New Little Red Riding Hood

MOTHER: Come, Little Red-Cap, here is a piece of cake and a bottle of wine; take them to your grandmother, she is ill and weak, and they will do her good.

RED CAP: Yes, mama.

MOTHER: Set out before it gets hot, and when you are going, walk nicely and quietly and do not run off the path, or you may fall and break the bottle, and then your grandmother will get nothing; and when you go into her room, don't forget to say, 'Good-morning,' and don't peep into every corner before you do it.

RED CAP: I will take great care.

Scene III**

Grandmother’s house on the other side of the woods. The bedroom at the center, furnished only with a bed, a  chair and a commode. This is the bedroom of a very old and sick woman, a bedroom that has not been cleaned for at least a month. However, needlework examples are covering the commode and the chair, to demonstrate that the room knew better times when Grandmother was healthy.

 Music is heard. It is slow and sinister, it is horrifying.

Grandmother is in bed. Loud knock at the door is heard.

GRANDMOTHER: in a weak voice: Who is there?

WOLF: in a high voice: Little Red Cap. I brought cake and wine, open the door.

GRANDMOTHER: Lift the hatch, I am too weak, I cannot get up.

The sinister  music grows louder as the wolf goes straight to Grandmother to devour her.

Unfortunately, I have missed the last Wednesday’s lesson

            Unfortunately, I have missed the last Wednesday’s lesson, when you have had such an interesting debate on what is literature and what came first, history or literature (reminds one of the philosophical question “which came into being first: a hen or an egg?”). The question of what is literature has been stirring me since I went to elementary school or even longer; for my parents, being a “soviet intelligentsia”, tried to cultivate in me love to literature not without some success since I learnt how to tricycle. Anyway, I would like to share with you some disorderly observations, to which I came soon after my tricycle was replaced by a stable four-wheel vehicle.

             Firstly, I am going to speak about the narrow meaning of Literature, which according to Orit and Oxford English Dictionary is “written works that are regarded as having artistic merit”, because this is what we learn on this faculty. Of course, we also read critical articles, but this kind of literature (without capital L) is going to be the subject of my final review letter, if I won’t change my mind.

Constructive thinking.

Constructive thinking.

This course provides intensive thinking practice for attaining a high level of  plunging into a particular work of art in order to become an intelligible, confident, creative playwright. Students are required to read the assigned texts carefully before the class in which they are to be discussed. Students will be exposed to exhaustive and wearying writing activity. Reading assignments are subject to change! Three exercises are to be passed through for each reading assignment. Class attendance is mandatory.

Other requirements: No yawning or snoring in class!

Exercise 1. Esthetic and colloquial synthesis*. 

The goal of this exercise is to help students perceive the most important aspects of a book, including exposure of environment, character, mood.

Description:

Students will take a story, or a certain chapter of a prose work and transform it into a play.

Exercise 2. An interview

The goal of this exercise is attaining a deeper understanding of character, providing him/her with additional sensuality, abilities and vividness.

Description:

Students will be required to write an imaginary interview with every character of the book.

Exercise 3. Constructive satirism.

This method of criticism is developed by the author of the present syllabus as a reaction against psychoanalytic criticism, Marxist criticism and Lesbian/gay criticism.

The goal of this exercise is to teach students to find plot holes in order to avoid them if, hopefully, they actually finish this course and go into the real world of playwrights.

Description.

Students will be required to search through the book and find equivocal phrases, indicate them and suggest solutions for eliminating ambiguity.

                                                                                                                                           

*See examples below. Examples are based on Grimms’ version of the fairy tale Little Red Head.

Example 1. Esthetic and colloquial synthesis

Act one,  Scene I.

The village house surrounded by woods. The acting area is the porch of the house. This is Red Cap’s house. The door leading from the porch to a dirty trashed kitchen is open. There is a hammock hung between two trees with a neglected book on it and an ashtray full of cigar butts.* It is the beginning of dawn. Stage director may want to  add a rooster’s crow. As the curtain rises, Mother and Red Cap, countrywomen, are standing on the porch. Mother’s look is very untidy, she is wearing a dirty apron over her peasant dress and dirty worn wicker shoes. Red Cap’s look, to the contrary, is neat and pleasing to the eye. She is wearing a clean apron and her wicker shoes are tidy.

A  wolf howl is heard in the distance.

Letter to Freud

Dear Sir,

          It has been brought to my attention that you are seriously toying with the notion of penis envy. Further to your suggestion of the scientific significance of your discovery I am pleased to submit my thoughts concerning the above issue. I am also enclosing a detailed psychoanalysis of myself in regards to the interest evoked by your ideas.  

          I am glad to inform you that I have read an account of your ideas with a certain amount of interest. Having critically analyzed myself in accordance with your method, I came to the conclusion that this interest has its origins in my infancy. That is, using your terms, my early childhood sexual experiences determine my adult interest in everything related to sex and sexuality. Unfortunately, the interest to your work is the only point where my views come to an agreement with yours.

          Further to your notion of penis envy, there seems to be some overstatement. First, I do not believe that the majority of female species experience the feeling of discontent and resentment aroused by and in conjunction with desire for the possession or qualities of the above mentioned male organ. I agree that a minor part of women do experience this feeling, but perhaps you are unaware that the latest development of medicine and plastic surgery has proved to avail deliverance of such envy. Let me also remind you that a minority of men encounter with the opposite concern, that is riddance of their male organ, which too can be easily accomplished with help of plastic surgery.

Second, I do not believe that this male organ signifies or has anything to do with women’s lack of social power. I am aware that some critics have made attempts to interpret your idea of phallus envy as “social castration”. However I consider that these attempts are nothing else but a desire to mask their interest in sex and sexuality by the impression of psychoanalytic research literary works. This is another point I am pleased to expound on.  

I am highly concerned with application of your psychoanalytic theories to literary works. I recently came upon an example of such application to Shakespeare’s Hamlet, where you offer a solution to the question why Hamlet hesitates to obey his father’s ghost  order to kill his uncle. There you suggest that Hamlet is unable to “take vengeance on the man who did away with his father and took that father’s place with his mother, [because this man] [...] shows him the repressed wishes of his own childhood realized.” Thus you prescribe Hamlet an Oedipus complex, which also is your famous invention. I am sorry to notify you that I find such “psychoanalysis” lacking any significance. First, in my opinion, it is because only the author of a literary work can know what he has in mind while writing. Second, it is because even the author may not be sure what he has in mind while writing. Third, the author may just write without having in mind anything but what he is writing about. Fourth, I believe that not every piece of literary work has anything to do with sexual complexes taking their origins in childhood sexual experiences.

In conclusion, although I do not agree with some of your ideas, let me express my admiration of your considerable investment in the sphere of sexual psychology. I have a faint hope that my letter helped change your views upon literature and femininity. In case you remain faithful to your position of explicit phallo-analysis, I would recommend you to turn to a good doctor in order to analyze yourself.

Regards,

Xfire

Gustave Dore’s misinterpreting of Milton’s epic.

                     

            Gustave Dore's romantic style of illustration, imaginative and richly detailed, was ideally suited to literary subjects. His wood-engraved illustrations for John Milton's monumental epic poem Paradise Lost are incredibly beautiful and impressive but mistakable.  His Satan’s Misery seems to be based on the superficial reading of the epic.  Dore uses the romantic Satan’s image, which looks perfect on the gravure but is not really related to the Milton’s subject.

              John Milton was a puritan and so were his works.  It’s a well known fact that puritans deny images, whence the item is impossible to be seen or correctly illustrated, and when this item is beyond human visualization.    Puritans iconoclast in their poetry refers either to G-d and everything that attaches him, or to Devil etc.  Dore was completely incorrect, when illustrating Paradise Lost because it should not be visualized but rather understood verbally.  If leaving this argument behind and turning to the epic itself, we can also recognize the error in the artist’s analyzing of Satan through the close reading of the text.

          After landing on Earth, Satan laments his fall and his future scheme for corrupting creation.  “Me miserable! which way shall I fly / Infinite wrath, and infinite despair?” (IV. 73-74).  But basing on this short quotation is hardly enough for the complete understanding of the subject; it suggests the indifferent attitude towards the rest of the text, which is truly big.  Dore’s Satan looks fairly miserable; he desperately stares at Havens, leaning on the Earthly rock.  The wings are outstretched as if he landed a moment ago, and he still hopes to take off and to fly back to the start point.  The most impressive proofs of his despair and misery are his terrified eyes, looking upwards and begging for forgiveness, and his hand, pulling out the hair in the gust of repentance.  The background is dark and empty, and the rock is huge and stony-cold.  His clothes reminds of a Greek warrior’s armor and the style of the body illustration reminds of the classic Greek sculptures with their little heads and unbelievably beautiful built up muscled bodies.   

            It is true that sometimes Satan’s army is described heroically and classically, almost like in  Oedipus Rex: “patience and heroic martyrdom” (IX. 32), “imblazon'd shields” (IX. 34) “gorgeous knights” (IX.36), “which justly gives heroic name” (IX. 40).  But Milton’s Satan doesn’t have any concrete form, but only a size, which is tremendously big.  Using the images from Books IV and IX, Dore disregards the opening chapter, which describes Satan himself but not his warriors. He is talking to his servant “with head uplift above the wave, and eyes /That sparkling blazed; his other parts besides /Prone on the flood, extended long and large” (I. 193-196).  He’s got eyes and the “other parts” which are not necessarily legs and arms.  The only criterion that is clearly described by the author is his “monstrous size” (I. 196), when he “stretched out huge in length the Arch-fiend lay” (I. 209).  The creature is of completely inhuman form but of “his own dark designs” (I. 213) as the narrator remarks.

           Dore’s picture is rightly called Satan’s Misery if to judge only according to the gravure image, but it’s incorrect to address Milton’s hero with such an epithet. A miserable and broken creature will hardly be able to arrange the resistance against G-d and his creation almost immediately after the fall.  Satan tells to Beelzebub that he wants “with rallied arms to try what may be yet / Regained in Heaven” (I. 270).

            The way that he is reproduced in Dore’s gravure suggests that the only thought that occupies his mind is coming back to the Creator and being rescued from this terrible coldness of Earth.  But Milton shows us Satan, who, dreaming of revenge, appears to Eve and convinces her to eat from the Forbidden Tree and to induce Adam to also taste it. “Ah! gentle pair, ye little think how nigh / Your change approaches, when all these delights / Will vanish, and deliver ye to woe” (IV. 365-368); he decides to ruin G-d’s beloved creation, instead of begging for forgiveness. 

             Gustave Dore’s Satan’s Misery rather represents the artist’s own opinion towards Satan’s figure than John Milton’s epic image.  A wonderful piece of lithography is more successfully perceived as a separate and an independent work of art than as a reproduction of the Paradise Lost main character.

Donne’s poetry abandons Catholic dichotomies.

        During the Renaissance there was a change of emphasis, which appeared to be man-centered rather than strictly G-d-centered. Educated men became interested in scientific knowledge but they still placed their ultimate salvation and trust in their knowledge of  G-d.  The Renaissance attitude toward man’s desires, body, soul, knowledge and belief in G-d is perhaps best reflected in John Donne’s poetry, which incorporated scientific and individualist ideas into the verses.

  Catholic dichotomy between spirit and flesh is one of the Catholic ideas that Donne abandons in his poetry.  Catholics adopted this idea from the platonic understanding of the separation between the spirit, which is to be of the holy, divine nature, and the material body, which is tended to be corruptible and finally tended to die, unlike the immortal soul.  Donne, however, seams to generate his own understanding of the connection between spirit and flesh, which is represented in his poem The Ecstasy: “Love's mysteries in souls do grow, /But yet the body is his book” (71-72).  The poet uses the term “mysteries”, which was a theological term attached to Jesus’ resurrection.  Donne’s love between a man and a woman is represented as a spiritual and even divine substance.  Moreover, the poet assumes lovers to be “saints” and human love to be holy in his The Canonization: “Us canonized for love” (36).  For him there’s no contradiction between a mortal, representing libido “fly” (19) and the image of the Holy Spirit - “dove” (21).  “The phoenix riddle” (22) has a multiple meaning; a man and a woman cannot be separated, because G-d creating Adam and Eve, made them “two being one” (23). 

Donne also declares love to be G-d’s creation in The Ecstasy:  “On man heaven's influence” (57).  In “For soul into the soul may flow, /Though it to body first repair” (58-57),  love is attached to the physical world and to the spirit; it is impossible to separate them because they are meant to be one.  Donne, living during the Renaissance has followed the man-centric tendency, while exploring the mechanism of his soul and body.

          Thus, creating his own attitude towards this mechanism, Donne abandons Cartesian dichotomy between mind and body.  The notion that the mind is somehow distinct from the body goes back to Descartes’ agreement with the Roman Catholic Church. He studied science and left the soul, the mind, the emotions, and consciousness to the realm of the church.  John Donne proclaimed with anti-Cartesian poetic wisdom that “the body makes the mind”.  Gold, David. “John Donne’s Poetry.” The Complete English Poems. Ed. A. K. Stone. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1986. His poetry has embodied knowledge and has emphasized in The Ecstasy that “by good love” (23), which is attached for him to the flesh, “were grown all mind” (23).

            In this poem he makes use of the concept of atoms: “We then, who are this new soule, know, of what we are compos'd, and made /For, the atomies of which we grow” (45-47).  The poet values sciences and knowledge, that’s why he includes a scientific term into his verse.  His “soule” is immediately followed by “know”; this combination derives from Donne’s individualist philosophy, where the feelings, the soul, the body and the mind are of one substance.  In addition to it he proclaims that body, which is inseparable from soul, is a vehicle of one’s knowledge.  Donne says that in order to understand the notion of the divine substance, which is soul, one has to use his mind: “That he soul's language understood” (22).  This new learning and understanding will help the development of “all mind” (24).  Human being uses his brain, while thinking; man cannot exist after physical separation of his “mind” – the brain, and the body.  So, there’s no logical reason for doing so metaphysically.

              It is possible to interpret John Donne’s new conceptions as the complete rejection of all religious dogmas of Christianity.  His emphasizing of sexual human love on one hand and relating it to G-d on the other may easily be understood this way.  He dares to mention that “we grow” out of atomies, which disparage the notion of the Holy Creation.  This opinion is an error in regard to the fact that Donne was a very religious person as well as a great number of scientists and philosophers of the Age of Discovery.  Even the men who produced the scientific revolution, including Copernicus, Galileo and Newton were all deeply religious men who believed that their discoveries revealed more deeply the glory of God.  The poet does not abandon G-d, but dedicates the majority of his poems to Him.  His poetry is a manifesto of a learned and a loving man about his gratitude to the Creator for being able to live, to think and to love. 

It is a well known fact that the discoveries of new destinations has always been accomplished with human mistakes and shortcomings

           It is a well known fact that the discoveries of new destinations has always been accomplished with human mistakes and shortcomings – as for Columbus the discovered continent of America, was India, which he desired to visit.  Marlowe reminds of this tendency in his play, and Francis Bacon invents his metaphor of “idols” to refer to such causes of human error.  In the first book of Novum Organum Bacon discusses the causes of human error in the pursuit of knowledge. Bacon defends the new studies against those who considered them to be a poison to one’s soul, but he also insists on the unmistakable understanding that can not accept any exaggeration. “The human understanding is of its own nature prone to suppose the existence of more order and regularity in the world than it finds,” (XLV.1-2).  In The Advancement of Learning the philosopher emphasizes the same issue of danger in knowledge for those, who were not trained enough, for they can easily adopt heresy or can think that “nature’s chain needs be tied to the foot of Jupiter’s chair”.

          Bacon distinguishes four idols, or main varieties of the error. The “idols of the tribe” are certain intellectual faults that are universal to mankind, or, at any rate, very common. One, for example, is a tendency toward oversimplification that is that there exists more order in a field of inquiry than there actually is. The “idols of the cave” are the intellectual peculiarities of individuals. One person may concentrate on the likenesses, another on the differences, between things. The “idols of the marketplace” are the kinds of errors for which language is responsible. The fourth and final group is the “idols of the theatre”, which are a mistaken systems of philosophy in Baconian sense of the term, in which it embraces all beliefs of any degree of generality.

            John Donne said in his Anatomy of the World that “new philosophy calls all in doubt” (205) and “no man’s wit /Can well direct him” (207-208).  “Wit” is a Renaissance metaphysical term for either similarity, or difference, which are used by Bacon in his Idols of Tribe.  Here we see the poet’s attitude toward the modern Renaissance philosophy which is very critical.  Bacon insists on man’s inability to distinguish between truth and false, and the poet is absolutely sure that man is an independent individual, a “phoenix”, who is able to take decisions without anyone’s help.  Poets and philosophers have been known as irreconcilable opponents for centuries.  We can easily recognize a similar situation in ancient Plato and Aristotle; poets would still withstand the philosophers’ siege during Renaissance, where we see Bacon and Donne.  Yet but still, they have at least a small amount of similarity in their works and ways of thinking – they write for man and about man.  Both of them insist on discoveries and the gaining of new knowledge, which will make man more and more powerful and wise. 

Sharp north, without declining west” (22), is the navigational terminology

                                                   

           “…Sharp north, without declining west” (22), is the navigational terminology; the author comes back to the discoveries of his time, still talking about the two lovers, which seam not to be related to this imagery at all.  The next line represents the major difference between the Medieval and Renaissance philosophy; it is the conception of the individual.   “Whatever dies, was not mix'd equally” (23) – during the Middle Ages, people saw themselves as fitting somehow into a hierarchy, each person having a place in some estate or corporate body, united with others in some kind of communion or community, of which the highest was the church.  However, during the Renaissance, individuals tended to see themselves as independent and self-reliant personalities; this tendency is clearly seen in John Donne’s poem.

              Another Renaissance individualist tendency is interest in human desires.  The topic of man’s desire for learning and perfection is represented in Christopher Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus.  The different values of the Medieval and Renaissance eras certainly come into play in Dr. Faustus.  By showing Faustus’ interest in the values of the Renaissance and involving Mephistophilis, as a character from the religious literature, the poet certainly mixes the values of religion, medieval times and Renaissance values of knowledge of the universe. 

              

             The central figure in Marlowe’s work is a man, who is occupied with the desire to become more powerful than G-d by studying different disciplines.  Faustus studies philosophy, medicine, physics and theology.  The man decides, that in order to become more powerful than G-d, he aught to become engaged in occult studies.  Marlowe’s engagement with this topic may be possibly explained in terms of 16^th and 17^th century Calvin believes.  The prologue of the play gives us a synopsis of the plot, and we hear of Faustus; “…melting heavens conspired his overthrow” (Prologue, 22).  Faustus can be seen to perish because he ignores the warnings he receives from Mephistophilis, the Good Angel and the Old Man throughout the play.  But on another level, this line suggests the idea that Dr. Faustus has been damned even before the beginning of the play.  “Calvinists believed that individuals were either Elect or Reprobate.” Brook, Isabelle.  Renaissance Studies. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1987.  It seems arguable that in Doctor Faustus Marlowe draws on this Calvinist doctrine, which was popular at the time of the play's writing.   But it’s hard to ignore the end of the play, where Dr. Faustus dies because he dared to compete with G-d and denied the important Christian dogmas.

           However, the fact that the play write is preoccupied with religious topics and usage of religious characters doesn’t negate the author’s involvement in Renaissance discoveries.  Faustus’ progressing in Alchemy and Magic makes him powerful.  He sells his soul to Satan and becomes strongly involved in abandoning G-d’s perfection; he wants Satan to become his servant.  It might suggest that the author, as well as Donne, refers to the process of the world discovery and man’s desire to become more powerful and wise.  His Faustus becomes in control of time and space, “cease thinking about God and think only of the devil” (V.260).  The world becomes “smaller” and Faustus becomes “bigger” and overwhelmingly powerful: “I’ll be great Emperor of the world,” (III.153).  The age of discovery really made the world “smaller” – it stopped being endless for man.  The fact that Faustus sells his soul suggests that he is not afraid of Hell, for he doesn’t believe in it: “This word Damnation, terrifies not me, /For I confound hell…” (III.106)   This moment refers to the difference between the Medieval and Renaissance notion of Hell: Dante’s one is a geographic place with its own map – Renaissance Hell is a state of mind, but not a place.  Dr. Faustus’ desire to become G-d and all his dangerous and imprudent ways to achieve what he wants are an illustration of an Age of Discovery man, who involves himself in “creating” a new undiscovered world.  The play represents Marlowe’s celebration of knowledge and man’s greatness, but it is also the author’s warning of not going too far.    

The period between the XVI-XVII centuries is known for the people’s revising of previous ideals,

The period between the XVI-XVII centuries is known for the people’s revising of previous ideals, for new important discoveries and for centralizing and focusing on man and his knowledge.  English Renaissance poets and philosophers refer to man as the highest creature, who plays an important role in their works.  They insist on the importance of the human being and of his wisdom; they devote themselves to examining human nature, psychology and desire of seeking for truth.  Renaissance poets choose man to be their main character, instead of referring only to G-d.

         Medieval literature and philosophy was based on a variety of religious dogmas and statements; they were mostly related to G-d and the Church order.  The poets devoted themselves to the saving of the humankind from heresies and dangerous prejudices.  Dante wrote his “Inferno”, where he developed a map of Hell and classified the sinners and their future punishments.  St. Bernard of Clairvaux writes his criticism on Abbot Suger’s architecture, insisting on the right way of the Church building.  Philosophers insist on geocentric construction of the universe, where the Sun rotates around the Earth.   

          The discovery of new planets, black holes on the Sun and the invention of the heliocentric system of the universe has changed a lot. The work of Nicholaus Copernicus shook the world.   It denied everything that humans had held certain for centuries.  The excitement and confusion that the astronomers and the scientists have left in their wake is reflected in John Donne’s seventeenth century poem "An Anatomy of the World — The First Anniversary."   As he wrote: "And new Philosophy calls all in doubt” (205).   “`Tis all in pieces, all coherence gone" (213).  The poet illustrates the situation in the world, when the old ideals break down and yield to demands of the new time.  “For every man alone thinks he hath got to be a phoenix,” (216-217) – Donne claims that now it is man’s turn to act after a long oblivion.  Man, who used to play the indirect role, will come up from the ashes as a mythological bird; he will not be a myth any longer, but will exist also in literature, and will be examining himself and asking questions that will get answered sooner or later.

             John Donne’s poem The Good-Morrow starts with one of those questions.  “I WONDE by my troth…” (1).   “Wonder” is capitalized, therefore, emphasized.  The Renaissance man is not afraid of asking questions; he consequently becomes wiser, after receiving answers.  The poet also refers to the lovers’ “waking souls” (10), which now look on each other “out of fear” (11), for the new time has come, and there’s no need in all the prejudices of the past; any person is free to love and to be loved and not to hide his fillings from the executive people’s eyes. 

             The lover in Donne's The Good-Morrow joyously uses the new cartography that has accompanied Renaissance exploration to proclaim union with his beloved: "Let sea-discoverers to new worlds have gone, / Let maps to others, worlds on worlds have shown; / Let us possess one world -- each hath one, and is one” (14-18).  The poet refers to the newest discovery of his time in order to proclaim the importance of knowledge and the significance of the new invasions during his lifetime.  Donne declares the speaker and his beloved in the poem to be the two perfect “hemispheres” (21).  Human brain consists of two hemispheres, which are responsible for logical (mathematical) and emotional (artistic) thinking and impulses.  This connection lets the reader realize that the author is strongly convinced in the importance of any possible developments in all the spheres of science, in order to increase people’s knowledge without increasing the already existing old whereabouts.  Unlike Golden poetry, Donne uses very physical and material images that can hardly be applicable to the image of Golden lovers.  Here comes the rational explanation to the occurrence – even love can be logical, explainable and understandable rationally.  Here we see another example of the poet’s interest in the Renaissance ideas of examining human nature and psychology.

I do agree that Dore’s representation of Satan

     is based upon the text of Paradise Lost. The first thing I think of when looking at this painting is the moment of Satan’s fall from Heaven. At least this is how my mind, unable to imagine anything not based upon actual image, is inclined to perceive the moment of Satan’s fall. This perception is reinforced by the surprised expression on Satan’s face and his pose - he is trying to get hold of the rocks in order to keep his balance. However, using hindsight, I understand that what Dore depicted in his painting is not what is described in Milton’s work, which I am going to demonstrate.

First of all, and this is most evident, Dore’s Satan is wearing clothes. However, clothes were actually invented (excuse my free style) by Adam and Eve after they ate the fruit from the Tree of Knowledge and realized that they were naked. Until then -- and the fall of Satan happened before this significant event -- the idea of nudity did not exist.

...innocence, that as a veil

Had shadowed them from knowing ill, was gone;

Just confidence, and native righteousness,

And honor, from about them, naked left

To guilty Shame; he covered, but his robe

Uncovered more.... (IX).

Satan of course could not have the idea of being nude, and therefore he has no reason to cover himself. Moreover, on Satan’s divine level the mundane meditations about nudity are not important. Even if they were, in the painting he is dressed too prettily for the moment of having just fallen from heaven.

Secondly, in the picture we can see clear contours of rocks, which very much remind me of the pass between the Tyan-Shan mountains in Uzbekistan. Yet Milton says, that

...Him  the Almighty Power

hurled headlong flaming from th’ ethereal sky

To bottomless perdition, there to dwell

In adamantine chains and penal fire...

Nine times the space that measures day and night

To mortal men, he with his horrid crew

Lay vanquished, rolling in the fiery gulf...

A dungeon horrible, on all sides round

As one great furnace flamed, yet from those flames

No light, but rather darkness visible

Served only to discover sights of woe,

Regions of sorrow, doleful shades...

As far removed from God and light of Heav’n

As from the center thrice to th’ utmost pole.(I)

Milton gives us a very “ethereal” idea of the place. Which is impossible to even call a “place”, because Milton actually does not give us any idea. “Bottomless perdition”, “fiery gulf”, “sights of woe”, “regions of sorrow”, “doleful shades” - all these so-called images do not contribute to our customary description and perception of “place”. It’s rather a very abstract description. Milton is very careful with the description of the place, which can not be compared to anything. Even the description of the distance of this place from Heaven is very abstract, “as from the center thrice to th’ utmost pole”, which still does not give us any idea where it is. Also, the time of Satan’s lying “vanquished” is compared to “nine times the space that measures day and night to mortal men”. All these images suggest that at the time (paradox) when Satan fell there was neither space nor time, and we, mortal people, including Milton, can only conjecture when and where it was. Thus, Dore’s depiction of the place is inconsistent.

 This representation of Satan by Dore, I believe, derives from the general trend to depict divine figures as human-like, which was de rigueur during the Renaissance. On their canvas the world is beautiful, and people are ideal. Dore’s Satan is pretty handsome too. His facial expression is just that of surprise, not even suffering, and that’s after the defeat! Yet Milton’s Belzeebub says to Satan about their co-mates:

“...though now they lie

Groveling and prostrate on yon lake of fire,

As we erewhile, astounded and amazed;

No wonder, fallen such a pernicious height!” (I, 279-82)

That’s about facial expressions. What about Satan’s looks in general? Having investigated the text of Paradise Lost, I found the following descriptions of Satan by Milton:

...With head uplift above the wave, and eyes

That sparkling blazed; his other parts besides

Prone on the flood, extended long and large,

Lay floating many a rood, in bulk as huge

As whom the fables name of monstrous size,

Titanian or Earh-born, that warred on Jove,

Briareos or Typhonm, whom the den

By ancient Tarsus held, or that sea-beast

Leviathan, which God of all his works

Created hugest, that swim th’ ocean-stream.

Him, haply slumbering on the Norway foam,

The pilot of some small night-foundered skiff,

Deeming some island, oft, as seaman tell,

With fixed anchor in his scaly rind,

Moors by his side under the lee, while night

Invests the sea, and wished morn delays.

So stretched out huge in length the Arch-fiend lay....(I, 193-209)

...............................................................................

...his ponderous shield,

Ethereal temper, massy, large, and round,

Behind him cast. The broad circumference

Hung on his shoulders like moon, whose orb

Through optic glass the Tuscan artist views

At evening, from the top of Fesole,

Or in Valdarno, to descry new lands,

Rivers, or mountains, in her spotty globe.

His spear - to equal which the tallest pine

Hewn on Norwegian hills, to be the mast

Of some great ammiral, were but a wand -

He walked with, to support uneasy steps....(I, 279-294)

All these images suggest that Satan is a titanic figure.  Yet they let us judge only about the SIZE of Satan, for nowhere in the book does Milton give us any idea that Satan looks so and so. In other books, too, although Satan gradually shrinks in size, he is only compared to familiar objects. For example, when Satan penetrates  the garden of Eden, he

At one flight bound high over-leaped all bound

Of hill or highest wall, and sheer within

Lights on his feet. As when a prowling wolf,

Whom hunger drives to seek new haunt for prey....(IV, 180-84)

Milton does not say that Satan looks like a wolf, he rather compares his behavior to a wolf’s. Similarly, when Satan whispers scurrilous things into Eve’s ear, he “squat like a toad” (IV, 799). Thus, Milton does not give us the slightest idea of how to perceive Satan’s looks, rather he lets us imagine Satan's size, his mean behavior etc. Therefore, Dore’s representation of Satan as a man with bat’s wings does not stand the critique. However, Dore may be forgiven, for 1) he was a child of his epoch and 2) the painting is very beautiful!