Re: I see Satan's second and third desire -- Mimetic Theory and Literary Study

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Date Posted: 18:08:14 01/21/08 Mon
Author: Erin Risch
Subject: Re: I see Satan's second and third desire
In reply to: Betsy Peters 's message, "I see Satan's second and third desire" on 04:35:40 01/21/08 Mon

I was looking at Satan's temptation of Eve in Paradise Lost, and I found an interesting passage:

"Thoughts, whither have ye led me, with what sweet
Compulsion thus transported to forget
What hither brought us, hate, not love, nor hope
Of Paradise for Hell, hope here to taste
Of pleasure, but all pleasure to destroy,
Save what is in destroying, other joy
To me is lost." (9.473-479)

The first thing that's pretty clear to me is that Satan is indeed struggling to separate hate and love. Betsy, you pointed out that Satan often envies the unfallen state of Adam and Eve, which we might call loving the models, but he also hates them deeply because of his envy(475).

The next thing that interests me is that Satan seems, in one sense, to understand the mechanics of his imitative desire, at least so far in that he knows that he wouldn't enjoy the object in itself at all. He seems to understand that the process of desiring, not the object, is giving him all of his intense emotions. He also seems to understand that, because he is a rival, he takes pleasure in being an obstacle to Adam and Eve, because the more he stands in their way, the more of a "winner" he is in the envy game.

I guess what really confounds this, though, is that Satan has no chance at having what Adam and Eve have, i.e. the unfallen state. Is there such a thing as reverse mimetic desire, wherein you wish that no one might have what you don't have?

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Replies:

Re: I see Satan's second and third desire -- Cara, 18:26:37 01/27/08 Sun