10 Years After

lunch Break: Peak Hour

I walked over to the student center to pick up some lunch. After grabbing a chicken sandwich I found a booth to sit in. I pulled out my Riverside Milton and read while eating. A classmate from my Milton class was eating nearby and, after we said hello, she asked to join me. Of course I agreed. Though in truth I was a bit tentative. I really wanted to get some reading done and not spend the time chatting idly. After a few minutes of idle chat, during which I finished my food, I set my tray to the side and pulled forth my book.

Of course it need not be said, she still wanted to talk. I tried to mutter agreements to whatever she was saying whie i read. After she finished her sandwich and we both sat there reading for a while. After a few minutes of much desired quiet she broke it to comment that Milton wasn't making his view immediately known in his Areopagitica. I brought her intention to the subtitle.

A few more minutes of quiet and then she wanted to talk about Paradise Lost, which we haven't reached in class yet. She then commented that, while she hadn't read any of Paradise Lost, she once had a conversation with some English teacher about the appearance of Satan. The end result was that her own view of Satan - due to him being an Angel and so close to God - resembles that image that Milton puts forth. My comment was that in most Mythologies a character's physical appearance mirrors aspects of that character's personality. She seemed puzzled by this and I tried to soften the possible upsettling comment of Christianity as being a mythology. I tried to place it in some sort of literary historical context, that biblical era works didn't usually have the modern idea that a person's physical appearance had no part to play with his emmotions or mental ablities. I even managed to bring in Sherlock Holmes as an example of how modern such a view is. She commented she and Milton view Satan as vain and thus require a beautiful physique. While I didn't disagree I mentioned that it seems to me, in part, that rather than being vain, he is rebellious - he seeks independence. "Better to rule in Hell than to serve in Heaven."

we walked to class.