Paradise Lost
Ratings149
Average rating3.7
Loved the poem and it was fun teaching. The allegory and allusions were quite fantastic and forced me to journey through Greek, Roman, and Biblical mythologies.
jesus. ok, so, it's good, right? actually, it's fucking beautiful. yes, i needed someone to force me to read it - three separate someones, in fact, all professors with the ability to at least explain why this was worth reading, and to clarify some of the latinate language where needed. but how the fuck are you supposed to rate THE Paradise Lost on an Amazon affiliate? like, this text is the epitome of public university education. it's dusty tomes on library shelves and quiet English reading-rooms with yellow oil light. it's not a beach read, or a bus read, or a sitting-in-bed-after-work-trying-to-just-have-an-interesting-night read. this text is absolutely worth reading, but only for like, 2 percent of all possible reading situations.
so whether i recommend the book comes down to context, as it always does, i guess, but especially here. are you an English Major? are you an English Graduate Student? are you an English - dare I say it - Professor? if so, two things: 1) i'm sorry and 2) read this book, not just because you should, but because you're probably weird enough to enjoy it.
Lots of random thoughts:
Book X: Adam is whining and crying because he's been made mortal by god after fucking up. He blames Eve, of course, and fears that all women are treacherous beings. “Why couldn't god find some other way for us to create offspring, without the use/creation of women?”
Why did God have to make a tree that no one was allowed to touch or eat the fruit from, Adam?? Eve blames the serpent, Adam blames Eve, I'm over here wagging my finger at naughty old God for playing with his food.
•••
Satan isn't the good guy here, but neither is god. Also, who made the angels, man? Bc if God made the angels, he also made them free-thinking enough to rebel. God is both sadist and masochist.
It brings into question the idea of good and evil in this way that I don't ultimately believe there's a pure definition of either, or that anything should really be described as such, because in this instance, to be good simply means to follow authority blindly, and to be bad is to break the authorities rules, or commit acts the authority deems “sinful”. I, no doubt, would have been wiped out in the flood.
Also - Jesus is the ultimate nepo baby. No one in the history of work has ever really been friends with the bosses son, you just kiss ass and hope you don't get fired.
My rating may not be strictly fair because I didn't understand half of what was being written. I had to read the cliffs notes guide along side the book to get any understanding.
Also I know it's a different time and everything but massively struggled with Milton's views particularly around women and his ideas that your death matches how “good” you are in life.
If I had father like God, I'd be in therapy for childhood trauma for the rest of my life.
Really appreciate the novel as a whole and the history of it, but it was just so much work to read this one. There was also inconsistencies between the prose that threw me off, as well as with the ordering of the events that happened.
Also, I went into the novel expecting it to be entirely in the devil's perspective and I his presence was almost nonexistent in the last quarter.
I mean, it's Paradise Lost. It's maybe the greatest piece of English writing ever written. Boy is it truly epic.
I don't have many thoughts to add to the book and I do not think anything I could say would do it justice so here are some of my favourite quotes instead. Hopefully they'll convince you to read it :)
(Narrator)
“To Paradise the happy seat of man,His journey's end and our beginning woe.”
(Satan)
“Better to reign in hell than serve in heaven” “So farewell hope, and with hope farewell fear,Farewell remorse: all good to me is lost;Evil be thou my good;”“Farewell happy fields,Where joy forever dwells: hail, horrors!”“Me miserable! Which way shall I flyInfinite wrath and infinite despair?Which way I fly is hell; myself am hell;“The mind is its own place, and in itself Can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven.”
(Adam)
“Did I request thee, Maker, from my clayTo mould me man? Did I solicit theeFrom darkness to promote me?” — also quoted in Frankenstein
(Raphael)
“Freely we serve,Because we freely love, as in our willTo love or not; in this we stand or fall.”“God made thee perfect, not immutable;”
✨And my favourite passage of all✨:
(God the Son)
“Behold me then, me for him, life for lifeI offer; on me let thine anger fall; Account me man: I for his sake will leave Thy bosom, and this glory next to thee Freely put off, and for him lastly dieWell pleased: on me let death wreak all his rage;”
(God the Father)
So man, as is most just,Shall satisfy for man, be judged and die,And dying rise, and rising with him raiseHis brethren, ransomed with his own dear life.So Heavenly love shall outdo Hellish hate,Giving to death, and dying to redeem,So dearly to redeem what Hellish hateSo easily destroyed, and still destroysIn those who, when they may, accept not grace.
Random notes: This was difficult to get through but it's not impossible. The poetry can be read in several ways but I found the fastest and most enjoyable way was walking around reciting the poetry out loud to myself, the trees and anyone who would listen. Switching to the audiobook was also helpful for especially dense passages. Honestly, like 85% of the references went over my head and I got through it fine but if that really bothers you (or if you're a nerd or something) there are dozens of annotated versions out there. I was just here for the poetry ✌️. It's also very similar to a play and once you start really imagining it on stage, it flows quiet nicely.
-Book III was amazing.
-God the Son was my favourite character
-Abdiels insults to Satan should be taught in sunday school
This was a tough one to get through. A very interesting concept of an Old Testament story in the Greek epic style, Paradise Lost, seemed super interesting. I however had a tough time with the dense language and poetic nature of 17th century English. Perhaps this is something that gets better with multiple reads. Definitely a lot of detail hiding for those willing to take in all in.
Random thought - this concept would make an amazing marvel style movie
