Hell: “the vast and boundless Deep” (I.177)
Introduction
“For one may be sure that whatever Milton touches straight-way becomes Miltonic” (Curry, 11).
Milton’s education exposed him to a wide variety of classical and Christian literature. His reading list would have included Hesiod, Homer, Virgil, Dante, Shakespeare, Spenser, Tasso and many others, in addition to the King James Bible. Milton drew upon these traditions in his creation of Hell in “Paradise Lost”, but quickly surpassed them with skill that no other epic poet has attained since.
Textual Occurrences
This section will deal with the use of language, specifically paradoxes, in describing Hell, the idea that Hell is a twisted, perverted image of Heaven and the physicality of Hell.
Milton critic Walter Clyde Curry claims that “[e]very physical property of Hell bears upon it the signature of chaos” (Curry, 15). If this is true, then perhaps it is fitting that Milton uses paradoxes in describing Hell, because both paradoxes and Milton’s Chaos are self-contradictory. The first example involves sight in Hell:
...yet from those flames
No light, but rather darkness visible
Serv’d onely to discover sights of woe (I.62-64).
The concept of flames that show no light is unnatural and thus fitting for Hell. Milton does not allow the “darkness visible” to act as a source of comfort for the devils; it serves to let them see their prison of eternal torment, and to act as a contrast to the abundant light of God in Heaven that they once enjoyed.
The second example of paradox involves wind and fire:
…the parching Air
Burns frore, and cold performs th' effect of Fire (II.594-595).
The image of freezing wind whipping through Hell so intensely that it burns the devils as effectively as fire is compelling, and terrifying that nature could be subverted so easily in Hell. Lastly, Milton employs a paradox to describe the duties of life and death:
A Universe of death, which God by curse
Created evil, for evil only good,
Where all life dies, death lives, (II.621-623)
In Hell, “death lives”, which is to readers a physical impossibility brought only to life by the wickedness of the fallen angels. Milton’s Hell continuously perverts the natural order of the elements and life and death, serving as a contrast to the perfection of Heaven.
The connections between Heaven and Hell are carried out not just through these paradoxes, but also in the geographical formations found in both locations. Four rivers run through Hell, plus the stream of Lethe:
…along the Banks
Of four infernal Rivers that disgorge
Into the burning Lake thir baleful streams;
Abhorred Styx the flood of deadly hate,
Sad Acheron of sorrow, black and deep;
Cocytus, nam'd of lamentation loud
Heard on the ruful stream; fierce Phlegeton
Whose waves of torrent fire inflame with rage.
Farr off from these a slow and silent stream,
Lethe the River of Oblivion roules
Her watrie Labyrinth, whereof who drinks,
Forthwith his former state and being forgets,
Forgets both joy and grief, pleasure and pain (II.574-586).
The rivers Styx, Acheron, Cocytus, Phlegeton and Lethe find their origins in Tartarus, the Greek version of Hell that Hesiod describes in “The Theogony”. Milton echoes the personalities of the rivers in the personalities of the newly fallen angels, and then uses this parallel to contrast their current situation to that of their peers in Heaven:
The personification of these four classical rivers (to be contrasted with the living steams of Heaven and the river of Paradise) itself suggests as much about the emotional and psychological nature of Milton’s Hell as it does about its physical condition: the ‘baleful streams’ recall an earlier description of Satan’s ‘baleful eyes’ (I.56) – full of evil as well as suffering and despair as he witness the dismal landscape around him. The mixture of lamentation and sorrow with hatred and rage evokes the condition of emotional state of the devils – potentially tragic but full of Homeric fury and wrath (Loewenstein, 71).
In aligning the fallen angels with Homeric imagery of “fury and wrath” and vengeance Milton is abolishing the importance of the epic warrior as a hero, much like Christ will crush the Serpent beneath his heel. Milton topples the pagan and epic traditions of old, bringing forth a new vision of Christ as an epic hero.
The physicality of Hell is unique in “Paradise Lost” in terms of its location within the universe: “[h]owever vast in extent the newly created universe of ‘bottomless’ Hell may be, its flaming mouth is situated, approximately, directly beneath the breached western wall of Heaven” (Curry, 149). In the classical tradition, Tartarus is located within the depths of Earth, and in the King James Bible, it is implied that Hell is also inside the earth. Milton places the creation of Hell before the creation of Earth because God creates Adam and Eve only after Lucifer has fallen.
Milton's Hell is sensual in ways that Tartarus and the Bible's Hell are not - but all the sensuality is to the effect of torturing the senses of the devils, rather than soothing or arousing them. Satan views his fallen comrades that are "...o'rewhelm'd/ With Floods and Whirlwinds of tempestuous fire" (I.76-77) after their fall from Heaven. Satan is "vaulted with Fire" (I.298) as he tries to make his way across the burning lake of fire to the shore:
…till on dry Land
He lights, if it were Land that ever burn’d
With solid, as the Lake with liquid fire (I.227-229).
Milton also implies that the general atmosphere of Hell is polluted and the air foul: “There stood a Hill not far whose grisly top/ Belch’d fire and rowling smoak” (I.670-671). Though Milton would not live to see it, those lines could easily describe industrial England of the 18th century. Hell is thus established as a place of eternal punishment for the devils, now subject to pain for the first time, and this torment attacks all the senses, not just the soul.
Historical Context
In “The Theogony”, the Titans are at war with Zeus and his siblings for a full ten years before the Olympus gods are able to claim victory. The passage describing the defeat of the Titans eerily echoes that of the fallen angels’ forced exile from Heaven to the newly created Hell in “Paradise Lost”:
overshadowed the Titans with their missiles, and buried them beneath the wide-pathed earth, and bound them in bitter chains when they had conquered them by their strength for all of their great spirit, as far beneath the earth to Tartarus. For a brazen anvil falling down from heaven nine nights and days would reach the earth upon the tenth: and again, a brazen anvil falling from earth nine nights and days would reach Tartarus upon the tenth (Hesiod, 11.?-?).
Him the Almighty Power
Hurld headlong flaming from th’ Ethereal Skie
With hideous ruine and combustion down
To bottomless perdition, there to dwell
In Adamantine Chains and penal Fire,
Who durst defie th’ Omnipotent to Arms.
Nine times the Space that measures Day and Night
To mortal men, he with his horrid crew
Lay vanquisht, rowling in the fiery Gulfe
Confounded though immortal (I.44-53).
Zeus, as the head of the Olympian gods, takes the place of the Son of God, who successfully routs Satan and his army from Heaven. The theme of chains and fire are present in both texts, and Milton copies the use of nine days to measure the space between Heaven and Hell. Differences arise in that Hesiod mentions earth, which was created at the same time as Tartarus, unlike in “Paradise Lost”, where Earth was created after the fallen angel’s revolt.
More similarities occur in descriptions of the path from Tartarus to Earth, and Hell to Heaven:
Round it runs a fence of bronze, and night spreads in triple line all about it like a neck-circlet, while above grow the roots of the earth and unfruitful sea.
…
It is a great gulf, and if once a man were within the gates, he would not reach the floor until a whole year had reached its end, but cruel blast upon blast would carry him this way and that. And this marvel is awful even to the deathless gods (Hesiod, 11.?-??).
…long is the way
And hard, that out of Hell leads up to light;
Our prison strong, this huge convex of Fire,
Outrageous to devour, immures us round
Ninefold, and gates of burning Adamant
Barr’d over us prohibit all egress.
These past, if any pass, the void profound
Of unessential Night receives him next
Wide gaping, and with utter loss of being
Threatens him, plung’d in that abortive gulf (II.432-441).
In Milton’s Hell, the simple bronze fence of Tartarus has been replaced by nine rings of burning fire and a gate of impenetrable stone (adamant). But both locations are described in hyperbolic terms: “he could not reach the floor until a whole year had reached its end” (Hesiod, 11.?-?) is a gross exaggeration, but works in describing the infinite depths of Tartarus.
Both Hesiod and Milton describe the gates that keep its inhabitants within their prison. However, Hesiod credits Poseidon, another Olympic god, with the creation of the gates, whereas Milton’s gates are made distinct by their guardians, Sin and Death.
There by the counsel of Zeus who drives the clouds the Titan gods are hidden under misty gloom, in a dank place where are the ends of the huge earth. And they may not go out; for Poseidon fixed gates of bronze upon it, and a wall runs all around it on every side” (Hesiod, 11.713-735?).
…
And there are shining gates and an immoveable threshold of bronze having unending roots and it is grown of itself. And beyond, away from all the gods, live the Titans, beyond gloomy Chaos” (Hesiod, 11.807-819?).
...at last appeers
Hell bounds high reaching to the horrid Roof,
And thrice threefold the Gates; three folds were Brass,
Three Iron, three of Adamantine Rock,
Impenetrable, impal'd with circling fire,
Yet unconsum'd (II.643-648).
Once again Milton triumphs the simple bronze of Hesiod’s creation by stating his gate is made of three types of material: brass, iron and adamantine rock. Beyond both sets of Gates are Chaos, but Satan cannot open the gate, only Sin has the keys.
Tartarus is described as dim, misty, being in murky gloom and “loathsome and dank, which even the gods abhor” (Hesiod, 11.736-744?). Milton departs from this depiction of Tartarus for the most part, and increases the dimness to “darkness visible” (I.63) before clarifying that this darkness is the lack of God, and therefore God’s light:
…here thir Prison ordain’d
In utter darkness, and thir portion set
As far remov’d from God and light of Heav’n
As from the Center thrice to th’ utmost Pole (I.71-74).
Tartarus is described in the same way a cave, deep within the Earth would be. The physical aspects of the cave are not meant to be a punishment, but rather accurately describe the nature of caves – they are dank, gloomy, full of stale air and probably slimy and stinky. Milton’s Hell, on the other hand, is created in terms of both physical and spiritual punishment for its inhabitants.
Hesiod’s “The Theogony” is but one of the texts that influenced Milton’s creation of Hell. This project would encourage the reader to explore the works of Homer, Virgil, Dante, Shakespeare, Tasso and Spenser to find similarities and differences in the depictions of Hell.
Scholarly Context
This section will discuss the concept of Hell playing double duty as both a spiritual concept and a physical location, and the idea of Pandaemonium as the archetype for all evil cities of mankind’s future.
The concept that Hell is both a physical entity and a condition, or reflection of its inhabitants, is a common theme found in Milton critical study, and indeed Milton gives proof of this concept within the text of “Paradise Lost”. Critic David Loewenstein states:
But Hell – Satan’s realm – is not only a physical or geographical place located at a vast distance from earth and Heaven: in Paradise Lost, as we began to see in the previous section, it is no less significantly a subjective, psychological, and interior state. In that sense, it is a place with no physical limits at all. The internalization of Hell was a powerful notion in the late Renaissance (Loewenstein, 74-75).
Milton repeatedly stresses the importance of the inward state of man (or in this case, of fallen angels) over the outward physical appearance throughout “Paradise Lost”. What makes the fall of Lucifer so tragic is that while he may lie to himself and his comrades, deep down he is aware the fault is his own, borne of free will:
Me miserable! Which way shall I flie
Infinite wrauth, and infinite despaire?
Which way I flie is Hell; my self am Hell;
And in the lowest deep a lower deep
Still threatening to devour me opens wide,
To which the Hell I suffer seems a Heav’n (IV.73-78).
Satan is aware that his sin has led him to not only dwell in Hell, but to contain that Hell within him, no matter where he flees: “…for within him Hell/ He brings, and round about him, nor from Hell/ One step no more then from himself can fly/ By change of place” (IV.20-23). Escape from Hell, both physically and spiritually, is no longer a possibility for Satan and his comrades.
This self-deceiving Satan in Book IV is a far cry from the furious and wrathful Satan of Book II:
…Farewel happy Fields
Where joy for ever dwells: Hail horrours, hail
Infernal world, and thou profoundest Hell
Receive thy new Possessor: One who brings
A mind not to be chang’d by Place or Time.
The mind is its own place, and in it self
Can make a Heav’n of Hell, a Hell of Heav’n (I.249-255).
This speech is taken almost immediately after Satan’s arrival in Hell, and only Satan and Beelzebub are conscious. At this time, Satan is unaware that an even more “infernal world” awaits him after he has succeeded in the temptation and fall of mankind. This “lower deep” devours Satan and his army when they are literally transformed so that their outward appearance now matches their inward sin:
His Visage drawn he felt to sharp and spare,
His Armes clung to his Ribs, his Leggs entwining
Each other, till supplanted down he fell
A monstrous Serpent on his Belly prone,
…
…he would have spoke,
But hiss for hiss returnd with forked tongue
To forked tongue, for now were all transform’d
Alike, to Serpents all, as accessories
To his bold Riot (X.511-514, 517-522).
The cycle of temptation and sin is completed with this act, and Satan and his army now match the monsters that inhabit hell in both temperament and physical appearance.
If Satan is to “make a Heav’n of Hell”, then he must have a building to rule from, much like God rules from atop the mountain in Heaven. The fallen angels, after exploring the landscape of Hell, realize there is building material available if they have the strength to mine and rip it from the floor of Hell: “…This Desart soile/ Wants not her hidden luster, Gemms and Gold” (II.270-271). Whereas the mountain of God is a natural creation in Heaven, Pandaemonium must be created through the destruction of Hell’s elements, and the fallen angels do so in “an hour/ What in an age they with incessant toyle/ And hands inumberable scare perform” (I.697-699):
Built like a Temple, where Pilasters round
Were set, and Doric pillars overlaid
With Golden Architrave; nor did there want
Cornice or Freeze, with bossy Sculptures grav’n,
The Roof was fretted Gold. Not Babilon,
Nor great Alcairo such magnificence
Equal’d in all thir glories, to inshrine
Belus or Serapis thir Gods, or seat
Thir Kings, when AEgypt with Assyria strove
In wealth and luxurie. Th’ ascending pile
Stood fixt her stately highth, and strait the dores
Op’ning thir brazen foulds discover wide
Within, her ample spaces, o’re the smooth
And level pavement: from the arched roof
Pendant by suttle Magic many a row
Of Starry Lamps and blazing Cressets fed
With Naphtha and Asphaltus yeilded light
As from a sky (I.695-730).
Milton relies on hyperbole and the biblical images of corrupt cities to create an improved upon archetypal image of the evil city. Milton critic John R. Knott states, “[w]e first see Pandaemonium as a temple, suggesting by its splendor the magnitude of hellish idolatry and devotion to luxury, then as a palace and council chamber, and finally as a city” (Knott, 150). Because the devils use Pandaemonium to plot their war against mankind in a mockery of the council of Heaven, Knott suggests “the primary role of cities in Milton’s epics; they are objects of siege or places from which war is waged. As seats of empire, cities symbolize the desire for mastery over people and things, the pursuit of power and the pursuit of wealth” (Knott, 155). In this line of thinking, Satan is also the archetype for all future tyrants of mankind, such as Nimrod, the builder of the Tower of Babel.
Milton builds layers upon layers of symbols and image from his own imagination meshed with the classical and Biblical traditions, describing both spiritual and physical levels, all culminating in the conception of a unique Hell that has been inspiring and challenging generations for four hundred years.
Popular Context
While putting together this wiki page, we came up with a short iMix of songs inspired by our reading of “Paradise Lost”. Click here for the direct link to the iMix, or go to the iTunes Music Store and search for “Songs for Geography Milton Wiki”. Songs on the mix include:
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Song Name
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Artist
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Heaven Beside You
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Alice In Chains
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Satan Is My Motor
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Cake
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Sheep Go to Heaven
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Cake
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Sin Wagon
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Dixie Chicks
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This Fire
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Franz Ferdinand
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Evil and a Heathen
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Franz Ferdinand
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Right Next Door to Hell
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Guns N' Roses
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Antichrist Superstar
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Marilyn Manson
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This Devil's Workday
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Modest Mouse
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Dead!
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My Chemical Romance
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Mama
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My Chemical Romance
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Help Me I Am in Hell
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Nine Inch Nails
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Lake of Fire (Live)
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Nirvana
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Hell
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Squirrel Nut Zippers
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Welcome to Hell
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Sum 41
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The Hell Song
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Sum 41
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Catch Hell Blues
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The White Stripes
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*Disclaimer: iTunes has labeled several of the songs as “explicit”, so if you’re under 18, please ask for permission before downloading.
In these two videos from the tv show "Shorties Watchin' Shorties", Patton Oswald describes what it would be like if he died during the Apocalypse and Janeane Garofalo describes her own personal Hell. Their acts are animated, allowing us to see Hell on Earth in the Apocalypse, and a Hell that includes stairmaster and karaoke for eternity. *Disclaimer: Mature content.
*Sometimes the videos refuse to load properly. If that is the case, click here for Patton Oswald's video, and click here for Janeane Garofalo's video.
If you're interested in owning your own land in Hell, the town of Hell, Michigan is selling deeds to land in Hell for $6.66 (*wink, wink*).
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Hell & Chaos Editor: Jay Jay Stroup
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