/lit/ - Literature

>>4860269

Ya

Hey what's everybodies problem with the Penguins? I like the translators (though oddly all of the Oxford translations I have seem to be my absolute favourite) and I think the black spine and covers look great. Vintage is sturdier, but a hell of a lot more expensive.

Hello, /lit/, newcomer from /mu/ here.

By newcomer I mean I'm hardly well read at all! But, i'm taking an introduction to literature class in college right now and we just wrapped up Milton's Paradise Lost. A few questions for you all:

Was anyone else really fascinated by the characterization of Satan in the poem? I had never before encountered a work that looked at Satan as a person with his own hopes and desires. I really empathized with his feeling betrayed by his creator, and his questions about why he was made the way he was.

Are there any other works that explore the Devil's mindset and tries to rationalize his actions? I'm a practical atheist, and I'm not really interested in Satan as a religious figure, just as a character. I'm also interested in how different authors approach the problem of the existence of free-will in a universe with a God that can foresee the inevitable future.

I've read The Iliad, The Aeneid, and the Inferno for this class as well, and really enjoyed them all. What are some other works like these I should read?

Be kind, I'm trying to expand my horizons here, haha.

Sup guys, wanna get into pic related but haven't read the bible, how fucked am I?

Name a better work of literature than Paradise Lost

Who is your favorite villain in all of literature?

I'm going to get ripped and then get Miltons Satan on my chest with some paradise lost quote under it though I don't know which one yet. Is this a common tattoo? Do you like the idea?

I'm thinking about getting a lot of work done in the theme of classic literature with The Divine Comedy, The Bible, Milton and Blake imagery and passages.

Is Satan properly described as a tragic hero, /lit/?

Alright niggers I'm trying to learn everything I can about ancient civilizations and humanities through olden works of literature, this is what I have read so far

Illiad
Odyssey
Arabian Nights
Romance of the Three Kingdoms
Tao te Ching
Bhagavad Gita

Here's my backlog
Divine Comedy
Ramayana
Grimm's Fairy Tales
The Pillow Book
Book of Five Rings
Faust
Mahabharata
Beowulf
The Prince
Art of War
Gilgamesh
Aeneid
Paradise Lost
Kalevala
Mountain Wreath
Journey to the West
Dream of the Red Chamber
Water Margin
Analects
Tale of Genji
Tale of the Heike
Song of El Cid
Theogyny
Works and Days
Metamorphoses
Song of Roland
Niblungenlied
Sagas of the Icelanders
Popol Vuh
Prose-Edda and Poetic Edda
Upanishads
Works of Plato
Works of Artistotle
120 Days of Sodom
Digenes Akritas

dunno how I'm gonna find half of this shit, either download it or buy the ebooks if I can't find it in a store or library. Anything else you folks can recommend?

>>3825555

>the state of /lit/

oh dear, I knew summer was here but didn't expect it to be this bad ...

What are the best classic novels based on christian themes/mythology?

>2013
>People think Satan is the protagonist of Paradise Lost

That always gives me a laugh. He's a tragic villain, but it's undoubtable that he is the story's antagonist.

>tfw people think the line "Better to reign in Hell, then serve in Heav'n" is meant to be taken literally
>tfw people don't realize Satan is insanely miserable and just saying that to try to get support, but he really wishes he were back in Heaven

Other widely misunderstood lit quotes?

Satan, I guess.

Would it be advisable to read The Divine Comedy before Paradise Lost?

If you have insomnia, or would like to hear a crazy and bored evangelical maniac's carp version of the fall of man, by all means buy this book. If you wish the bible was more wordy and full of endless descriptions of nothing this book is for you. If you are a normal person and have absolutely no trouble sleeping avoid this garbage. If you're looking for a good book along these lines that won't bore you to tears, try Dante's Inferno. Al least he writes something that's interesting and at times amusing.

Don't you ever wake up and feel like an idiot and have this urge to purge all your useless liberal arts and pseudo-sciences with mathematics? I for one grabed a book on Mathematics, on Arithmetic and Algebra, the basics, so that I may understand mathematical reasoning and not just memorize processes and formulas. You know, how you take multiplication for granted and then it is explained to you differently, that a factor times another factor is the cartesian product... And then, if you feel like explaing it to a child, you just draw it this way, and you're surprised the child understand, and you ask yourself, why didnt they teach you mathematics this way? It's amazing how much time you can spend trying to re-learn addition and multiplication of whole numbers and rational numbers and the rules there is and so on.

Makes you wonder about all that contradictory drivel that are some statements you make with no thought or true logic.

speaking of the devil,
have you seen gustave dore's illustration of Paradise Lost? very nice stuff.

Hey /lit/ I'm looking for books of what I can only describe as Biblical fiction. Stuff like Paradise Lost and The Divine Comedy, where it explores Judeo-Christian theology with corresponding themes and stuff. Sorry about the vagueness.

Last words of my last dream this morning before my alarm went:

"That makes you a writer, no matter what you are.
That makes you a nerd, no matter what you are.
That makes you a Satan, no matter what you are."

read paradise lost, it's better

Sup /lit/, Theology student here, can you recommend me some good books on Angels? I'm considering doing my dissertation on them but I want to get a feel of the academic books relating to them before I really make up my mind. I'm particularly interested in the idea of Lucifer/Satan as a fallen angel, so stuff along those lines would be neat.
Pic related, it's one of Gustave Doré's illustrations for Paradise Lost.

Do you think Satan is a hero in Paradise Lost? I would argue that he isn't, but rather shows the dangers of following someone so easily.

You almost want him to win.

L is for Lucifer, hells proud ruler.