He had been surprised when the young Englishman he had met hadn't been afraid of who he really was. At a time when Witchcraft was ripe and the belief and fear that Devil was among them was all-too potent (and true in this case), Lucifer had been shocked that the man had barely battered an eye; had not called for someone to destroy him.
Instead, the young man had made friends with the Devil, promising not to tell anyone of his true nature. Especially since Lucifer had promised and also shown that he wasn't planning on doing anything that might be conceived as 'evil', immoral for the time, almost certainly, but not evil.
In fact, it had been Lucifer that had introduced this young man to his future wife who he eventually married in 1582. In return, the young man had shared with the Devil the first drafts of his writings, asking him for his opinions. Asking him if he could picture the words on the page in his mind.
It was then that Lucifer explained what he now deemed as his curse.
Having spent millennia in Hell had changed Lucifer and his opinions. First, it had been his name; he had changed it not long after accepting his new fate, but wanting to keep something of his old self. He had once been the Lightbringer, after all, and, despite it being at his Father's calling and that he had never been able to see it in the way that it was intended to be seen, creating the stars was something that he was still immensely proud of.
Secondly, Lucifer had begun to hate his Father even more. Once the pain at being cast out had faded, what had been left was anger. Anger that his Father had thrown him out the way he did; anger at how his siblings had watched as his wings were broken by force, not one of them stepping in to help him; anger at how all of this could have been prevented if his Father wasn't the bastard that he was.
And thirdly, Lucifer had begun to view the matter of his colour-blind sight differently. He had never really given it much thought when he had been in Heaven, but his time in Hell had made him rethink many things. Maybe the lack of colour in his sight had been part of his punishment? His Father was supposed to be an all-knowing being, right? Therefore, maybe he had foreseen what would happen to him in the future. Maybe being unable to see his stars and the colour they made in their true form was a punishment right from the moment he could see. Maybe he had been damned from birth.
The young man he explained this to, one night sat in a pub, had listened with fascination. They kept their voices low, not wanting anyone to overhear what they were saying and think either of them mad.
It was then, as the Devil explained his tale, that the young man began to realise that he had been asking him the wrong question when it came to reading his works. Rather than asking Lucifer if he could picture it in his mind, colours and all, he should have been asking if the words he chose impacted him in certain ways. Could he feel the anger in the syllables and the passion in the tones they were spoken in? Images in all their vibrancy was not what was important, but rather the vibrancy of the language.
So, many years later, when the young man became the most famous playwright in history, he would often look back to those moments spent with the Devil himself to remind him that the words he chose often had more impact than the images they created.