“Desire dazzles and destroys.” Compare the presentation of the destructive power of desire in one poetry and one drama text you have studied.

Both Milton, in ‘Paradise Lost’, and Webster, in ‘The Duchess of Malfi’, highlight the destructive nature of desire on those it effects. There are subtle differences in their presentation, with themes such as desire for power, desire for piety and sexual desire being depicted in varying ways; these differences may emerge from their historical contexts and author’s intentions, as Webster is writing around fifty years before Milton. In ‘The Duchess of Malfi’ and ‘Paradise Lost’ characters are depicted as desiring power, which ultimately leads to destruction and disastrous circumstances. Eve’s desire to eat the fruit, brought about by Satan’s temptation, certainly highlights the false logic she chooses to believe to fulfil her desire and we can conclude she was ‘dazzled’ by Satan’s words. Indeed, Milton highlights the disastrous consequences of Eve’s desire though the personification of the earth in the line ‘Forth reaching to the fruit, she plucked, she ate: / Earth felt the wound, and nature from her seat / Sighing through all her works gave signs of woe, That all was lost.’ Similarly, in ‘The Duchess of Malfi’, Bosola’s desire to rise in the ranks of the court are immediately established in the first scene, when he insists to the Cardinal he has ‘done you / Better service than to be slighted thus’. Webster portrays Bosola sacrificing his morality in order to satiate his desire for power, as although he acknowledges he would be ‘an impudent traitor’ and ‘they’d take me to hell’, he cannot resist the promise that ‘Thou mayst arrive / At a higher place by’t’. An interesting comparison between Eve and Bosola is that when they place piety second to their own desire, they encounter problems. This may reflect the devout nature of 17^th century society, when weekly attendance at church was expected, or a fine would occur, and religion was intrinsic to everyday life, with atheism being regarded as heretic and illegal. The theme of the importance of piety and rejecting the devil is likewise seen in much Renaissance and Jaccobean drama, such as Marlowe’s ‘Doctor Faustus’, in which the title character unwisely sells his soul to the devil, or Middleton and Rowleys’ ‘The Changeling’, which depicts treachery caused by humanity’s sinful nature through the reference of ‘original sin’. Therefore, the destructive nature of desire for power, and a subsequent rejection of piety, is a theme drawn upon by both authors and also reflected in the historical context of the 17^th century.The theme of sexual desire and its destructive consequences are portrayed in ‘The Duchess of Malfi’ and ‘Paradise Lost’. The sexual desire of Adam and Eve is depicted as sordid by Milton, especially when compared to their first idyllic union when ‘the flowery roof / Showered roses’ ‘on their naked limbs’; a symbol of natural blessing for their procreation. However, after the fall, Milton creates a sense of them thwarting nature to fulfil their gross sexual desire as ‘flowers were the couch, / Pansies, and violets, and asphodel, / And hyacinth, earth’s freshest softest lap’. Likewise, in ‘The Duchess of Malfi’, one critical theory by Clifford Leech and James L. Calderwood suggested that the Duchess’ marriage to Antonio was purely fuelled by her lusty desires as a highly sexed widow, thus showing desire could be viewed as the key cause for her downfall in her irresponsible marriage to Antonio. Again in ‘Paradise Lost’, the trope of burning imagery describing Adam and Eves’ desire, ‘desire inflaming’ and ‘in lust they burn’, associates sexual desire with the ‘great furnace flamed’ – hell – and thus highlighting its sinful nature and proving it is removing the couple further from God. Similarly, taking Clifford Leech and James L. Calderwood’s’ reading in mind, the Duchess is similarly removed from God due to her sexual desires, as she uses the pretence of making ‘a pilgrimage / To Our Lady of Loreto’ in order to save herself and Antonio, by nature a symbol of sexual sordidness, and thus falsifying and misusing her connection with God. The theme of sexual desire is also intrinsically linked to the cause of madness, as in the 17th century lust was seen to cause sickness; in Shakespeare’s sonnets, especially 129 and 147, he often describes love ‘as a fever, longing still / For that which longer nurseth the disease’. Likewise, in ‘The Duchess of Malfi’ Ferdinand’s desire to kill his sister becomes implicitly sexual as his madness has connotations with this association with lust. This is epitomised in Act II, scene five, where his ravings cause him to ask ‘Have not you / My palsy?’ to the Cardinal as he is taken over by a ‘violent’ ‘rage’. Thus, sexual desire has many negative connotations in both works.In conclusion, there are some very similar themes portrayed in both texts, as their commentary on lust, piety and a desire for power link highly due to the historical context of the importance of religion in the 17^th century.