The theme of betrayal can be found at the heart of both Milton's Paradise Lost and Ibsen's A Doll's House, but interestingly the answer to whether these betrayals are worth forgiving has changed over time. Where contemporary audiences of Milton and Ibsen have been shown to avoid and refute the abandonment of women by their families, it can be argued that more modern audiences may recognize the importance of gender equality and, by therefore, forgive the female characters in these texts. The betrayal that the male characters primarily exhibit in their relationships is their prioritization of honor and pride over love for their wives. Yet while in A Doll's House Nora is unable to forgive her husband for this, in Paradise Lost Adam eventually achieves the "miracle of miracles" and his union with Eve is rectified. However, one could argue that Adam's greatest sin is not the betrayal of his relationship with Eve, but his relationship with God, a betrayal ultimately unforgivable and fraught with consequences in Milton's text. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why violent video games should not be banned"? Get an original essay In both texts, the female protagonists betray trust in their relationships by leaving their husbands in search of independence, knowledge and 'equality. In A Doll's House, Nora leaves her husband and children for arguably selfish reasons as she seeks independence and knowledge of the outside world: “I must try to educate myself. I have to be completely alone. As in Milton's context, in the 19th century there were strict patriarchal expectations of female behavior and therefore Ibsen's presentation of a woman rejecting her "duty" as a mother and wife provoked great indignation among his audience. Indeed, Niemann, the actress in an 1880 German production, refused to play the ending, declaring, "I will never leave my children" and got Ibsen to change the ending, an act he called more late of 'barbaric outrage against the play.' However, while Ibsen's contemporary audiences took issue with Nora's decision to leave her home, more modern audiences were sympathetic to her struggle and forgave her for her actions. Bravard argued that "the cause of Eve's downfall lies in the husband who punished her" and arguably this also rings true with A Doll's House, where modern audiences find it difficult to blame Nora for what she is driven to do so by her husband's behavior and the patriarchal structures that restrict her life. These days there is more emphasis on individualism rather than the family unit and perhaps that is why women can relate to Nora's struggle ("I have another duty that is just as sacred, my duty towards myself") and thus forgive him for having left the family. her children, perhaps even celebrating her decision to leave her husband. Certainly, it appears that Ibsen held this view, which has been characterized by many critics as a "proto-feminist" who championed women's independence through his writings. However, this would undoubtedly be a reductive interpretation of the position of Ibsen who himself declared: “I don't even know what women's rights are, I believe in human rights. "So we see that where Ibsen's contemporary audiences could not forgive Nora's betrayal of trust in her relationship, like Ibsen, a modern audience is sympathetic to Nora's decision and understands the importance of the gender equality. It could therefore be argued that the real betrayal in this case is notnot Nora's betrayal of Torvald but Ibsen's betrayal of his society's representation. The play is based on the real-life story of Laura Keeler, who, after leaving her family, was no longer able to achieve the same independence that Ibsen suggests Nora will find, but instead, she is placed in a psychiatric institute by her husband and is publicly disgraced. It can therefore be said that Ibsen's society was not yet ready for the female strength and determination that features in A Doll's House, and where a more modern audience is able to empathize with Nora, the true story behind the play and the reaction of his contemporary audience represents the ruthless society in which Ibsen wrote. Similarly, Eve is depicted in Paradise Lost as betraying trust in her relationship through her desperation to "get away" from Adam's side and therefore, "from her husband's hand, his gentle hand, she withdrawn”. Like Nora, Eve leaves her husband thinking of herself with a desire to be "made" "more equal", but while initially, like Nora's, it seems that Eve's decision to leave her husband is based on a desire for equality, his reflection on the opportunity to keep "the chances of knowledge in his power without a co-partner" and desire to be "sometimes superior" no doubt, making his actions a little less forgivable and more selfish. In Milton's society, at a time when women were largely considered subordinate to their husbands, Eve's desire to be "superior" would no doubt have been laughable. Milton himself believed that "wives were to husbands as subjects were to the king" and wrote extensively in his divorce treatises about the desired family structure ("who could be ignorant that man was created for woman and not woman for man") and so, although Critics have argued that Milton, as an advocate of divorce and an individualist, would support Eve's desire for independence. Ultimately, it could be argued that Milton and his contemporary audience would not be able to forgive Eve's betrayal. Perhaps in reality, it would be more accurate to say that her voice is represented by Adam's and his dismissive speech: "bad woman". On the other hand, like in A Doll's House, today's audiences are able to identify with Eve and her struggle for power. as a woman constrained by the patriarchal parameters of society. Handle writes: "It is not surprising that she wanted to be 'sometimes superior' given that she was always treated as an inferior." It seems, however, that where a modern audience is accustomed to a more gender egalitarian society, the reader is able to see the drastic consequences that a life without equality would bring, and therefore sympathize with Eve's desire for power. Yet Milton's contemporary society did not have this luxury, and as an audience completely unfamiliar with gender equality, it is perhaps understandable that Eve's consideration of superiority would be seen as so unfathomable and unforgivable . We therefore see that in the texts of Milton and Ibsen, women are condemned for leaving their husbands by their respective contemporary audiences, but where these critics cannot ignore these feminine acts of betrayal, modern audiences have been seen sympathized with Eve and Nora and their quest for independence and equality, and therefore were more willing to forgive them. As in these two texts, the women betray trust in their relationships, so do their husbands, but their betrayal lies not in independence but in pride, where similarly, they are shown to grant selfishly prioritize their own desires. In Paradise Lost, Adam betrays Eve by turning his back on her andtotally blaming his fall: “Get out of my sight through the serpent!” This name is the best. It suits you to associate it with him. In the 17th century when Milton was writing, the vast majority of people were still fundamentally religious and so the use of the derogatory noun "serpent" which aligns Eve with the devil would have been inherently insulting. The juxtaposition between Adam's speech to Eve before and after the fall serves to emphasize the extent to which he avoids his wife and betrays the trust in their relationship, while demonstrating his wounded pride through his animosity toward her. Before the fall, Adam refers to his wife. as "fellow soul Eve", Eve's "Virgin Majesty", calling her "virtuous" and praising her beauty, but once he realizes the consequences of the fall, his tone changes drastically to blame and acrimony then that he curses her, “ungrateful Eve” and protects her “oh woman”. While a modern audience would no doubt be quick to point out that it was Adam's final decision to fall with Eve, Milton's contemporaries, like Adam, placed all the blame on Eve and immediately forgave her for her betrayal. CS Lewis, for example, called Eve's transgression "murder" and Baldwin declared that "a woman's consumption of a forbidden food brought disaster to mankind", completely ignoring the implication of Adam in the fall and placing the responsibility for the consequences for humanity entirely on Eve. Arguably, Milton's initial audience saw Adam's anger toward Eve not as a betrayal but as an understandable reaction that did not need to be forgiven, and in an age when female vanity and persuasion were current, the blame is placed on Eve for using her feminine wiles to manipulate Adam into falling with her, who, therefore, "fell by luxury" (CS Lewis). We then see that Eve is doubly victimized, for choosing to stray from "her husband's side" and for convincing Adam to fall with her, and subsequently Eve is seen doubly betraying her husband with actions deemed unforgivable by Milton's readers. Likewise, where perhaps at first modern audiences would find Adam's response to Eve inexcusable and Edmeades "verbally abusive" unlike Torvald in A Doll's House, Adam is able to perform the "miracle of miracles" and to forgive his wife, restoring their relationship and defying the "test of excessive love" before the end of Book X. In fact, some critics have called Adam's actions "heroic". However, to say that a modern audience would be completely sympathetic to Adam even after his forgiveness would arguably be too simplistic, given the condescending tone of his speech: "thy frailty and infirm sex forgiven", for the use of the adjective “crippled”. has implications of female inferiority that would be rejected by modern society. Overall, we can again infer a generational divide in terms of audience response, but where the women in these texts were condemned by their respective contemporary audiences, Adam in this text and also Torvald in A Doll's House are easily forgiven and instead the woman is considered traitors. In fact, Adam's real betrayal in the eyes of Milton's readers is not Eve but his relationship with God, for prioritizing his Robbins "lust" over his love and faith for God would have been deemed unacceptable at that time. Regarding his betrayal of Eve, it seems that the readership of this era was familiar with male pride and therefore the idea of ​​a woman damaging him, as Eve does in the fall, would be considered as the ultimate humiliation for a man. Finally, as with Adam, Torvald's love of pride for his love for his wife may be.’