Trouble in Paradise? Milton’s Adam and Eve

Title: Trouble in Paradise? Milton’s Adam and Eve

By Mandy Green (Durham University, English Studies)

Date: Tuesday, October 2, 2025

Time: 1730-1900

Room: EB203

Abstract: It is a rare blessing when two people fall in love at exactly the same moment; even in Paradise – in the first ever love story, according to Genesis – Adam and Eve do not instantly fall happily into each other’s arms. Milton situates the crux of his epic poem, Paradise Lost, not in the manic strife between Satan and God, but in the complex human dynamics of love between Adam and Eve – amor, not arma, is Milton’s theme.

About the speaker: Mandy Green is Professor of Renaissance Literature in the Department of English Studies at Durham University (UK). Her research focuses on classical presences in English literature, especially Ovid and Milton. Her monograph, Milton’s Ovidian Eve, traces how Milton borrows narrative shapes, verbal echoes and Ovidian metaphors from the Metamorphoses to stage a fluid, shape-shifting portrait of Eve in Paradise Lost. At Durham she is a member of the Centre for the Study of the Classical Tradition, the Centre for Visual Arts and Cultures, and the Institute of Medieval and Renaissance Studies. She is active in the British Milton Seminar, reviews for Modern Language Review, Milton Quarterly, Classical Review and Review of English Studies, referees for Milton Studies, and serves as Associate Editor of the International Journal of the Arts in Society.

Organized by the Department of English Language and Literature