We’ve all heard the story of Adam and Eve, or at least some version of it, right? Long story short, it goes something like this:

God creates the world and everything in it. Man (Adam) meets Woman (Eve) and they fall in love. Satan, an enemy of God, is absolutely NOT okay with this. He causes chaos by disguising himself as a talking snake and tricks Eve into breaking the ONE rule they had, which warns them not to eat the Forbidden Fruit from the Tree of Knowledge. *Sigh* Adam follows suit and God is not happy. As a consequence, the couple are banished from Eden, and life on earth begins.

This tale is one that has echoed through the ages, giving meaning to many on where it all began, and how we humans came to be conscious of good and evil. In the 17th century, an English poet named John Milton took the story a step further and wrote Paradise Lost to “justify the ways of God to men” (Book 1: l. 26). This risky and monumental task proved to be Milton’s greatest work, and the revered literary masterpiece crowned him as a king of English literature for many years to come.

I, a Muslim reader, first encountered the classic rendition of the Genesis story during my second year as an undergrad and was instantly mesmerised by Milton’s words. In my final year, we studied the epic poem at great length and each week, our seminar class was bustling with fascinated takes on where the metaphysical journey across heaven, hell, and the garden of Eden had taken us. No two people had the same experience, and each character meant something different to us all. It was in that classroom, studying that text, that I realised we all had our own unique readerprint.

It sounds like a pretty simple conclusion, I know. But the fact is, when you’re someone who has almost always looked a little different to your peers, and you discover a sense of unity in a text that equally baffles and enchants you all in fantastically distinctive ways, you can’t help but dig deeper. Even though Milton’s story deviates from the Quranic account that I believe in, the poem spoke profoundly to me and I was riddled with wonder on whether others felt the same.

Since then, I have embarked on a PhD on the subject with the hope of uncovering how we shape texts, and how they shape us. My research has led me to collect data across Higher Educational institutions in the UK and North America, where I investigate how the canonical work is read and understood today. To appreciate modern Muslim engagements with English literature, I place close emphasis on Milton’s female Muslim readers from BAME backgrounds and examine how reading experiences are influenced and coloured by cultural and/or religious formations, and question how they inform our ever-changing negotiations of identity.

To my delight, I have discovered a rich range of diverse experiences in my respondents from both religious and non-religious backgrounds. Whilst some readers report that they are not fooled by Satan, others admit that they find him captivating. As each reader wrestles with questions on morality posed by Milton, the deeply introspective poem causes some to experience a crisis of faith. Loved by most and found troublesome by others, one thing that we can all agree on is that Paradise Lost is a text that stays with you forever.

So, what about you? Have you ever encountered a work that questions the foundations on which you stand and lean on? If so, what does your readerprint look like?

Image: Detail from ‘Satan Watching the Endearments of Adam and Eve’ by William Blake (1808)