The Birth of Eve in Fuseli’s, Blake’s, Groom’s and Petrina’s Illustrations of Paradise Lost

Laleh Atashi¹  & Alireza Anushiravani²

¹Assistant Professor of English Literature, Department of Linguistics and Foreign Languages, Shiraz University , Iran. Email: lalleh.atashi@shirazu.ac.ir

²Professor of Comparative Literature, Department of Linguistics and Foreign Languages, Shiraz University , Iran. Email: anushir@shirazu.ac.ir

Volume 9, Number 2, 2017 I Full Text PDF

DOI: 10.21659/rupkatha.v9n2.12

Received April 07, 2017; Revised July 24, 2017; Accepted July 27, 2017; Published August 10, 2017.

Abstract

In this paper, we are going to analyze how Milton’s Eve has been illustrated by Fuseli, Blake, Groom and Petrina. The purpose is to see to what extent the artists reflect, challenge or write back to the text they are illustrating.  This study focuses on the way the four illustrators have presented the moment of Eve’s creation. Blake and Fuseli illustrated the poem at the end of the 18^th and at the beginning of the 19^th century. Petrina and Groom, two woman artists, illustrated Paradise Lost in 1930s. The four illustrators’ depictions of Eve are informed by different cultural discourses and gender ideologies dominant at the time they were produced.

Keywords: Eve,  Paradise Lost, Milton, Illustration, Blake, Fuseli, Groom, Petrina.

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