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nicohvi 's review for:
Paradise Lost
by John Milton
Seems like John Milton was a lot of things: well-read, articulate, deeply pious, and pretty misogynistic.
The latter can surely be attributed to the times in which he lived, but still, it's jarring to read passages calling for women to be obedient servants in an acclaimed literary work. I mean, Milton managed to depict Satan as a (sometimes) likeable anti-hero, I'd think that was as much against the norms of 17th century England as equal worth for women.
Anyway.
The poem itself is absolutely stunning at times, especially the first third depicting Lucifer's ill-fated war with God (who's a big problem with this work, but I'll get back to him later). It quickly becomes obvious that Milton is a huge fan of Homer, and the heavenly war is torn straight from the pages of the Iliad: armour, spears and all.
Reading Paradise Lost I couldn't help but feel that Milton wanted to re-create the story of original sin in the mold of the Greek tragedy. While this is a powerful idea, it still felt jarring to be served countless references to one mythology (Narcissus, Prometheus, Zeus, etc.) while immersed in the origin story of another.
That being said, Greek mythology has a literary trump card up its sleeve. Or, rather Christianity has a literary elephant in the room which I've already mentioned - God.
It's kind of hard to write a compelling narrative when one of your main characters is an omniscient, all-powerful being whose actions are impossible to justify on the simple basis that we don't understand him due to our own inferior minds.
All the stakes immediately get reduced to nothing when you stop for a moment and consider one of the sides has an all-powerful being who can snap his fingers and end everything. The war in Heaven is a perfect example.
Both sides are fighting one another in impressive fashion with spears and bronze armour (I'll leave why they settled on old-school armour and weapons, though I'm willing to bet Milton's fascination with a story concerning a certain wooden horse had something to do with it), and Satan even pulls a trick to turn the tide of battle in favour of the bad guys.
Then Jesus arrives.
Speaking of Jesus, a short tangent: God demands all the angels submit to Jesus, saying how he's the best of them all, when all Jesus really is is just another image of God. He created a (I'm guessing) slightly inferior version of himself he calls 'Son' for no other reason than he wants to, and being God, who's going to argue against him?
Anywho, Jesus shows up and the entire battle is over.
I mean, God couldn't be bothered to do something himself, he sent his kid. And that was enough to literally send Satan and all his guys tumbling down to Hell.
However, if you suspend your disbelief over God (and more or less ignore all logical loopholes that exist due to his omnipotence) the story in itself is satisfying enough, and Milton's prose is angelical.
The latter can surely be attributed to the times in which he lived, but still, it's jarring to read passages calling for women to be obedient servants in an acclaimed literary work. I mean, Milton managed to depict Satan as a (sometimes) likeable anti-hero, I'd think that was as much against the norms of 17th century England as equal worth for women.
Anyway.
The poem itself is absolutely stunning at times, especially the first third depicting Lucifer's ill-fated war with God (who's a big problem with this work, but I'll get back to him later). It quickly becomes obvious that Milton is a huge fan of Homer, and the heavenly war is torn straight from the pages of the Iliad: armour, spears and all.
Reading Paradise Lost I couldn't help but feel that Milton wanted to re-create the story of original sin in the mold of the Greek tragedy. While this is a powerful idea, it still felt jarring to be served countless references to one mythology (Narcissus, Prometheus, Zeus, etc.) while immersed in the origin story of another.
That being said, Greek mythology has a literary trump card up its sleeve. Or, rather Christianity has a literary elephant in the room which I've already mentioned - God.
It's kind of hard to write a compelling narrative when one of your main characters is an omniscient, all-powerful being whose actions are impossible to justify on the simple basis that we don't understand him due to our own inferior minds.
All the stakes immediately get reduced to nothing when you stop for a moment and consider one of the sides has an all-powerful being who can snap his fingers and end everything. The war in Heaven is a perfect example.
Both sides are fighting one another in impressive fashion with spears and bronze armour (I'll leave why they settled on old-school armour and weapons, though I'm willing to bet Milton's fascination with a story concerning a certain wooden horse had something to do with it), and Satan even pulls a trick to turn the tide of battle in favour of the bad guys.
Then Jesus arrives.
Speaking of Jesus, a short tangent: God demands all the angels submit to Jesus, saying how he's the best of them all, when all Jesus really is is just another image of God. He created a (I'm guessing) slightly inferior version of himself he calls 'Son' for no other reason than he wants to, and being God, who's going to argue against him?
Anywho, Jesus shows up and the entire battle is over.
I mean, God couldn't be bothered to do something himself, he sent his kid. And that was enough to literally send Satan and all his guys tumbling down to Hell.
However, if you suspend your disbelief over God (and more or less ignore all logical loopholes that exist due to his omnipotence) the story in itself is satisfying enough, and Milton's prose is angelical.