This should be interesting. According to a story in the Guardian, there is talk afoot to turn Milton’s wonderful but challenging poem Paradise Lost into a movie. There’s even a screen play. My first thought was, are you kidding me? How are you going to turn ten books of beautiful verse into an approximately two hour movie.
For example:
What in me is dark
Illumine, what is low raise and support;
That to the highth of this great Argument
I may assert th’ Eternal Providence,
And justifie the wayes of God to men. (Book I, l. 22-26)
Plus, this is, afterall, a pretty bold poem. There’s a sympathic Satan, for Go– (Can I say for God’s sake if I’m talking about Satan?) for someone’s sake them. If I remember right, Adam and Eve get it on in the first few books. (Forgive me, it’s been a while.) ‘Course, Satan does turn into an ugly, toad-like thing after a few books. But that’s all kind of hard to by if you’ve read through Milton’s description of Hell and Pandaemonium.