I’ve been
reading a collection of the classic tales of Solomon Kane by Robert E. Howard,
and I’ve noticed just how dated these stories are. Don’t get me wrong, they are
well written and quite entertaining. But what I’m referring to in this instance
is whenever Solomon Kane faces the other-worldly creatures in these tales they’re
usually described as something from hell, or like Satan himself. Though there
are a lot of creepy things that Solomon Kane faces, and Howard does a good job
of describing how horrific the creatures are, it doesn’t scare me like the
readers who read them around the time the stories were published. These stories
were written in the late 1920’s and early 1930’s. This was before television
and horror movies desensitized people; a time where dark, supernatural things,
especially the Devil, were something feared whenever thought of.
Dante
Alighieri’s 14TH century allegorical poem, Inferno (better known as
Dante’s Inferno), depicted Satan trapped in the middle of Hell, waist-deep in
ice, giant, with three faces, gnawing on traitorous men like Brutus, Cassius
and Judas Iscariot. In John Milton’s epic poem, Paradise Lost, Satan is the
defier against God, rebelling and taking a third of the angels with him and
warring against the heavenly host. He is the deceiver of mankind.
It seems
like in the 60’s, 70’s and 80’s, mediums of all sorts used Satan as the image of
absolute fear and evil. He was in literature, horror films, and Rock/Heavy
Metal music. I remember being a kid in the 80’s and Satan seemed to be
everywhere in the movies, in music, and in the news (Satanic crimes and
murders). Now, it seems like all that started to fade out in the late 90’s, and
the fearful image of Satan has been swept under the rug; and no one recalls
much of it anymore, except to say, “Remember when?”
In fantasy
fiction, many villainous characters have been inspired by Satan. Those who have
not read past The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings may think that Sauron is the
Satan figure in Tolkien’s creation. But when you read his other works, like The Silmarillion, you find out about the one who
Sauron was seduced by, and who Sauron served. That is Morgoth, who was Melkor
before he turned to darkness. Morgoth, like Satan, was the most powerful of his
kind, but wanted to do things his way and rebelled against the creator, Eru,
and brought darkness to creation. After Morgoth was defeated and cast into the
outer void, Sauron imitated his master, thus continuing the likeness of
Morgoth.
In C.S. Lewis’ The Chronicles of Narnia, Jadis, the White Witch, rebels
against her sister, refusing to submit to her and wanting the throne for
herself. She later usurps the throne of Narnia and plunges the world into a
dark winter for 100 years. She has minions of all types of evil creatures. All
traitors belong to her, and as we see in The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe,
she means to take Edmund’s life (since he was declared a traitor), but Aslan
(the Christ-figure in the books) chooses to die on his behalf. The White Witch
leads the “crucifixion” (so to speak) of Aslan, with all her minions; just like
Satan had his way with Jesus on the day of his crucifixion.
Even The Wheel of
Time books by Robert Jordan have the Dark One, also known as Shai'tan,
which is Arabic for adversary, which
is the same meaning for Satan. In Jordan’s series, Shai’tan, the Dark One,
is known as the “opponent of the Creator’; and was bound by the Creator at the
moment of creation.
Things get
twisted around in Anne Bishop’s Black Jewels trilogy; a dark fantasy where the
character, Saetan, the High Lord of Hell, is the good guy, as well as those who
dwell in Hell. In this world, Darkness is the power of right; basically good
and evil are reversed.
Piers
Anthony’s Incarnations of Immortality series is basically about mortal people
becoming immortal incarnations of Death, Time, Fate, War, Nature, Evil and Good
(Satan is the incarnation of Evil). The first five books simply deal with Satan
using and tricking these newly turned immortal incarnations for his own evil
purposes, and these incarnations fight against him. By book six another mortal
assumes the incarnation of Evil (Satan), but he actually has a good side, and
the evil things that Satan has done in the past begins to become rationalized
and seen to be for some greater purpose.
More
recently, Sara Douglass’ novel, The Devil’s Diadem, is set in 12TH
century England where there is a mysterious plague sweeping the land, and it is
later found out that imps from hell and the devil himself are sending the
plague in search for a stolen artifact.
In closing,
Satan has been used and imitated in fantasy fiction and allegory for generations,
and it appears that his likeness is diminishing more and more in the genre;
save for a few elements in urban fantasy, which deals more with demons in
different fictional representations. The more you look at it, the dark lord
imitation of Satan is becoming yesterday’s element in the genre, as Satan and
Satan-like characters no longer scare us or have us biting our nails in
suspense, because it’s been used and told and retold so many times. More and
more villains in the genre are simply appearing as the dark side of man, or
just an opposing force. Satan isn’t scary anymore. But the ancient telling of
this being, fallen from grace, through the Bible, and reinterpreted through the
mythologies of many civilizations and stories up to today, is epic in scale. It is the source of the retelling of the clash between good and evil, which drives
the majority of the genre.
Thank you, very informative. Wonderful.
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