In Clive Barker’s frequently fantastic and often grotesque The History of the Devil, a lovelorn Satan is sick and tired of living in Hell. He bemoans the loss of his angel-wings, his freedom of flight, his elegance, and grace. And he misses God. So, he calls a trial, his appeal, to seek re-admittance into Heaven. The prosecution argues that the Devil’s presence on Earth has had a disastrous effect on mankind, whereas the defense counters that the Devil is – and always has been – man’s greatest scapegoat.

As the trial moves through space and time, a seductively wide range of characters tell the Devil’s story, each testimony revealing the Devil wearing a different skin, until, by the end, he sheds them all. Are these scenes of humanity’s great failures – or are they the work of the Devil, his own wicked crimes? Does even the Devil eventually deserve paradise?