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zachlittrell 's review for:
Paradise Lost
by John Milton
It's the tits, frankly. Awesome, horrific, funny, and thoughtful.
And it's a fun and inspiring way to kick off an epic poem with fallen angels waking up in Hell, and arguing with each other what to do next (and the fact one demon says, "We're already in Hell, it can't get worse" and another says "Ohoho I don't want to find out" is an absolute delight). And there's Satan himself, encouraging a can-do attitude. A charismatic and heroic immortal buccaneer that steps into Chaos itself.
And the fact that God keeps treating Lucifer like Charlie Brown and repeatedly snatching away his precious football right at the last second is a frustratingly good cosmic joke.
The parts without Satan are not as fun, but are still some beautiful poetry. Milton does a marvelous job presenting Adam and Eve at first as noble, innocent, and naive creatures -- and after they eat the apple, as neurotic, moody, and petty. If you're hoping for Eve to get better treatment...that's not really going to happen. The story happens as it does, and so it goes. But it does make their Fall so much more human. Them sharing the Original Sin and everything that comes with it is an act of intimate doomed love.
Milton turned Genesis into a romantic, colorful exploration of the universe's origins. Satan, Adam, and Eve coping with the liberty of free will within a terrifyingly unknowable plan -- a creeping, stalking idea in 17th century or 21st. That blind ill aging man sure produced an evergreen beauty on the human condition, and will haunt my thoughts for a long long time.
And it's a fun and inspiring way to kick off an epic poem with fallen angels waking up in Hell, and arguing with each other what to do next (and the fact one demon says, "We're already in Hell, it can't get worse" and another says "Ohoho I don't want to find out" is an absolute delight). And there's Satan himself, encouraging a can-do attitude. A charismatic and heroic immortal buccaneer that steps into Chaos itself.
And the fact that God keeps treating Lucifer like Charlie Brown and repeatedly snatching away his precious football right at the last second is a frustratingly good cosmic joke.
The parts without Satan are not as fun, but are still some beautiful poetry. Milton does a marvelous job presenting Adam and Eve at first as noble, innocent, and naive creatures -- and after they eat the apple, as neurotic, moody, and petty. If you're hoping for Eve to get better treatment...that's not really going to happen. The story happens as it does, and so it goes. But it does make their Fall so much more human. Them sharing the Original Sin and everything that comes with it is an act of intimate doomed love.
Milton turned Genesis into a romantic, colorful exploration of the universe's origins. Satan, Adam, and Eve coping with the liberty of free will within a terrifyingly unknowable plan -- a creeping, stalking idea in 17th century or 21st. That blind ill aging man sure produced an evergreen beauty on the human condition, and will haunt my thoughts for a long long time.