recess with flowers, gardens, and sweet smelling herbs is spoused Eve decked her first nectual nuptual bed. So it's created both by God and by Eve and the heavenly choir sing and everything. Okay. Then thus at their shady lodge arrived, both stood, both turned, and under open sky adored together both. Their words are presumably the same. They are totally in harmony. Just these little details.
The God that made both sky, air, earth, and heaven, which they beheld. The moon's respplendant globe and starry pole. Thou also makes the night a maker omnipotent, and now the day. And notice how Milton, the narrator's voice, has just now blended with Adam and Eve's.
And it's like they're all talking at the same time which we in our appointed work employed have banish have finished happy in our mutual help. It's clearly Adam and Eve ordained uh wait a minute and mutual love the crown of all our bliss ordained by thee. God ordains mutual love. Okay. But thou has promised from us to a race to fill the earth who shall with us extol thy goodness infinite. Then this said of unanimous, notice all the emphasis on sane, sane, unanimous, mutual, and other rights observing none, but adoration pure, which God likes best into their inmost power. Handed they went, and handed was a term like for being married. So this is the consummation of the marriage >> and ease the putting off these troublesome disguises which we wear.
>> Okay. straight side by side were laid.
Nor turned Iween Adam doesn't know for sure. I mean Milton doesn't know for sure. Adam from his fair spouse nor Eve the rights mysterious of canubial love refused whatever hypocrites go. So this is then Milton goes on to say hail weighted love. But look at this description.
>> What do you make of this? Straight side by side were laid nor turned they from their spouse. H it's it's very very different to what Satan sees, isn't it?
Like it's almost as if Satan is projecting a relationship of pure domination.
>> This is not domination. It is not missionary style to be explicit.
[laughter] >> But seriously, the side by side suggests such equality.
>> I'm reminded of of the part from the good the good mororrow where Don says, "Whatever dies was not mixed equally.
equally >> if if any if any love is is not equal it it will perish it it belongs to death.
Um and also I um in another part of the the good mororrow where he he says that she is all states and I I am all princes all um >> right >> um >> and also when they're looking at each other and they are one world because each in the eye can see the face of the other.
>> They can see the reflection of themselves looking at in the eye close up. Yeah.
>> That's what I see here. M yeah >> you know it's that complete equality but but but okay >> but but but what happens in book eight but we won't go there yet >> when [clears throat] Adam is telling Raphael about his desire for Eve >> it's very different >> he's warned against >> and Raphael warns him >> yeah it's interesting in this scene We don't really get much of desire. The the act happens almost by God's will.
>> Thank you.
>> But we don't get oh I want you. I need you. You know this sort of this force which then consummates. Yeah. It just seems to be natural process.
>> I have disagreed with people so often about that.
>> I know.
I said that's what I think. I said I don't see any desire here. M >> you're right Milo. I mean that that's the thing we don't see except maybe we're fallen we only think of desire in one way but all this equality.
I mean my I think that's my reaction to this too. I say where's the desire?
>> I suppose desiring something is is you're always projecting inequality onto the world, aren't you? I mean it wouldn't be worth desiring if it wasn't better than something else. Yeah.
>> And it's a lack.
>> And so maybe that means you're not feeling any lack here.
>> Yeah. No, precisely. Yeah. The desire can only come from Yeah. from want of something from some internal poverty.
>> Something wanting something you don't have.
>> So I just find this so rich. So many different ways to inter people read it so differently.
And is desire dangerous?
>> Because, you know, >> I mean, it's you could just frame Satan's um, you know, pride as as pure desire. I I Yeah, >> it is.
>> Yeah.
And and Satan's like um he's inequality is really essential to to Satan. um's there's a or or he's frustrated that you know his his perceived equality with God is not recognized. During his speech in act one we get whom reason hath equaled force hath made supreme above his equals. Um so you know a huge part of Satan's fall his reason for starting the war in heaven is this um is resentment at inequality. But we see Adam and Eve in this in in this bal scene there. There's >> there's there's no resentment towards each other, but also no resentment towards this this >> Yeah. to certainly not to God. Yeah.
>> They're just content. I mean, with with Satan also, it's like when the sun is suddenly elevated, it almost comes off as if they were all the sons of God. But we find out there is actually a hierarchy among the angels. But it sounds like God suddenly promotes somebody who had been equal before.
And to me that's a very I mean that's a very understandable resentment. You know >> this is this is always the thing.
>> You were both equal and suddenly >> it's the sense that he's giving Satan some of his notion because of course he didn't like kings. He didn't like that kind of monarchal hierarchy and yet has to sort of weave his way around God being supreme and yet hierarchy under God being problematic. And that's why it seems that he's of the devil's party because he's giving the devil a lot of his real political opinions only >> I think that's true.
>> Yeah. And this is why you get almost a sort of um dissonance in the poem. Whose side are you on? At first it seems like a lot of sympathy for Satan. towards the end it dries up >> because the political point and the religious point seem incompatible and yet we're compelled by both of them.
It's not as though it breaks >> but we can't really settle. We can't say well obviously this Satan guy evil from the beginning nothing he said was worthwhile. Whereas God especially early on the father seems a little bit authoritarian. seems like >> oh yeah >> looking down I and almost tricks Adam at first when he doesn't give Adam Eve saying Adam feels lonesome says and God's like well why don't you hang out with the beasts they there you know talk with the beasts come you're all right hang out with the beasts and Adam's like I don't know about that I got you got you you'll have someone don't worry just checking >> I love that part I know it's so good because he knows he's different from them but he doesn't have an equal. You he doesn't have a partner. He doesn't have somebody that sleeps close enough to him. This whole thing between equality and not, you know, and hierarchy [clears throat] throughout the poem. And I think like you both said, you can't really say it's one or the other because those things are both so much intention in this poem.
>> It's one of the things I love about Paradise Lost actually. Like it's a guy who just didn't sort out his internal conflicts.
>> Yes.
Yeah. And and and I I I love that. I I I love I love books by people who don't really know what they believe [laughter] >> or who are always, let's put it this way, they're always trying to figure it out.
>> Yeah. Precisely.
>> So, it's an endless process.
>> Yeah. And often when people figure out what they believe, they become kind of lousy writers. I mean, William Werdsworth, the obvious example, first 10 years, amazing, and then just he figures out that he's William Werdsworth and um 45 years of slop, [laughter] >> whereas Blake is never like that, right?
>> No, no, of course Blake never has any idea who William Blake is. And and and that's kind of in in Milton as well.
There's just this drive. There's a he like on a case-byase basis, he has certain certain feelings. Um yeah, but it's it's hard to to yeah pin him on any specific thing. And in John Dunn, um it's like he he rushes towards paradoxes in himself with glee and finds all of his poetic voice in in the things that are most contradictory.
>> Yes. Yes. Yes. But that's why I mean as [clears throat] different as these two poets are there is this part that never quite settles you know that is always somehow seeking though Milton seems to be a lot more confident of himself particularly in his pros and not in Paradise Lost he may seem it but you know but but there's something much more authoritarian about Milton to me than there is about Dunn but you might disagree about that >> something some similarity I find in Paradise Lost in particular is this use of Satan as the adversary to say certain things. This seems to be John Dunn's entire modus operandi is every poem >> wonderful >> seems to be written by a different guy.
They're all Satans. We get the Satan who wrote Love's uh Alchemy, the Satan who wrote the indifferent. And it's all these, you don't know who the who John Dunn is, but you have all of these like little sprites and imps that he conjures up to say things. And imagine John Dunn's Paradise Lost. He wouldn't just notice the contradictions, but make the whole point. Hang on, >> the whole thing.
>> Yeah. And then he wouldn't necessarily resolve it. He'd just he'd give it to us. Whereas in Milton, we get the supreme resolution and that's the whole point. ignore the fact that maybe it didn't quite tie together because new Jerusalem is on the way. Don't worry guys, God the Father is here. But John Dunn is always in the sort of case of they Satan saying one thing or another and we can never pin him down, >> right? And you know and to go along with that, I think that's such an interesting way of thinking. It's also the difference between someone somebody who always wanted to write an epic and somebody who obscures epics >> only only lyrics and he's also anti-spenser Spencer the epic >> you know but what an interesting way Milo about thinking about those the difference in those poems because um Dun always has an antagonist when it's got even in the holy sits I mean was not always an antagonist exactly in some of the love poems, but in his holy psalmist, I mean, like he's always arguing with God, >> commanding him.
>> Yeah. Often they start with imperatives.
Uh yeah, >> so many imperatives, commands, commands, commands, batter my heart, three person God, you know, and then rape me at the end, you know, it's like so different from from Milton, but it's like and yet there's this weird connection between them, including I think the whole sense that they both have that erotic love can be spiritual, >> you know. Well, Milton might not go so far as saying erotic.
[laughter] >> I mean, that's that's a little >> it's a loaded word now, but yeah, like the the OOS using the Greek, you know.
Yeah, that's right.
>> That ballpark. Exactly.
>> I know. [laughter] I know.
>> Yeah. Um Yeah. I was I I was just remembering when when when Milo was saying like John Don would make the contradiction the whole point. I I was um it seems to be something kind of frequent in lots of English Protestants during the 17th century of finding contradictions the mysterious and profound and actually faith giving rather than faith robbing.
I mean there's a good example of Thomas Brown, the great pros.
>> Oh yes. Oh god, I love Brown so much.
>> Yeah. Yeah. and he's writing about the transubstantiation and um really can't reconcile himself to it simultaneously being the bread and and the body of Christ but um settles on believing it at the end there's this wonderful sentence I believe it because it is absurd >> exactly >> it is not it is not that its absurdity gets in the way its maximum absurdity actually lends credence to it. If it were if it were less absurd, it wouldn't be a divine truth.
>> Divine truths have a certain absurdity to them. And that seems like a a a something that Don though not in the same words is attracted to. Like >> I think D is >> Yeah.
>> Because for him part of that mystery is in sex.
>> Yes. But okay, the other thing with Brown, remember he says that he loves I love to pursue blah blah whatever it is to an O altitudo. In other words, he likes to exercise his reason to the point where it can't get there and it requires this leap of faith, this love of mystery. And you know you're saying that about Brown makes me think that's what I think is there with Dun when he is celebrating like in the ecstasy or you know a few not all the poems this sense that there is something mysterious about it that takes you beyond to something else and and that's the spiritual leap but I don't know that Milton has spiritual leaps. No, it's it's much >> I don't know that he has that sense of mystery.
>> I don't know. Milo, what do you do you think? I mean, I'm just thinking about all of these writers, putting them in conversation.
Um, how much does Milton have paradox?
He's always reasoning everything out.
>> Yeah. And if you look at Paradise Regained, that's sort of supremely reasoned.
That's just just, you know, this is and it's it's it's not fun because of it because Satan will always try and tempt the Jesus character, but being very theologically canonical, the Jesus character will never even waver. He'll immediately say, "Well, that makes no sense for this reason, this reason, this reason." Satan moves on to temptation number two. And then by the last one, he just seems desperate. It's like he's on the pinnacle. It's like, "Click, come on. You've lost. [laughter] Give up.
>> There's no drama in it." But there is the fascinating um and I don't even know if it's if it's grammatically intentional, but towards the end of Paradise Regained when Satan falls and then it sort of the pronoun says he was caught by angels and then says fed with all of this sort of um godly mana, but then the he is actually referring to Jesus, but it doesn't there's no switch in the noun. So, I don't know if this is secretly radical theology or just just something almost I've read one take that said it's as though Satan has been robbed even of the uh the the permission to be referred to by a pronoun. It cannot be Satan because he's completely vanquished. But I also like the idea of of this kind of implicit universal forgiveness. Even Satan in falling somehow is covered by this um this this new Jerusalem, this paradise regained.
That might be incorrect, but it it's attractive, but that's the closest I can get to this paradox, this gap, this spiritual leap. What if Satan and Jesus combined in the same pronoun fall together, saved together? I don't think it's there necessarily, but I I noticed it because I thought, hang on, that doesn't make sense. Looked it up, lots of commentary. Fine, it does make sense, >> but grammatically sort of throws you out a little bit.
>> Yes, it does. It's a weird ending.
And then when also tempt not the Lord thy God, >> is that a declaration?
I [clears throat] mean, he's the son is quoting the Bible, but is that a declaration of his own identity or not? I think people disagree about that. I mean, I find it a very puzzling poem at the end. And so, you're seeing this as more of this kind of universal possibility of grace, but I don't think Satan has any possibility of being saved.
But but yet to end it like that might give the possibility of that an offering.
>> Yeah, I'll just read the section reading it, you know.
>> Yeah, I'll read the section just so we we know what I'm talking about.
>> Yeah, please do. Right. So Satan fell and straight a fiery globe of angels on full sail of wing flew nigh, who on their plumey vans received him soft from his uneasy station and up bore as on a floating couch through the blide air.
Then in a flowery valley set him down on a green bank, and set before him spread a table of celestial food, divine and brosial, fruits fetched from the tree of life, and from the font of life and brosial drink that soon refreshed him, wearied and repaired. What hunger if hunger had impaired, or thirst, and as he fed angelic choirs sung heavenly anthems of his victory over temptation and the tempter proud.
>> So by the end, that must be Jesus over the tempter. Yeah.
>> But so Satan felt >> It is. It is.
>> Received him an amazing sort of twist of the brain.
>> Received him.
That's weird.
>> I don't know how to read that. You're right.
>> That is a very very strange ending.
>> But reminds me of what you were mentioning.
>> I have to write an essay on this. The description in the bower is initially from the kind of narrator point of view and then twists without us noticing to being Adam and Eve. This just kind of clicks in my head >> and how Milton is capable maybe without noticing of slipping from the one into the other >> continuously.
>> Very very interesting because he does slip from one to the other at the end >> in this way that is hard to define.
That is really I got to go back and read it again.
>> I mean I have to have to write about this. [laughter] [snorts] >> Um >> um let's let's go back to uh desire. We talked about the Bower scene being a kind of desireless space. I'm curious where desire comes from. How does it enter the picture in in classical myth?
An arrow hits you. We've been reading my >> Please do please go. Yeah.
>> Okay. And then we'll be right back.
>> Joshua Reynolds day.
>> Great man.
>> I wrote this these out so I could find the places. Okay.
It happens when they have sex after the fall. But it's before that the desire I think first appears. Let's see. Okay.
Book eight. This is when he's talking with Raphael and he's telling his story of his creation.
And then after he tells the story of his creation, he tells the story of the birth of Eve. This is, oh my god, this is so good. Um, I think this is one of my favorite places. This is where, um, he knows that he is alone and and God teases him and he says that I, you know, he says, I see all the other animals. They all in pairs. They all have a mate. And God is teasing him and but to the almighty answered not displeased a nice and subtle happiness I see thou to thyself propos in the choice of thy associate and then he says but I'm all alone you know and then Adam goes back at him and everything and Adam says I by conversing cannot these erect from prone in other words he can't somehow get these animals who are on all four by talking erect them to be prone but also it's like I can't have somebody who's like an equal and then God says find I find thee knowing not of beast alone but of thyself expressing well the spirit within thee free my image not imparted to the brute so then he's going to make thy likeness thy fit health thy other self thy wish exactly to my heart's desire fire. And so then he does the cesarian section or whatever it is on Adam and takes Eve out. Wide was the wound, but suddenly with flesh filled up and healed, the rib he formed and fashioned with his hands under his forming hands a creature grew man-like but different sex so lovely fair that what seemed fair in all the world seemed now mean or in her summed up in her contained and in her looks which from that time infused sweetness into my heart unfelt before into all things from her air inspired the spirit of love an amorous delight. She disappeared and left me dark.
>> I wake to find her or forever to deplore her loss. All other pleasures all obscure.
>> She disappeared and left me dark. That to me is the first sign of a desire.
>> Reminds me again of of of a passage from Don from I think again again from the good mororrow. the um uh if ever any beauty I did see which I desired and got was but a dream of the >> dream of thee and the nocturnal upon St. Lucy's day.
>> Yeah, >> talk about darkness. She disappeared and left me dark.
>> It's interesting that that I think in the invocation to the muse at the beginning of Paradise Lost, one of the things Milton uh asks to be rid of is is this darkness. What is dark in me illumine um what is low raise and support. Yeah.
>> Right. And then the inner light that there's the inner light that he gets from God. Hail holy light beginning of what is it? Three >> or something.
>> Yeah. Three. Yeah. and and that whole thing of so to me I saw I'm looking at that I think I see a little bit of the desire but at the end of eight there he's confessing to bra to Raphael about his feelings about Eve and he says and this would be uh 8 line 53 or so but here for otherwise transported I behold Transported touch transported something happens to him >> here passion first I felt commotion strange in all enjoyments else superior and unmoved here only weak against the charm of beauty's powerful glance I think that totally devalues Eve because it's not a glance it's something more than that >> um of nature and he wonders maybe nature failed in me or left some part not proof enough. This is desire.
>> But this is the very desire that Adam is going to be told by Raphael is bad. It has to be controlled by reason. Now we've got this opposition between the longing for somebody which we didn't see in the beginning and the sense that that's dangerous. It can take you away from God. So I don't think Milton just elevates love and sex in any way. I think there's this tension in it.
You know that may I don't know I don't know what to I do know what I make of it for myself but and then you know he says and then he says yet when I approach her loveliness so absolute she seems one of the weird things about Adam is that Adam feels inferior when he's next to Eve.
Eve never feels inferior. she has to be taught inferiority, you know, I mean, so this whole thing is so complicated and every time I teach it, everybody who reads it reacts differently.
But so there's this contradiction. The poem is, you know, is erotic love good or dangerous or both bad. It always has to be kept under control.
>> All of this is prelapserian or all of these feelings that Adam's having >> preapserian. They haven't fallen.
>> Yeah, they've not fallen. So, all all of this everything that Adam's feeling now, all of these uh like cravings and feelings of lack, they must be uh paradical like because they've not they've not had the fruit yet.
>> Maybe paradise wasn't perfect.
>> Yeah. [laughter] Yeah.
>> Seems to Yeah. almost necessarily if the new Jerusalem is to be better, which it is. That's the whole premise, there has to be some some flaw or imperfection in the old paradise. Maybe this is some expression of that. Because otherwise, there's always the strange paradox of, well, you've got paradise, but what about an even better paradise? Hang on, then the first one wasn't paradise because >> can't be bettered. But there's this whole thing in Milton that >> the following is superior to the original. So heaven's great, but earth in a way is better even though it's not heaven because he made it second and it's improved. So new Jerusalem better than old Jerusalem, which puts you in an interesting situation with Adam and Eve.
Even if Eve is sort of subcreated from Adam, she is second and more beautiful in the way perhaps earth is more beautiful than heaven, new Jerusalem more beautiful than than old paradise.
>> But it's not stated, but it's following Milton's. There is a question about that's a very interesting thought but also like do you want to be in the new Jerusalem in a new paradise when there is no sexual desire and no marriage I mean it has a wonderful sermon about there's no marriages in heaven >> Jesus brings up the big problem you know this seven brothers or something they were all married to the same wife and who who will you be married to in heaven yeah and instead of an ingenious kind of a Jesuit response Jesus just says, "Well, that'd be none of that upstairs. Don't worry about it.
[laughter] All the be orbs floating around in orb universe."
>> Yeah. I don't know how nice it sounds.
>> Yeah.
>> We read this as human beings. Do we really want no desire?
>> You know, I mean, >> and yet, >> and yet, and yet, and yet desire is painful. I mean >> I mean like you get to the new Jerusalem you you feel desire again the new Jerusalem falls and it's a loop cyclic you know [laughter] just like the new Jerusalem just immediately someone just eats the tree and it and it goes on a loop again another sacrifice the whole >> the new new Jerusalem >> the new new Jerusalem maybe maybe the maybe the Garden of Eden was like the 19th Jerusalem this has just This has been looping for [laughter] for eternity kind of.
>> It's just so that's why I I mean I love this poem so much because you know there's so many contradictions in it or you know so many things that are both perfect and imperfect at the same time and I don't know.
>> Yeah. I I just I mean I just love the music of it. I mean that with Paradise Lost, I'm I'm like that's the main draw for me overall. It's very interesting ideas, all these things we can talk about. It's just how wonderful it sounds on the tongue. I just love saying it out loud to myself. I just It's gorgeous.
Gorgeous.
>> So beautiful. So beautiful. Even the ugly parts, you know.
>> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
>> And I I and all the I I love all its descriptions of undescribable things.
Maybe as a blind man, he had a certain sort of knack for the um for for describing kind of places, impossible wastes and Yeah. And and also I mean it's I I think Samuel Johnson said it's um it's beautifully written for his weaknesses. So his weaknesses are kind of like writing a convincing human being, a human psychology. But it wouldn't be it wouldn't be right if Adam and Eve were human beings the way we encountered them in the world. It makes sense that they're strange kinds of human beings. And >> so >> yeah, just picking this wonderful, wonderful subject that seems to play to all his strengths and sort of submerge all his weaknesses. Yeah. I wonder if we could uh we could talk about the postlapserian is it sex on I think is it book nine?
Yeah.
>> Yeah, book nine.
>> Yeah. [laughter] >> Yes, it is. Okay. Can we say one thing before that >> please?
>> Okay. And it's the transition.
The fact that Eve needs a lot of persuading by Satan. She argues with him a lot. Adam needs none.
naive. I think that's fits with what we were just talking about. How he can't live without her. She disappeared and left me dark. Takes him one line. As soon as he sees her, he knows he's going to eat.
>> There's no rationalization, nothing. It just happens instantly after pages and pages of Eve going on.
>> Yeah. So I think I think that's that's part of the thing because he has already decided he will fall with Eve. So now on to the sex. Okay.
Um Yep. And he says, "How can I live without thee?" Echoing that she disappeared and left me dark. And that is book 9 uh 895 to 9:16.
It's 9:08. How can I live without thee?
It's just to me that is one of the most heartbreaking of all lines in the poem.
>> It's just so simple and so direct and no excuses.
>> It's just a decision.
>> Exclamation mark, not a question mark.
>> No, it's exactly right. And no wonder my students always find Adam and E is so much more human after the fall. They cannot not identify with Adam and Eve before the fall at all including the hot sex. Okay. [laughter] God. All right. So that is um page 14 book nine uh 127 to 45. Okay. Is he's described they're described as with new wine intoxicated both they swim with and mirth and they feel divinity within them.
um breeding wings wherewith to scorn the earth. But that false fruit for far other operation first displayed carnal desire in flaming he on Eve began to cast lascivious eyes she him as wantingly repaid. Now this is kind of equal, right? You know there is a different equality here than the equality when they're just like lying side by side. But it still is a reciprocal thing. Okay. In lust they burn till Adam thus g Eve to diance move. No gan to I can't read to diance move. Eve now I see thou art exact of taste and elegant of sapiience no small part. Since to each meaning savor we apply and pallet called judicious.
Notice how his language has changed too.
This is very clever.
>> Fancy Adam.
>> This is I the praise yield thee. So well this day thou hast pervade. Much pleasure we have lost while we abstained. You see while we abstained we lost this pleasure. At first you want to read it. Much pleasure we have lost.
Yes, they have. But no, they haven't.
While we abstained from this delightful fruit, nor known till now true relish tasting. If such pleasure be in things to us forbidden, it might be wished for this one tree had been forgiven.
Forbidden 10. But come so well refreshed. Now let us play.
play >> as meat is after such delicious fair.
For never did thy beauty since the day I saw thee first and wetted thee adorned with all perfections so inflame my sense. And look at those words inflaming burning.
>> Yeah.
>> Echoing hell >> infernal. Yeah.
>> Absolutely. inflame my sense with order to enjoy the fairer now than ever bounty of this virtuous tree. So he said, so said he, and forbore not glance or toy, of armorous intent, well understood of Eve. She has new knowledge too. She understands all the tricks of sex now.
Okay. Eve whose eye darted contagious fire. Her lusty her sorry her handy didn't slip.
>> I don't want [laughter] to ste that her hand he seized and to his shady bank thick overhead with verdant roof and bowered. He led her nothing loaf.
They're no longer in the bower.
They're out in nature where all the other animals are. Flowers were the couch. Pansies and violets and asphodel and hyasin earth's freshest softest laugh. There they took their fill of love and loves to sport took largely of their mutual guilt. The seal and I want you to think about why is sex here the seal of guilt.
the solace of their sin till dewy sleep oppressed them wearied with their amorous play. Soon as the force of that facious fruit that with the exhilarating vapor bland about their spirits had played an innermost bowers made error was now exhaled the grosser sleep bred of unkindly fumes with conscious dreams uncumbered now had left them up they rose from unrest.
M >> and then they bite. Why is this the seal >> of guilt? The same thing happens in um Dr. Fus in Marlo's play where sex with Helen confirms the seal of his damnation. You know if marriage is the kind of image particular you know for the relationship between God and humans then an aberrant kind of sex would then be the seal of guilt I think you know it's like which is why Dun keeps insisting good sex is good that's holy there's nothing wrong with that but not for Milton it's like >> I don't know >> no yeah yeah and it's and it's interesting that it isn't It isn't like disappointing while it's happening, you know? It's it's like it's much better than before.
[laughter] >> Yeah. Exactly.
>> Playful.
>> Yeah. Yeah. Um and it's only >> Yeah. only afterwards does does it engender a fight. But the act itself is um kind of like I don't it seems kind of straight down the line like I I don't know classical. Yeah.
Exactly.
>> Makes sense. Okay.
>> Yeah. Yeah.
>> But what happens afterwards? Postco exhaustion.
>> Exactly. Like the rest of reality is a bit worse than that.
Yeah, exactly. Um, >> yeah.
>> So, I mean, we have the whole thing here >> as opposed to done in the canonization.
We die and rise the same.
>> They are not diminished by the act of love.
>> No.
>> And that's where I love to put them together. You know, in the canonization, it's like, no, we don't die.
>> And what's resurrected?
in love's alchemy. Some there the cynical version something like a a winter seeming summer night or something like that.
>> It's horrible.
>> Yeah.
>> Yes. It's like sex is such a disappointment.
Love is a disappointment. It's not just sex. He's saying like there is no such thing as real love. True love.
>> We expect something wonderful.
We're all taught to expect, you know, the great love of our life and it's all going to be wonderful, but it's not.
>> And I wonder if this is just an attempt to almost an ethology for that fact, even just for the kind of postcoal trying to say, okay, if this if this was a very good thing followed by something that at least physiologically was less good, >> let's explain that. Why would God build that into man? Well, clearly he wouldn't.
>> Wouldn't do that. So, we must have built it into us. How did that happen?
>> History sort of expands backwards. And then we get into that kind of pre-darwinian thing Jack's talking about. We don't have another mechanism >> to even explain it.
>> But we need one.
>> That's great connection. It really is. I think that's absolutely right. And I think it's Augustine trying to explain it too, except he just has so much guilt. Okay, that's a whole different thing. But um but yes, but so I think you're right. I mean it does go back.
It's like then Milton having it here and yes I think yeah it's not not concerned with a scientific a later kind of scientific explanation about what happens.
>> It's like a theological >> Yeah. And we're and we're still separate from the other animals. The thing about the post Darwinian zeitgeist is like the thing that explains the way the other animals behave is also the thing that explains the way we behave. Whereas >> true.
>> Yeah. Whereas Adam is separate from the other animals. You know, they walk on four legs, [laughter] >> right?
>> Completely different thing. Complete no relation to me.
>> Totally different thing.
>> What they're doing in the field over there, nothing to do with what I'm doing in the bower. I've got two legs.
[laughter] >> Yeah.
Yeah.
>> Love this conversation. You guys are wonderful.
>> No, thanks. Yeah, send all your friends.
I [laughter] >> What?
>> Send all your friends. I'm I'm curious when when when did you first um were you always like in kind of like a bookish household? You you were familiar with Don and Milton growing up or was it >> or was it was it [laughter] >> I'm curious I'm curious when when you first came across them.
Yeah.
>> When I did what?
>> When you first came across like like Don Milton, what what drew you to poetry?
>> I did not come across them until I was Well, I came across Milton my junior year in college. I went to Indiana University. I didn't come across Dunn until my first year in graduate school.
>> Never heard of him. Never read any of this stuff. Totally fell in love with Dunn. I thought Milton was fascinating.
Was I in love with Milton? No. But I was fascinated by him. But Don was just the most wonderful thing I'd ever read. And it was old. I mean, I couldn't believe it. But you asked me where do I come from? Oh my god. Do you really want to know that?
>> I I I was I was Did I I meant like where did you come to the books? But >> you could say you could say where you're from. I don't know. Now I'm compelled by the answer. [laughter] from the bowels of >> a very unusual scandalous [snorts] unorthodox Jewish family sort of.
>> Yeah.
>> Were they like >> wrote I wrote a memoir about it that has not been published. My agent >> whatever that got all screwed up. She got dementia blah blah blah. I revised it so many times I don't know what's going to happen but it's called No, I won't even say what it's called. But [sighs] um but yeah, you can promo me on this.
Okay. Not [laughter] really. But I don't know what I'm going to do with it. I know it's a great book and I've been told that by so many people including very close friends of mine who were, you know, major authors, but very hard to publish something like that. Anyhow, um, >> yeah, >> my father thought he was the final prophet, >> last prophet, and he kept predicting the end of the world.
>> How many How many did he get in? How many predictions?
>> Oh, every day basically. [laughter] I grew up in a very apocalyptically oriented um home where he you know I mean where he thought he was maybe even the redeemer.
>> Yeah. The Messiah. Yeah.
>> He is sort of Yeah. So the name of it is the Messiah's daughter. Okay. God. It is really really true. Self-educated, you know, homeless from the time he was 10. H >> a lot of trauma in his life. Uh ended up living in a cave in Israel for a year where he had visions and was reading the Bible and things like this. I mean whatever. So he comes over to America many many many many years later after having a family there and and I'm born and it's a very unusual household is all I can say.
>> Wow.
And so I mean that's why it's kind of funny that I mean okay he was like he his work his views were condemned by basically Christian Protestants Catholics and Jews. [laughter] So I grew up truly um unorthodox. If you want to read it, there's an very an essay I published in Milton studies at the end of a volume that was on Milton studies six volume 662 or something like that on is Milton good for the Jews. And so the very final um one is my essay called from Moses to Milton which is sort of the story. It is the story of how I got from there to here >> and became an honored Milton scholar.
[laughter] listed along with Northrup Fry and CS Lewis who would be rolling over in their graves if they knew. But [laughter] >> but I mean so I my my trajectory is totally bizarre. Um but it means that >> yeah I suppose that the het hetradox religious views uh >> heterodoxy and the thing is both Dunn and Milton are heterodox. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. Milton thought I was getting away from everything but it turns out that everything I somehow and I'm constantly dealing with the Bible just like he was.
I thought I was getting away from everything but apparently everything ended up becoming things that I ended up using in totally different ways. I wouldn't have done anything that I have done probably without having had a background that I tried to escape and flee from you know so that that is the irony of this um what I thought was a curse really has become a gift >> you know and so now what am I going to write on paradise reate about [laughter] the sun I get to I was asked to you know [laughter] so it's going to be really interesting and I think the people who asked me knew about something about my background I thought well that might be really interesting commercial presses now they want the quick fast read something you know very short people have lost their attention span they don't want anything people have to think hard about you know it's too uh doesn't fit an academic thing exactly it fits nothing just like Sure. Yeah.
>> Maybe sometime it's going to fit. Find the right place and if not I have to focus on me.
>> Yeah.
>> Um >> yeah. Is it like a big like like you know you've been working on it for decades kind of thing?
>> Oh god. Yes. Because it started with me not intending to write about my you know my story at all. I wanted to recover a family history that is totally lost and unusual and bizarre because it also involves a lot about America. Um >> m yeah >> um it's because my father wouldn't have come over here if he hadn't had support from a powerful person here. So I'll just leave that as a mystery because it was in the middle of the war.
>> Okay. Goodness me.
>> Yeah. I know. So I mean there's just really it's a very complicated story.
He um and it very much touches on our own times like is there really a chosen people, a chosen land?
>> Does that mean Oops, a bug is in here.
[laughter] I killed it. Talk about Kafka, the metamorphosis.
[laughter] >> No, I mean it is.
>> You're doing a good job of making it maximally compelling. I'm I'm [laughter] >> well it is maximally compelling and the thing is then they kept saying then readers would say oh it needs more of your story we want more memoir so I had to pair down history and biographies and everything much of which I put back but so it's a combination of both it's like I don't know >> but it's not like girl makes good kind of thing you know [laughter] >> girl is crazy [laughter] Yeah, but in a good way. But that's why my students love me. I mean, you know, it's crazy. I mean, it is. It's weird.
The more unfiltered I am, the better it is, you know. [laughter] >> Yeah. I think especially at that age.
>> It's good to It's good to meet really unfiltered adults when you're like 18 to 21.
>> Oh, I love them. It's my favorite age.
Oh my god, I love it. I've been teaching for a long, long time. And I taught graduate students and did dissertations for a long time as well. But I really my my preference is really for you know undergraduates. It's like the right age especially now when the world sucks you know.
>> Yeah. And I I suppose people like you you know they're really ready to change >> in in a way questioning >> right.
>> Yeah. I've had weird things of people saying, "Well, you also taught us life lessons called survival." No. No. I don't know. I don't know.
>> Well, I mean, >> which one of you is friends with Ivan?
>> I know Ivan from from the old Milo, right?
>> Yeah.
>> Yeah. What the hell of a guy, >> our friend?
>> He's wonderful. Oh my god. He's just a wonderful person. Wonderful person. But he was the only guy in my class this time. Normally I have a number of them, but for some reason all the guys disappeared this year.
>> Yeah. Male readership's completely dropping off. Like in especially in fiction, you know, like really?
>> Yeah. I mean, in the UK, I think we make up about 18% of the fiction market.
>> Are you serious?
>> Yeah. And I think it's sim I think it's probably kind of similar in the States as well. And if you take out like the nerd core, if you take out June and Lord of the Rings, that number is probably quite a bit lower.
That's so sad.
I just I But also just even with with women or whatever, um attention spans are gone.
>> Everybody wants short clips, something and short fixes, quick fixes.
And um I don't know. I don't know. And so my teaching has also changed I suppose a bit though. It's always been that for a long time because sometimes I think if you give somebody this huge thing and they have to read it in one day, how much attention are you going to pay to it?
>> Yeah. Yeah.
>> They're going to skim it and skimming isn't reading. So like I sort of give bits and pieces to really focus on. But this is very sad though about about reading.
>> This is why we publish these these featurelength interviews to throw down the gauntlet to the attention deprived you.
>> I love it.
>> Try to get through this.
>> I love it.
>> I've looked I've looked at yours. I've looked at yours and they're wonderful.
And so yes, I will definitely tell my students. Did you want to know anything about um the divorce? No.
>> Yeah. The divorce tracts. Yeah, I' I'd hear.
>> No, no, I just picked a couple of I just wanted to just say two or three things, that's all.
>> Sure. Yeah, absolutely.
>> I mean, because I think you'll find it really interesting, and this is why I'm laughing about Milton's Elegy7.
Okay. One of the things is, and I'm writing about this, I think, in my Paradise Regain thing, too. Milton doesn't use the word charity or even the concept of it anywhere pretty much other than the divorce tracks in which case he argues that allowing divorce is charity.
How do you like that?
Because his wife had left him after [clears throat] a couple months of marriage. She leaves him for three years and that is when he writes four tracks polyical tracks publishes them asking you know asking them to allow marriage.
>> I mean no no no marriage the opposite >> marriage is so holy and wonderful and because most marriages are not like that we should be allowed to divorce an unfit partner.
>> Okay. So the reason that they're just two sentences I wanted to read you. I mean I'm sorry this is just so good. He says that marriage is supposed to be a solace but he can be what he calls a household captivity.
>> How do you like that? Are either of you married?
>> Yeah. [laughter] >> Recently just just you just got into it.
>> My husband died.
No, that's okay. He he lived a long time. We were married a long time. Okay.
household captivity. And then, oh my god, there are two places where we describe sex. Compare this or contrast this. [laughter] It's an essay question.
Compare or contrast with Paradise Lost.
Okay. Okay. 706. Okay. This is just I mean I love this. It's so horrible. I make my students read it and not to um kind of discourage them, you know, but [laughter] okay. I also have a kid. You know, it's like a grandchildren. I I totally do believe in it when it works. Okay. Um Okay.
703. Okay. This is just wonderful. I won't keep you much longer than this.
What thing more instituted to the solace and delight of man than marriage? And yet the misinterpreting against abusers of law for divorce given by Moses. He's saying Moses allows divorce and Jesus says not. And he said, "No, Jesus really didn't mean it." Okay. He says, "Um, has changed the blessing of matrimony not seldom into a familiar and co-inhabiting mischief, at least into a drooping and disconulate household captivity, without refuge or redemption, so ungovered and so wild a race does superstition run us from one extreme of abused liberty into the other of unchurchable restraint." And he says the the end or the goal of marriage was the apt and cheerful conversation of man with woman to comfort and refresh him against the evil of solitary life not mentioning the purpose of generation till afterwards. So that's reproduction is not the main purpose as being a secondary end in dignity. Yet now, if any two be but once handed married in the church, and have tasted any sort the nuptial bed, if they've had sex, let them find themselves never so mistaken in their dispositions through any error, concealment, or misadventure, that through their different tempers, thoughts, constitutions. They can neither be one to another a remedy against loneliness, nor live in any union or contentment all their days. Yet they shall so they be but found suitably weaponed. In other words, they both have the equipment to the least possible equip possibility of sensual enjoyment.
If they be made spy of antipathy to fad together and [laughter] combine as they may to their unspeakable will weariness and despair of all social delight.
Listen to that. Is that horrible?
There's one other place that just dis Okay. What's interesting is when he talks then he goes on to talk about what is the ideals of marriage. He says it's the marriage of aeros and anteros two twin brothers.
That is how he describes the ideal of marriage. That's what it should be.
>> That kind of same >> arrows like even her reflection. Yeah.
>> You see you see. Oh my god. I hadn't thought about that. But it is you see and it's like it's not hetero.
>> Heterosexuality is doomed. That's the [clears throat] bodies. They're different.
>> Isn't that the saddest thing? It's [laughter] terrible. So that's why I go back to Don.
>> But I just I just wanted to tell you that because charity lies in divorce and finding your perfect partner is the one who mirrors you.
>> Same sex. [laughter] No, it's been an absolute delight. Elsa, thank you so much for making the time.
>> This was great. Okay, this is wonderful.
You guys have a great day and I love talking with you.
>> Okay, show me what you edit.
>> Okay, >> too.
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