What does it look like?

The book is an octavo – the technical term used to describe the most common book size since the early 17^th century. It is called an ‘octavo’ as each page is an eighth of the size of the original sheets of paper, which were folded to form the book – in size, it is about 19cm high.  Its binding is made of leather and has been decorated with beautiful gold tooling on the front and spine. The book is a first edition.

The second page has an inscription in ink, in the hand of Thomas Hollis, who donated the book to Christ’s College in the 18^th century. Thomas Hollis, (1720-77), was a strong supporter of liberty and greatly admired Milton for his republican views.  He donated many of Milton’s works to Christ’s College’s Library, and indeed to libraries around the world. It has rather a plain title page and the rest of the contents are very simple in style as well. Many later editions of the poem were very lavish in comparison, with detailed illustrations.

Who, what and where?

Paradise lost was written by poet, politician, polemicist, and former student at Christ’s College, John Milton, (1608-1674), in 1667. Milton wanted the poem to stand alongside those written by the great authors of ancient Greece and Rome, such as Homer and Virgil.

However, unlike Homer’s Iliad or Virgil’s Aeneid, which were epics featuring the many gods and goddesses of ancient Greek and Roman religions, Paradise Lost was a Christian epic poem, written, as Milton himself put it, “To justify the ways of God to man”.

Its central theme is the so-called ‘fall’ of man, when Adam and Eve were banished from the Garden of Eden, having been tempted by Satan in the form of a snake.

Why is it significant to the study of religion?

From an early age, Milton’s parents intended for him to become a clergyman in the Church of England: by his own account he was “destin’d of a child” for a religious career.

However, Milton’s developing Puritanism caused him to call into question what he came to see as the “tyranny” that had “invaded the Church,” something he explicitly stated in a polemical essay entitled ‘The Reason of Church Government’ (1641).

During Milton’s student years, Christ’s College itself had a reputation for being strongly of Puritan and this influence is evident in some of the poet’s early writings, which have a distinctly anti-Catholic edge.  Later on, Milton served as an official propagandist for the Parliamentarian cause, speaking out strongly in favour of regicide, (in this case of Charles I).

By the time Paradise Lost was published, however, the Civil War, (1642-49), was over, the monarchy had been restored and Milton’s views were deemed treasonous. The poem itself, considered by many the finest poem in the English language and one of the most imaginative literary interpretations of the Bible ever written, clearly shows how religion, politics and literature were very closely linked during this period.