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mirror that holds up to Shakespeare’s emotional life.
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Chapter OneThe Heavenly Eden: the Garden of Beauty

A. The Garden Tradition from Classics to Renaissance Literature
Garden is a predominant and prevalent imagery in the western literature, which hasa long pedigree with rich connotations. The original garden imagery can trace back toEuropean classics and mythologies in which distinguished gardens or fairylands weredescribed. These ample precedent gardens can be roughly divided into two types: one isthe enclosed garden which marks the scene of prosperity and flourishment, like the palace garden of Alcinous in Homer’s epic The Odyssey4; and the other is the open field,valley or remote island which presents a picturesque natural landscape, revealing ahappy and harmonious prospect of life, such as the Golden Age in Ovid’sMetamorphoses5. It is noted that, whether classic literary garden or mythological setting,are both considered as the paragons of earthly paradise, sharing such similarcharacteristics as moderate climate, fertile soil, blooming flowers and abundant fruits,and above all, blessed life without labor, sorrow, worry or disease. Obviously, the vividportraits of garden imagery in the classical works reveal the admirations of the poets inthe ancient times for the harmonious beauty of earthly paradise. With the revival ofclassical culture and literature, these ideal gardens have undoubtedly become thesources of garden poetry in the Renaissance.Garden imagery can also be found in the biblical tradition and there are twoeminent gardens in the Bible. The most striking example is the Garden of Edendescribed mostly in Genesis. According to Rivers, the favored derivation of the name“Eden” was traditionally from the Akkadian edinnu, which originated from a Sumerianword meaning “plain” or “steppe”, but it is now believed to be more closely related toan Aramaic root word meaning “fruitful, well-watered”.6The Garden of Eden is alwaystaken as “the garden of God”, a beautiful place where springs up every tree “that ispleasant to the sight and good for food”7and a source of freshwater from the four riversto drink. Besides, in accordance with God’s command, man was responsible for thetending and keeping work of the Garden of Eden. (Genesis 2:15) In this God-guardedEden, Adam and Eve, the originals of mankind, led a happy and harmonious life andknew nothing of good and evil. In this sense, the Garden of Eden is not merely a visiblesensual paradise which provides beauty and sustenance, but a invisible spiritual onewith an innocent and pure state before the first fall of man.8It appears, therefore, thatthe Garden of Eden is a materially and spiritually excellent land for human to live,which entrances human beings to spare no efforts to find a way back to this promisingparadise after the banishment of Adam and Eve. 
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B. TheAnalogy Between Garden Imagery and Human Body
According to the traditional cosmology, the Great Chain of Being presents avertical world in which all the creatures, animate or inanimate, are assigned their precisepositions, beginning on the high with the noblest and descending to the meanest things of creation. Meanwhile, the same world is largely horizontal which consists of a numberof planes, arranged one below another in order of dignity but connected by an immensenet of correspondences.16The different dimensions of the world revea本论文由英语论文网提供整理，提供论文代写，英语论文代写，代写论文，代写英语论文，代写留学生论文，代写英文论文，留学生论文代写相关核心关键词搜索。