The Eve Function in Paradise Regained.

Eve, named eight times in Paradise Regained, is usually assimilated to the so-called triple equation between the temptations failed by Adam and resisted by the "second Adam" Jesus. In this essay, Andrew Kau argues that the androcentric typological "equation" should be replaced with an "Eve function" that generates from within the "inputs" of the poem's formal and dramatic structures various interpretive "outputs" that challenge its surface values of typological orthodoxy, masculine virtue, and epic triumph. While Satan absorbs the negative role assigned Eve by the mainstream Christian tradition, Jesus gradually becomes identified with the Eve of Paradise Lost, a representative of moral autonomy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]