Characters
Satan
Some readers consider Satan to be the hero, or protagonist, of the
story, because he struggles to overcome his own doubts and
weaknesses and accomplishes his goal of corrupting humankind.
This goal, however, is evil, and Adam and Eve are the moral heroes
at the end of the story, as they help to begin humankind’s slow
process of redemption and salvation. Satan is far from being the
story’s object of admiration, as most heroes are. Nor does it make
sense for readers to celebrate or emulate him, as they might with a
true hero. Yet there are many compelling qualities to his character
that make him intriguing to readers.
One source of Satan’s fascination for us is that he is an extremely
complex and subtle character. It would be dif cult, perhaps
impossible, for Milton to make perfect, infallible characters such as
God the Father, God the Son, and the angels as interesting to read
about as the awed characters, such as Satan, Adam, and Eve.
Satan, moreover, strikes a grand and majestic gure, apparently
unafraid of being damned eternally, and uncowed by such terrifying
gures as Chaos or Death. Many readers have argued that Milton
deliberately makes Satan seem heroic and appealing early in the
poem to draw us into sympathizing with him against our will, so that
we may see how seductive evil is and learn to be more vigilant in
resisting its appeal.
Milton devotes much of the poem’s early books to developing
Satan’s character. Satan’s greatest fault is his pride. He casts
himself as an innocent victim, overlooked for an important
promotion. But his ability to think so sel shly in Heaven, where all
angels are equal and loved and happy, is surprising. His con dence
in thinking that he could ever overthrow God displays tremendous
vanity and pride. When Satan shares his pain and alienation as he
reaches Earth in Book IV, we may feel somewhat sympathetic to
him or even identify with him. But Satan continues to devote himself
fi
fl
fi
fi
fi
fi
to evil. Every speech he gives is fraudulent and every story he tells
is a lie. He works diligently to trick his fellow devils in Hell by having
Beelzebub present Satan’s own plan of action.
Satan’s character—or our perception of his character—changes
signi cantly from Book I to his nal appearance in Book X. In Book I
he is a strong, imposing gure with great abilities as a leader and
public statesmen, whereas by the poem’s end he slinks back to Hell
in serpent form. Satan’s gradual degradation is dramatized by the
sequence of different shapes he assumes. He begins the poem as
a just-fallen angel of enormous stature, looks like a comet or meteor
as he leaves Hell, then disguises himself as a more humble cherub,
then as a cormorant, a toad, and nally a snake. His ability to
reason and argue also deteriorates. In Book I, he persuades the
devils to agree to his plan. In Book IV, however, he reasons to
himself that the Hell he feels inside of him is reason to do more evil.
When he returns to Earth again, he believes that Earth is more
beautiful than Heaven, and that he may be able to live on Earth
after all. Satan, removed from Heaven long enough to forget its
unparalleled grandeur, is completely demented, coming to believe
in his own lies. He is a picture of incessant intellectual activity
without the ability to think morally. Once a powerful angel, he has
become blinded to God’s grace, forever unable to reconcile his past
with his eternal punishment.
fi
fi
fi
fi
