Comparing John Miltons Satan to Dantes Lucifer - Research Paper Example

?[Your full May 2, Comparing John Milton's Satan to Dante's Lucifer John Milton’s Paradise Lostis an epic poem, in which he portrays the character of Satan as an embodiment of leadership and authority. He is shown as being responsible for the ultimate sin that Adam and Eve committed after eating the Forbidden Tree. Dante Alighieri’s Inferno is a narrative poem of Dante, who is accompanied by Virgil into a myriad of circles of the Hell, where he meets different sinners undergoing horrifying punishments in every circle, and eventually meets the Lucifer in the last circle, from where they climb down to the surface of the Earth. This paper is a comparison of two characters: John Milton’s Satan and Dante Alighieri’s Lucifer. The thesis statement that carries this paper toward a direction is that: Milton’s Satan is an embodiment of power, heroism and leadership; while, Dante’s Lucifer is powerless, dull and uninteresting. Paradise Lost is one of the greatest masterpieces of John Milton’s, which has been studied, criticized, and evaluated in every period of time since it was written. The character of Satan has been evaluated in different regards, mainly claimed as being the most convoluted and dynamic character in literature. In Milton’s text, Satan is shown as possessing a sense of havoc, chaos, and wreck. The reader is never clear whom Milton is justifying as being innocent: Satan, or Adam and Eve. Flannagan (26) writes in his book that many romantic critics believe that Milton is unknowingly in the devil’s party, as he portrays Satan as the most powerful character throughout the story, seducing us into following his leadership when, for example, he is shown arguing with Areopagitica, or when he chooses to speak truth for a moment. The reader ends up sympathizing with the Satan in the minutest of feeling, in addition to the greatness of Shakespearean acting in his character. Ruth and Milton (15) write, “Milton’s appealing delineation of Satan’s character, some commentators say, forces the reader to sympathize and identify with the fallen archangel just as Milton himself does.” Satan is shown on a hot lake of molten lava in Hell, and weeping at a point later, which are the sites the reader empathizes with him at. The energy that comes out of his character while he is in the Hell, and while he plans the whole story against Adam and Eve, makes his character so magnificent that no other character in the story can beat. God, in comparison, has been portrayed as an uninteresting character in Paradise Lost- something that the Satan convinces the reader to believe in Book 3, while behaving like a naive victim all the way. At least this is the perception the reader conceives when he reads the Satan’s fervent dialogues and their contagious rhetoric throughout the storyline. His speeches are as weird as the disguise he adopts to entice Eve to eat the Forbidden Tree; that is, the serpent that is clever, sharp, quick, smart, and vengeful. Carrying angelic features and possessing potent weapons, Satan is shown as an embodiment of authority, power, control, and leadership. He is the leader of the fallen angels, sharing with them the plan to leave the Hell for a quest based on vengeance. Critics and reviewers have agreed upon the heroic aspect of Satan in Paradise Lost; for example, Brackett (313) writes that Milton has shown Satan as such a “clearly and dramatically drawn figure that many post-romanticism readers viewed him as a heroic figure, a Byronic hero of sorts…as Satan proudly declares his preference for the position of ruler of hell to servant in heaven.” Hence, the heroic and leadership incarnation of Satan’s character in Paradise Lost shows Milton’s idea of sin that has been discussed many a times by critiques later on. It is also important to discuss how Milton has expressed Satan’s persona of heroism and leadership in his work. Satan is proud of his army that he thinks is so powerful that repulse can never be known. He and his army stand like gods, as the reader reads in Book 1 (Milton 18, lines 629-630): How such united force of gods, how such As stood like these, could ever know repulse? Satan’s pride and false sense of self worth makes him exaggerate the number of angels that have fallen into his army, and his heroism shows itself when he feels proud that he is going to confront God in a vengeful quest. Satan says (Milton 18, Book 1, lines 631-634): For who can yet believe, though after loss, That all these puissant legions whose exile Hath emptied Heav'n shall fail to re-ascend, Self-raised, and repossess their native seat? These instances show Satan’s heightened sense of self-worth and pride, leading to creating a perception in reader’s mind that he has heroic and leading qualities. In contrast to John Milton’s Satan, Dante Alighieri’s Lucifer in Inferno is dull and uninteresting. We understand that Lucifer is another name of Satan used in literature, who fell from Heaven after he disobeyed God. His arrogance and pride made him disobey, and he became an enemy when once he was a favorite angel. Dante shows Lucifer as a three-headed body with a large and frozen core as a punishment of his heinous crime of disobeying God. “…so towered from the ice, up from midchest”, Dante writes (XXXIV, line 29). However, Dante’s Lucifer is not so smart as Milton’s Satan, because we see him flapping and chewing on the most evil sinners with his three mouths. The ice would have melt if he stopped his flapping and waving about, but that would mean that he admitted his defeat against God, which he did not want. We conceive the notion that Lucifer wants to keep on struggling against God’s will through not stopping waving and flapping. This is the height of stubbornness and disobedience that we see in Dante’s Lucifer, and that describes Dante’s idea of sin. Lucifer appears to be a figurehead, just an evil body with no uniqueness. “Unlike any of the other infernal functionaries, Lucifer seems to be completely unaware of what goes on”, writes Jacoff (89). He does not possess any heroic qualities or any idea of leadership that makes him stand out of all the other characters in the story. This is the biggest difference that Lucifer has against Milton’s Satan. Perhaps the reader finds Lucifer as uninteresting because Dante has not spent much effort and time in explaining his character like he does with Vanni Fucci or Guido da Montefeltro. The reader finds the sinners described by Dante as much more detestable than Lucifer. Also, the punishments being born by the worst of sinners are much more horrible and heinous that the one Lucifer is going through. That is why the reader finds the characterization of Lucifer is unexciting and boring. There is lack of emotions which distinguishes Milton’s Satan from Dante’s Lucifer. Milton’s Satan expresses emotions like pride, hate, vengeance, self-worth and self-pity at many times; while Dante’s Lucifer is void of any such emotions. Jacoff (89) writes about Dante’s Lucifer, “He is a machine totally desensitized and dehumanized, that is to say, totally deprived of either emotions or intelligence.” However, this points to the fact that there is at least this similarity between Milton’s Satan and Dante’s Lucifer; that is, the reader does not find the two characters as abhorrent and odious as they actually should be. The weeping of Satan in Paradise Lost and the frozen body of Lucifer in Inferno makes the reader slightly empathize with the two characters. However, the fact cannot be denied that Milton’s Satan is much more interesting and unique than Dante’s Lucifer. Here, it is also notable that Dante’s idea of sin greatly differs from Milton’s. Dante has shown Lucifer as struggling against the punishment, wriggling his body violently to get out of the ice, when he is getting more entrapped with every move. Dante has tried to convey the perception that even the greatest of evils and sinners are not able to move in front of the sovereignty of God, who is the Almighty and the Creator of the universe. No matter how much the sin or evil tries to confront God, it cannot make even one small move without the will of God. The powerlessness of Lucifer depicts this central idea; while, the power of Milton’s Satan conveys a different idea. Milton’s Satan is vengeful and has been given power by God, to see how much he may do to anger God. He has been given free will and independence to make the moves of his own choice, no matter in the end he is the one who has to counter defeat. To conclude, the differing point between the two characters is that Milton’s Satan was given power to move freely and act, only to see defeat at the end; while, Dante’s Lucifer had not been given any power from God, and was void of free will and independence. Milton has put in power, intellect, sharpness, heroism, and leadership in his character of Satan. Dante has portrayed Lucifer as a powerless being, struggling for survival. Hence, the power and powerlessness, respectively, describe Milton’s and Dante’s ideas of sin in their respective texts. Works Cited Brackett, Virginia. The Facts on File Companion to British Poetry: 17Th and 18th Centuries. Infobase Publishing, 2008. Dante, Alighieri. Inferno. UK: Bloomsbury Publishing, 2003. Flanaggan, Roy. John Milton: A Short Introduction. John Wiley and Sons, 2008. Jacoff, Rachael. The Cambridge Companion to Dante. USA: Cambridge University Press, 2007. Milton, John. Paradise Lost. USA: Wilder Publications, 2007. Ruth, Corinna S., and John Milton. John Milton’s Paradise Lost. USA: Research & Education Assoc., 1995. Read More