In class the other day we all had some really great discussions about Paradise Lost and our three groups' respective topics. The group that I was in was assigned the character Satan as a topic of discussion. We all had some interesting things to say about the specific quotes from the book that we were told to look at. The one that interested us the most was the "better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heaven" quote, and what this said about Satan in particular.
One thing that Dr. M-B told us to think about, that none of us really went over after our discussions, was why Milton decided to include this back-story behind how Satan fell from Heaven and became this evil entity as we know him today. Obviously a lot of Paradise Lost has to do with Adam and Eve and how they eat an apple and, like, that's where sin comes from and stuff? Basically this whole telling of how Satan becomes Satan is to provide a behind the scenes look to the reader at how things came to be the way they are when Adam and Eve enter into the story.
In class, my group and I came up with an interesting analogy for what happens within the first two books of Paradise Lost. In the first Star Wars, C-3PO and R2D2 escape from the Imperial scum in an escape pod and crash land in the middle of Tatooine. From there, they go on to meet Luke and yeah, everything else in the Star Wars universe ends up happening. If C-3PO and R2D2 had been destroyed by Vader, they never would have met Luke, Luke would have never met Obi-Wan, and everything that ended up happening in the Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi simply wouldn't have happened and the tyrannical Empire would have been left to its own devices. So yeah. Lots of similarities, am I right? If Satan hadn't fallen from Heaven and convinced Eve to eat the forbidden fruit, the "world," according to Milton and the Bible and what-not, would be much different. However, Satan convincing Eve to eat the apple was most definitely a bad thing, while the two droids meeting Luke turns out to be a very good thing in the end. So there are some differences but they're pretty similar, heheh. Just a thought. What does everyone else think? Why do you think Milton included Satan's back-story other than to simply provide some background info before Adam and Eve enter into the whole ordeal?
I think that the whole backstory thing was to give the story more dimension. Everyone knows the story of Adam and Eve, but not that many people know about the fall of Lucifer and the rebel angels. By introducing this story to the reader, the reader is able to understand some of Satan's motives. For instance: why does he convince Eve to eat the apple in the first place instead of just letting her go about her merry way?
ReplyDeleteThat's just my idea. Love the Star Wars reference btw!