Milton’s Paradise Lost would make a terrible video game. The book starts with Satan and his fellow rebel angels hurled out of heaven after losing a battle with god and the loyalist angels. The battle is described later at tedious length in flashback chapters, and it’s somewhat ridiculous because obviously god and his crew of angels were always a “lock” to win. And Satan and his comrades, being angels, can’t be “killed,” just tossed around and decomposed by omnipotent blows and eventually cast out and down.
I suspect our fascination with the bad guys and our preoccupation with bad news are related, and maybe that is Satan's win, though as the saying goes, he won the battle but not the war, because we survive.
Interesting piece, David. I noticed that you didn’t capitalize “God.” Why was that?
Also, I’ve never read “Paradise Lost,” and now I want to.
Beautiful essay. Would you characterize Michael Corleone as a charismatic "devil"?
I suspect our fascination with the bad guys and our preoccupation with bad news are related, and maybe that is Satan's win, though as the saying goes, he won the battle but not the war, because we survive.