I’m so Henry Winter coded
(Lying on the floor in a dark room and contemplating murder because my head hurts)
I was recently going through The Secret History again to look for the different books mentioned within it and there was one specifically that made me pause. On page 83 Henry is trying to translate Paradise Lost into Latin and when Richard asks why he responded with “I am interested to see what I wind up with”.
There was two reasons this struck me, one being how paradise lost is about whether or not humans really have free will to make their own choices or if they are fated. (“Such a thing as the fatal flaw”)
The second and honestly more interesting reason this struck me was because it reminded me of one of my other favourite books, Frankenstein. Paradise Lost is read by Frankensteins creation in the book and is his favourite novel (Henry winter also claims “Milton to my way of thinking is our greatest English poet, greater than Shakespeare,”). And all of a sudden things started to fall into place for me, all the similarities between them, from how large they both were to how they both ended at their own hand. Frankenstein’s creation and Henry Winter. So different and yet the same. Both monsters of their own making. I just think it’s interesting.
This is still one of the funniest parts in the entire book to me I love it so much, I don’t have any reason for it but it is very near and dear to my heart.
