Paradise Lost by John Milton

I started off listening to this as an audiobook, but I found that I couldn't focus enough to get out of it what I wanted to. So I bought a copy of this (this is one that I want to have on my shelves) and read it while listening to the audio. It took me a few months to get through it--I've been reading a lot of other things so I just did this a few chunks here or there--but I feel like this is one that you can't just rush through anyways. I wanted to be slow and savor it, and really get something out of it. I read a few parts of this in college, but never the whole thing, and I don't really know that I knew what the whole thing was about. I didn't realize how grand of scope the whole epic poem is. It's about the Fall, of course, but it's also about the great war in heaven between God and Satan and their followers, and about what happens to Satan and where he goes, and about the Creation and what is going to happen after the Fall on the earth as well. When this poem is described as an epic poem, it really and truly is Epic.

I feel like there is a lot of LDS doctrine in this poem. (There's a lot of very, very wrong doctrine as well, particularly about Eve and her role in the Fall and about women in general, but that's just to be expected, I guess. It still was annoying to read.) There's a lot of focus on men's agency and the agency of the spirits in heaven, and about obedience and the consequences of our choices. Satan is a full-fledged character in the poem, particularly in the first half, and he's delightfully wicked and prideful and vengeful, as Satan should be. I kept thinking while reading this that the title Paradise Lost is kind of about two different paradises that have been lost: Adam and Eve lost the Garden of Eden by eating of the fruit, but it is also about how the spirits who followed Satan were thrown into hell after their rebellion and they lost the paradise of living in heaven with God. I think that loss is almost more poignant and heart-breaking (particularly when looked at through the lens of LDS doctrine, since we know the Fall from the Garden was supposed to happen and not actually a terrible thing after all). I kind of liked how Adam and Eve were such fallible characters, especially after they ate the fruit and they began to see the consequences of what they had done and they began to blame each other and fight and have to work through their actions. I like to think that Adam and Eve were so mature that they truly saw the bigger picture, but we know they hid themselves from God when they knew he was coming, so they may not have been and there very well may have been some fault-finding and blaming going on there. I feel like reading this made me think so much about Satan and how he works, and about the Creation and the Fall in a different way.

As I read, I kept finding quotes and things that were especially meaningful or beautiful and underlining them. Here are some of the best:

Satan: "Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven" (Book 1).

God: "They trespass, authors to themselves in all
Both what they judge and what they choose; for so
I formed them free, and free they must remain,
Till they enthrall themselves" (Book 3)

Satan: "O then at last relent, is there no place
Left for repentance, none for pardon left?
None left but by submission, and that word
Disdain forbids me, and my dread of shame
Among the Spirits beneath...
So farewell hope, and with hope farewell fear.
Farewell remorse: all good to me is lost;
Evil be thou my good" (Book 4)

Satan: "Here, happy creature, fair angelic Eve,
Partake thou also; happy though thou art,
Happier thou may'st be, worthier canst not be:
Taste this and be henceforth among the gods,
Thyself a goddess, not to earth confined" (Book 5)

Raphael to Adam: "God made thee perfect, not immutable;
And good he made thee, but to persevere
He left it in thy power, ordained thy will
By nature free, not overruled by Fate
Inextricable, or strict necessity;
Our voluntary service he requires; ...
Freely we serve,
Because we freely love, as in our will
To love or not; in this we stand or fall:
And some are fall'n, to disobedience fall'n,
And so from Heav'n to deepest Hell; O fall
From what high state of bliss into what woe!" (Book 5)

Adam: "I now see
Bone of my bone, flesh of my flesh, my self
Before me; woman is her name, of man
Extracted; for this cause he shall forgo
Father and mother, and to his wife adhere;
And they shall be one flesh, one heart, one soul" (Book 8)

Raphael: "Be strong, live happy, and love, but first of all
Him whom to love is to obey, and keep
His great command; take heed lest passion sway
Thy judgement to do aught, which else free will
Would not admit" (Book 8)

Satan: "All good to me becomes
Bane, and in Heav'n much worse would be my state.
But neither here seek I, no nor in Heav'n
To dwell, unless by mastering Heav'n's Supreme;
Nor hope to be myself less miserable
By what I seek, but others to make such
As I, though thereby worse to me redound:
For only in destroying I find ease
To my relentless thoughts" (Book 9)

Eve: "For bliss, as thou hast part, to me is bliss,
Tedious, unshared with thee, and odious soon.
Thou therefore also taste, that equal lot
May join us, equal joy, as equal love" (Book 9)

Satan: "That which to me belongs,
Is enmity, which he will put between
Me and mankind; I am to bruise his heel;
His seed, when is not set, shall bruise my head:
A world who would not purchase with a bruise,
Or much more grievous pain?" (Book 10)

Adam: "Pains only in child-bearing were foretold,
And bringing forth, soon recompensed with joy,
Fruit of thy womb" (Book 10)

Michael: "Yet doubt not but in valley and in plain
God is as here, and will be found alike
Present, and of his presence many a sign
Still following me, still compassing thee round
With goodness and paternal love, his face
Express, and of his steps the track divine." (Book 11)

Michael: "The rule of Not too much, by temperance taught
In what thou eat'st and drink'st, seeking from thence
Due nourishment, not gluttonous delight,
Till many years over thy head return:
So may'st thou live, till like ripe fruit thou drop
Into thy mother's lap, or be with ease
Gathered, not harshly plucked, for death mature" (Book 11)

Michael: "Nor love thy life, nor hate; but what thou liv'st
Live well, how long and short permit to Heav'n" (Book 11)

Michael: "Judge not what is best
By pleasure, though to nature seeming meet,
Created, as thou art, to nobler end
Holy and pure, conformity divine" (Book 11)

Adam: "Henceforth I learn, that to obey is best,
And love with fear the only God, to walk
As in his presence, ever to observe
His Providence, and on him sole depend" (Book 12)