Paul Basu

On Paradise: Between Hope and Memory

Lost edens, hoped for utopias. The idea that a better place exists haunts the human imagination. Accompanying the ‘On Paradise’...

Title	Description	People	Date
6. J. C. Niala: Everyday Paradises	Dr J. C. Niala reflects on her research with allotment gardeners. She discusses how ‘paradise’ may be found in everyday places, acts, and what she terms ‘banal utopias’.	J C Niala, Paul Basu	28 September, 2026
5. Sondra Hausner: Transcending Paradisal Imaginaries	Professor Sondra Hausner questions the assumed universalism of concepts of Paradise. From a Hindu and Buddhist perspective, such imaginaries are vehicles for transcendence.	Sondra Hausner, Paul Basu	28 September, 2026
4. Peter Boxall: Paradise and the Drama of Hope	Professor Peter Boxall discusses Paradise and Utopia in a secular context. Images of perfect worlds must be more than mere wish-fulfillment, they must be put into relation with the world as it is in order to generate hope.	Peter Boxall, Paul Basu	28 September, 2026
3. Wes Williams: Paradise and Utopia	Professor Wes Williams discusses Paradise as a fictional construct that can be imagined into being or made in the act of naming. He considers Thomas More’s Utopia as a moment in the longer history of Paradise.	Wes Williams, Paul Basu	28 September, 2026
2. Kathryn Murphy: Paradises Lost and Regained	Professor Kathryn Murphy discusses 17th-century Christian thought concerning humanity’s expulsion from Paradise, nostalgia for a lost originary state, and possibilities for reinstantiating Paradise within.	Kathryn Murphy, Paul Basu	28 September, 2026
1. Veronika Poier: Paradise Gardens and Divine Order	Dr Veronika Poier discusses the Persian origins of Paradise as an enclosed garden, expressive of divine order on Earth.	Veronika Poier, Paul Basu	28 September, 2026