Paradise Lost

*Paradise Lost* is the greatest epic poem in the English language. Begun by John Milton in the 1650s and completed in blindness through dictation, it set out to 'justify the ways of God to men.' The argument moves in twelve great stages from the rebellion and fall of Satan, through the council in Hell, the seduction of Eve, the war in Heaven, the Fall, and the slow hand-in-hand departure of Adam and Eve from the garden.

This edition reproduces the 1674 twelve-book text in full, presented as verse with line breaks preserved as Milton wrote them. A short editor's preface places the poem in its biographical context; a modern subtitle is supplied for each Book.