Eve’s Speech to the Forbidden Tree in Milton’s Paradise Lost
In Book IX of Milton’s Paradise Lost, Eve makes a very important and revealing speech to the tree of knowledge. In it, she demonstrates the effect that the forbidden fruit has had on her. Eve’s language becomes as shameful as the nakedness that Adam and Eve would later try to cover up with fig leaves. After eating the forbidden apple, Eve’s speech is riddled with blasphemy, self-exaltation, and egocentrism.
The first part of Eve’s speech contains the most blatant blasphemy. In it, she turns the forbidden tree into an idol, or a false god. She promises that “henceforth [her] early care, / Not without song each morning, and due praise / Shall tend [the tree]†(ln 799-801). The long sounds of the spondees in “not without song each morning, and due praise†add to the deliberateness of Eve’s blasphemy. The tree replaces God in her eyes, and begins to receive the praise that she had formerly reserved only for God. Besides being blasphemous, this is also ironic.
