Here's to our last blog post!!
Of course, the one time we read two "chapters" of a book, its the one book that I want to read in it's entirety.
I think Paradise Lost was my biggest in class reading success thus far this semester. Granted, that first sentence threw us all for a loop (especially when Dr. MB drew the sentence out... Like, whaaaaat?!) But, this is the first book that we've read this semester where I wanted to keep reading and reading until there wasn't anything left to read out of this thing!
PL was right up my alley in terms of content. With Beowulf, I was interested in the back story; what the author DIDN'T tell us rather than what they did. Beowulf awakened my imagination with "What if..." questions. I wanted to know everything about Grendel and his mommy dearest. I was convinced (and still am) that Grendel's story was bigger than what we were able to experience in the poem of Beowulf. PL was exactly the same! We were able to take a glimpse into something that no one could possibly even fathom (except for Milton, of course!)
I mean, sure, Grendel COULD have had a bigger back story than originally thought. Maybe. But to take on what happened to make Satan and his followers fall from Heaven? That's a tall order and I was digging it the whole time! PL really made me think about what the Bible doesn't say and what was left out that we won't ever knew to begin with.
I have always been a huge religion buff. I love learning about different theories regarding Heaven, Hell, Satan, angels, demons, devils EVERYTHING! So this book was perfect for me. Everything from Satan's push out of Heaven to meeting Sin and Death was so friggin' awesome. Because, honestly, no one ever really thinks of this stuff until someone brings it up in some way. We wouldn't have thought about Satan, Sin, Death, "demonocracy" <-- thanks Brendan, if it weren't for Paradise Lost. This book made me scratch my head with questions in the best way possible.
It's just an interesting concept that feeds my brain. I have all these questions and no answers and I want to know! Even just getting someone's interpretation or general idea about these things is so cool, to me. I'm starting to understand how Dr. Faustus felt. Now, I wouldn't go as far as to make a deal with Satan to get these answers but I'd come pretty close!
It's been fun socializing and discussing with everyone about what we have read this semester!
Though I found the language kind of tricky, I also really enjoyed Paradise Lost. Milton took on a really big (and probably controversial) task, but I think he did it very well. The story keeps you interested because it is so unlike anything else that we hear about Hell. Democracy for the damned? Who would have thought? Apparently Milton did and that is probably why the story is still so popular today. I read the beginning in high school and absolutely hated it. I was dreading getting to this text because of my first experience with it. That being said, I am really glad I had to read it again. I appreciated it so much more this time around, and I understood it better which I think goes a long way in helping me to enjoy it.
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