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B.A 1st Sem English Major & Minor Unit 3 Elizabethan/Renaissance Drama
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Unit 3 Elizabethan/Renaissance Drama
Short Questions & Answers:
1. Who wrote the play “Doctor Faustus”?
Ans: Christopher Marlowe.
2. When was “Doctor Faustus” first performed?
Ans: Around 1592.
3. What is the genre of “Doctor Faustus”?
Ans: Tragedy.
4. Who is the protagonist of “Doctor Faustus”?
Ans: Doctor Faustus, a scholar.
5. What does Doctor Faustus desire above all else?
Ans: Knowledge and power.
6. What pact does Doctor Faustus make with the devil?
Ans: He sells his soul to Mephistopheles in exchange for 24 years of service.
7. Who is Mephistopheles in the play?
Ans: A devil who serves as Faustus’s companion and servant,
8. What are the consequences of Faustus’s pact with the devil?
Ans: Faustus experiences internal conflict, moral decay, and ultimately damnation.
9. What is the famous opening line of “Doctor Faustus”?
Ans: “Settle thy studies, Faustus, and begin.”
10. Where does much of the action of “Doctor Faustus” take place?
Ans: In various locations across Europe and in Faustus’s study.
11. What tragic flaw does Doctor Faustus possess?
Ans: Hubris or excessive pride.
12. Who attempts to persuade Faustus to repent and seek salvation?
Ans: The Good Angel and Old Man.
13. How does Doctor Faustus meet his end?
Ans: He is carried off to hell by Mephistopheles after his 24 years are up.
14. What themes are explored in “Doctor Faustus”?
Ans: Themes include ambition, the limits of human knowledge, temptation, and the consequences of sin.
15. What role does the chorus play in “Doctor Faustus”?
Ans: The chorus provides commentary and sets the scene for the audience.
16. How does Christopher Marlowe’s use of blank verse contrib-ute to the play’s impact?
Ans: It elevates the language, making the tragic elements more poignant and the characters’ speeches memorable.
17. What influence did “Doctor Faustus” have on later literature and drama?
Ans: It influenced the depiction of the Faustian bargain in literature and inspired subsequent playwrights.
18. How does Marlowe portray the conflict between good and evil in the play?
Ans: Through the characters of the Good Angel and Evil Angel, and the struggle within Faustus himself.
19. What is the significance of the ending of “Doctor Faustus”?
Ans: It serves as a cautionary tale about the consequences of unchecked ambition and the pursuit of power.
20. What is the moral lesson conveyed in “Doctor Faustus”?
Ans: It warns against the dangers of making deals with the devil and emphasizes the importance of repentance and redemption.
Long Questions & Answers:
1. What is the moral lesson that Marlowe tries to convey with Doctor Faustus?
Ans: Christopher Marlowe wrote The Tragical History of the Life and Death of Doctor Faustus in about 1590, at a time when England was at the height of its Renaissance, in the latter part of the reign of Queen Elizabeth I, and about one hundred years since the end of the Medieval period.
In the midst of significant advances throughout Europe in science, law, medicine, and theology, Marlowe seems to have written Doctor Faustus from a noticeably Medieval perspective. Marlow seems to be promoting the Medieval beliefs (the morals of the story) that too much knowledge can be dangerous and indulging in magic and the occult can lead to dire consequences.
Doctor Faustus is an Elizabethan tragedy clearly based on Aristotelian principles of the tragic hero. Faustus suffers from the tragic flaw (hamartia) of excessive pride (hubris). He makes a serious mistake in judgement based on his tragic flaw (selling his soul to the devil in exchange for unlimited knowledge and power), which brings about an unavoidable punishment (nemesis), which is eternal damnation.
Near the end of the play, when his twenty-four-year period of unlimited knowledge and power is ending, Faustus comes to an important realization (anagnorisis) that his pact with Lucifer was essentially meaningless, and he’s now faced with the profound reversal of fate (peripeteia) that awaits him, when he is transported from the world of pleasure to the depths of hell.
Although the audience hopes throughout the play that Faustus will come to his senses and realize what he’s done before it’s too late, his fate is ultimately sealed by his own actions, and the audience undergoes catharsis (a release of feelings of pity and fear) for his inevitable downfall.
An interesting aspect of Doctor Faustus is that throughout the play, Marlowe presents the Medieval view that no matter what a person has done in life-including selling their soul to the devil, as Faustus did they can still find salvation by renouncing the evil they’ve done and asking for God’s forgiveness
Faustus has several opportunities during the play to save his soul but refuses to avail himself of God’s forgiveness until near the end of the play.
In scene 13, Faustus tries to call on God to save him, but the devils won’t let him.
THIRD SCHOLAR. Yet, Faustus, call on God.
FAUSTUS: On God, whom Faustus hath abjured! on God, whom Faustus hath blasphemed! Ah, my God, I would(30) weep, but the Devil draws in my tears. Gush forth blood instead of tears! yea, life and soul! Oh, he stays my tongue! I would lift up my hands, but see, they hold them, they hold them! (Scene 13, 28-34).
That’s when Marlowe changes the rules, and the entire perspec-tive of the play, and transports Faustus from the Medieval Christian world into the secular, humanistic Renaissance world.
If “man is the measure of all things,” as the ancient Greek philosopher Protagoras wrote in the 5th century B.C.-and which, as a concept, was adopted in the Renaissance by humanists like Marlowe (who might also have been an atheist) then a man is wholly responsible for his choices and his actions.
Faustus lived his life as he chose to live it, and there’s no reprieve from his poor life choices, no last-minute absolution for his sins, and no forgiveness for his meaningless, ill-spent life-except, perhaps, as an example and a warning to others.
2. What was Marlowe’s debt to Moralities in Doctor Faustus?
Ans: Morality plays, or Moralities, followed Mystery plays and were probably the outgrowth of a desire to teach Christian principles without adhering strictly to the narratives told in the Old and New Testaments and the saints’ lives. Morality plays were in vogue in England at the end of the fifteenth century (1400s), yet they did continue to have an influence that can be readily seen in Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus.
Moralities were intended to teach Christian principles of how to live and how not to live: One lives by virtues and avoids vices. Moralities were allegories in which abstract concepts were alle-gorized as personified characters such as Evil and Greed and Beauty and Mercy. Doctor Faustus certainly instructs on how and how not to live and has characters who are allegorized personifications of abstract concepts, along with supernatural characters like Lucifer. When Lucifer comes to Faustus to chastise him for thinking of God and calling on His name, he brings a pageant of the Seven Deadly Sins with him. These allegorical characters perform a dance for Faustus and teach him how to adhere to each representative vice.
LUCIFER. Do so, and we will highly gratify thee. Faustus, we are come from hell to shew thee some pastime: sit down, and thou shalt see all the Seven Deadly Sins appear in their proper shapes.
Talk not of Paradise nor creation; but mark this show: talk of the devil, and nothing else.
[Enter the SEVEN DEADLY SINS.]
Moralities show the supernatural struggle between Vice and Virtue, Good and Evil, as the opposing forces of Good and Evil contend for the hero’s eternal soul. This is certainly present in Doctor Faustus as illustrated by Mephistophilis’s presence and role and as confirmed by Lucifer’s intrusion. One difference is that in the end of a Morality play, Repentance saves the hero through the help of Perseverance so ultimately the hero is forgiven, redeemed, and saved. Not so for Faustus whose end is a grizzly one in which he is hopelessly brought face-to-face with the Devils that come to escort him to the waiting Mephistophilis.
FAUSTUS. Fair Nature’s eye, rise, rise again, and make Perpetual day; or let this hour be but A year, a month, a week,
a natural day, That Faustus may repent and save his soul!
…
The stars move still, time runs, the clock will strike, The devil will come, and Faustus must be damn’d. O, I’ll leap up to my God! Who pulls me down?
3. What are the various stages of Doctor Faustus damnation Stage in Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus?
Ans: This is a large question for a limited format. I can give an overview of the first and last stages of Faustus’s damnation. The first stage began when Faustus was “swoln with cunning, of a self-conceit” after having mastered all studies and sciences of his era. Undoubtedly, Faustus had a great and extraordinary mind used, again undoubtedly, for the wrong aims. Being “glutted now with learning’s golden gifts,” Faustus, based upon a real Doctor Johann Faust (1488), turned his considerable mental powers to magic, sorcery, “necromancy”:
CHORUS: He surfeits [overindulges] upon cursed necromancy;
Nothing so sweet as magic is to him,
Which he prefers
Faustus’s reason for this gorging on magic is that he desires things beyond the scope of humanity. He desires power over all things of earth;he desires deity (to be a god), which is ironic because (1) desiring to be like God is what caused Lucifer to be be cast out of heaven to start with and (2) compared to the pantheon of gods, Faustus would be insignificant as a god. This was the beginning stage of his damnation.
FAUSTUS: All things that move between the quiet poles Shall be at my command:
A sound magician is a mighty god:
Here, Faustus, tire thy brains to gain a deity.
The final stage of Faustus’s damnation is a painful one. The Old Man comes to Faustus to try to lead him back to God through repentance. Faustus agrees with him and desires to seek repentance
FAUSTUS: Accursed Faustus, where is mercy now?
I do repent; and yet I do despair:
Hell strives with grace for conquest in my breast: What shall I do to shun the snares of death?
But-Mephistophilis appears, having heard the whole conver sation, terrifies Faustus and threatens him grievous pain, thus Faustus recants his desire to be guided to repentance by the Old Man:
MEPHIST: Thou traitor, Faustus, I arrest thy soul For disobedience to my sovereign lord: Revolt, or I’ll in piece-meal tear thy flesh.
FAUSTUS: Sweet Mephistophilis, entreat thy lord To pardon my unjust presumption, And with my blood again I will confirm
My former vow I made to Lucifer.
Thus begins the final stage of Faustus’s damnation. He is later to confess to the Scholars what he has done and that he is in his last hour of life. They plead to pray with him yet, in concern for their safety, Faustus regretfully sends them away. Though Faustus sees signs outside in the sky that repentance might yet be his, he talks about it without knowing how to accept it. At the clock’s stroke of midnight, the Devils come to remove Faustus to Hell. The Chorus concludes the tragic drama by warning to stay away from practicing magic, one of the “unlawful” things;
CHORUS: Cut is the branch that might have grown full straight,
Faustus is gone: regard his hellish fall,
Whose fiendful fortune may exhort the wise,
Only to wonder at unlawful things, Whose deepness doth entice such forward wits
4. Why does Faustus prefer necromancy over philosophical inquiry in Doctor Faustus? Critically analyze this.
Ans: Dr. Faustus prefers necromancy over philosophical inquiry for the simple reason that it gives him access to power, which is what he wants more than anything in the whole world. Besides, philosophical inquiry requires a good deal of thought, study, and effort, and Faustus has pretty much had enough of all that. Truth be told, he’s been getting rather bored lately with the pursuit of knowledge, which is becoming an increasingly fruitless exercise. What he wants is instant knowledge, knowledge he doesn’t have to work for, knowledge that is handed to him on a silver platter. With this knowledge the knowledge provided by necro-mancy-he wants to exercise power over others, to astonish and dazzle them, to be renowned the world over as a great magician. No amount of hard philosophical labor could ever possibly bring Faustus such power and fame.
5. Analyze Doctor Faustus in terms of the tragic flaw theory of character development.
Ans: The character of Doctor Faustus certainly coincides well with the tragic flaw theory of character development. From the opening lines, the reader already gets a sense that Faustus has an insatiable desire to attain knowledge which will confer power on him. His desire for this knowledge, particularly his view that he is entitled to it, is his tragic flaw. As his character develops, the reader is meant to understand the corruption that inevitably coincides with the pursuit of such knowledge, as well as the blindness to potential consequences.
The last lines of the play effectively summarize the lesson to be learned, a lesson which springs from the outcome of Faustus’s tragic flaw. He aspires to too much, and in doing so he gets what is rightfully his. An excess of anything becomes a bad thing. Faustus’s excess pride and intellectual curiosity ultimately consign him to hell.
6. Discuss the character of Doctor Faustus.
Ans: First, you need to observe Faustus in his element to be able to decipher him. He lived in 16th century (Renaissance) Europe. These were times when academia began to rebel against the accepted Medieval notion that everything, especially knowledge, is centered around God. Therefore, Marlowe wrote Faustus in times of philosophical and religious debate, and when people for the first time began to openly explore the supernatural as a way to think outside the parameters of the previous Medieval times. You will find that, as we discuss Faustus, he might very well be a product of his times, and a victim of his weaknesses.
Doctor Faustus himself:
Doctor Faustus is a complex, confused, and tragic protagonist whose extreme intelligence brought on to him both glory and doom. It brought him glory because his wit and brilliance made him famous and respected among his peers and in academia, even in the circle of magicians that he wanted to enter. But it brought him doom because his ego got too big for his own good, and led him to a stubborn battle against the conventions of the time under his own premise he was way ahead of everyone else.
Ultimately, his ego, stubbornness, ambition, and greed for more intelligence and power led him to make a pact with the devil for 24 years of service. The result of this was a waste of everything: his so-called intelligence, his life, and his soul. This clearly shows that Faustus was indeed intelligent, but blinded by ego: The ultimate example of the typical genius who is brilliant enough to do amazing things, but who cannot tap on common sense for the most basic. In the end, he wasted it all.
Faustus’ Tragedy:
He wasted his intelligence because, once he began to receive the powers and gifts of Lucifer, we can clearly see that he does not use them wisely, nor can think of productive ways to make use of them. Instead, he wastes them in silly and unnecessary feats such as poking tricks at the Pope, and summoning characters from history for no important reason.
He wasted his life because, throughout his adventures, we still cannot see a genuine, or ultimate purpose to his actions. We unveil a man who has a thick crust made of brains and wit, but inside this crust, he is ultimately empty. When his 24- year pact came to an end, he had had more than plenty of opportunities to repent and turn everything around. Yet, his personality was too egotistical, stubborn and nonsense to even come do that for his own good. In the end, he asks to burn his books in an ultimate demonstration of a life utterly wasted.
Faustus and his reality:
Like in the beginning, Faustus is a representation of the mind wandering outside the box and tapping onto sources for which it is not prepared, and guided exclusively by the same weakness that was, ironically, his strength: An intelligence he was not ready to absorb in full.
7. Dr. Faustus suffers because of his sins. Why does Hamlet suffer? What are his sins?
Ans: Hamlet suffers both as a result of his own flaw and as a result of other people’s sins. When the play begins, he is miserably unhappy because of the sudden death of his father as well as the hasty remarriage of his mother, Gertrude, to his father’s brother and Hamlet’s own uncle, Claudius. Then, he learns from his dead father’s ghost that it was actually Claudius, the new king and Hamlet’s new step-father, who murdered him. All of these circum-stances relate to other people’s sinful behavior, and they make him quite miserable.
However, Hamlet’s unhappiness is extended by the fact that he is so reticent to avenge his father’s death, as he’s been charged to do by the ghost; this isn’t really a sin, but his inability to act is a flaw. He spends almost the entirety of the play wondering how he could be so cowardly, but then he continues to do very little to actually exact his revenge. Even once he becomes convinced that Claudius really did kill his father, Hamlet stalls and does nothing of import until the final scene (when, really, he has to because he’s about to die, himself). His inability to act decisively is his major flaw, and it makes him very unhappy too.
8. How does Faustus represent the attractions and dangers inherent in sixteenth-century humanism?
Ans: The story of Faustus puts forward this question: what is holding humanity back? Faustus himself thinks that the confines of human thought and beliefs are too burdened by religion and human philosophy. At the start of the play, Faustus considers all the academic and spiritual pursuits of humankind, and determines that he desires more substantial knowledge-namely, unlimited knowledge, something that law, philosophy, and religion cannot provide.
Faustus turns to necromancy, the practice of raising the dead, as the only alternative that might provide him the power to desire. The main issue is that necromancy is forbidden by Christian teaching, and Faustus would have to abandon the Church if he were to engage in it. Faustus’s turn from not only the Church but also the traditional way of thinking (looking to authority for direction) is a clear indication that Faustus is a representation of the Renaissance and humanism.
Humanism was a system of philosophy grounded in the Renaissance ideals of individuality, the dominance of human reason, and a rejection of traditional institutions. Humanists, unlike many Christians, believed that humans, at their very core, were good, and that the idealization of humans was good. Ultimately, Faustus demonstrates that, despite the allure of placing humanity at the center of the universe, humanity is not perfect, and human nature is damned in its imperfection.
Faustus chooses to sell his soul to pursue knowledge. He says,
Philosophy is odious and obscure;
Both law and physic are for petty wits;
Divinity is basest of the three,
Unpleasant, harsh, contemptible, and vile:
‘Tis magic, magic, that hath ravish’d me.
Faustus looks at all the scholarship and learning of the past with disdain. He turns to new ways of learning, namely magic, to help him move beyond. Marlowe uses this quest for unlimited knowledge and power as a metaphor for the humanist pursuit of knowledge. Despite seeing humanity as ultimately good (and thus the pursuit of knowledge as good), Faustus is damned for his attempt to learn things that cannot be ascertained.
Despite selling his soul for unlimited knowledge, Faustus soon learns that even after selling his soul, he cannot know or do everything. He is not granted spectacular knowledge, and specific things, like understanding how the world was made, are denied explicitly to him. This denial of crucial knowledge points out the flaw in humanism. People are finite beings, trapped in the imminent frame, and human understanding cannot produce the transcendent. Ultimately, Faustus falls into the trap of believing that humans can perfect the pursuit trap of knowledge and learn everything. Marlowe shows that the idea of unlimited knowledge is folly, because humans are ultimately flawed and damned to imperfection.
9. In regards to Doctor Faustus, how does Christopher Marlowe view human nature?
Ans: It is hard to say what Christopher Marlowe thought about human nature because his life was short and we have so little to go on, much of which is still conjecture. However, we can surmise a few things from the way he lived. He was in clandestine government service for Queen Elizabeth I; he was in a lot of fights; he was a traitor and gold coin counterfeiter; he was accused of other crimes; a warrant was issued for his arrest; there is much controversy surrounding his death; and he was the first to use blank verse in English poetry after translating Latin poetry.
Christopher Marlowe was a successful scholar who studied history and theology, though his studies were interrupted for a protracted period of time for what is believed to be clandestine service as a spy. He had a volatile temper and was accused of murder on two occasions, though the Queen released him both times. He was caught in the Netherlands making counterfeit coins, which is a treasonous offense. His personal life stirred up as much controversy as his public life because he was suspected of conversion to outlawed Catholicism, of heresy, and of unacceptable sexual orientation.
His death is a mystery. Some believed it was faked by one branch of Elizabeth’s government to keep him safe from another branch. He is said to have gotten in a quarrel with a man after dining with him and was supposedly fatally stabbed in the eye. Some accounts say the fight occurred in either a tavern or a “spy safe house.”
From all this, it is possible to co lecture that Marlowe held a low opinion of human nature and that he thought human nature was a disposable entity. He may have engaged in clandestine and criminal activities because he believed, like Dr. Faustus, that power was the beginning and end of life. But on the other hand, he was the originator of English drama and the first to use blank verse in English poetry after having translated Latin blank verse to English. This implies a belief in higher beauties because, during the Elizabethan age of the Renaissance, poetry was believed to be an imitation of the truths of God. In many ways Christopher Marlowe parallels the value system of Dr. Faustus, except that Faustus craved unlimited knowledge and it looks like Marlowe may have craved unlimited power.
10. What are some of the similarities between Doctor Faustus, Richard III, and Macbeth?
Ans: What a great question! These are three very deep and rich texts you are comparing, but I would say the most clear comparison we can draw between them lies in the way that each of these three characters pledge themselves to evil and how the rest of the play charts their inexorable descent into perdition. Perhaps this is most clearly shown in the character of Doctor Faustus, who makes a literal pact with the devil ensuring the loss of his soul after a period of time. The rest of the play therefore shows the panic of Faustus as he realises that, however much power he has and whatever he is able to do, that power is not his own and only brings his eternal damnation that much closer
If we consider the characters of Richard and Macbeth, we can see something similar. Both are characters who deliberately engage in evil acts in order to gain temporal power in exchange for sacrificing eternal salvation. This decision is made early on in the plays, and the rest of the action shows how they continue to mire themselves in sin after sin. Note in particular this famous quote from Macbeth from Act III scene 4 that describes his state:
I am in blood Stepp’d in so far, that, should I wade no more, Returning was as tedious as go o’er.
Macbeth identifies that he is so guilty now that it would be just as hard to try and go back as it would to carry on, so he might as well carry on.
These three plays therefore present us with characters who effectively damn themselves at the beginning of the play and then end approaches. They consolidate that salvation for temporal power, and are shown to be worse off for this exchange.
11. What is the difference between the A text and B text of Doctor Faustus?
Ans: During the Elizabethan period, playwrights rarely, if ever had control over the editing and publication of their work, and clearly not in the case of Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus, which was first published long after its author’s death in 1593. Thus, scholarly disputes have often arisen over which version of a given text is the most authentic or authoritative.
The earliest surviving version of “Doctor Faustus” is the A. text, published in 1604, followed by the so-called B-text, in 1616. While the latter version is about one-third longer than its predecessor, the A-text is considered to be the more authentic, due to stylistic and orthographic idiosyncrasies recognized as Marlowe’s It’s now widely accepted that the added scenes and lines of the B-text are the the work of other hands, commissioned by theater manager Philip Henslowe.
Despite its authenticity, one anomaly of the A-text is that some scenes mistakenly run together, ignoring obvious time lapses, so are usually rearranged for performance. Among the differences of the B-text: the anti-Catholicism of the play is emphasized by the lengthening of Faustus’ scene at the papal court, his parley with the skeptical Knight is also longer, and the malevolent antics of the various demons have multiplied.
In sum, the main difference between the A and B texts of Doctor Faustus is that the former version is the more authoritative of the two.
12. How does Faustus negotiate with his own soul?
Ans: The key passage to look at in order to examine this is the closing soliloquy of the play where the bell tolls signifying one hour until Faustus is taken to hell. Even at this incredibly late period in his life, as he approaches damnation, Faustus is still attempting to procrastinate and to delude himself, asking his soul to ‘the this hour be but/A year, a month, a week, a natural day.
He is in the perverse theological position of knowing that, if he offers his repentance sincerely, he is in a position to ‘repent and save his soul but even as he utters this speech, he narrates it in the third person, referring to himself as Faustus as a form of rhetorical distancing of himself from the situation that he has created. One might understand this to be simple delusion or distancing himself from his situation. However, one might also read it as a sign of Faustus’s perverse academic interest even at the point of his own damnation, that he still wishes to see what happens, that this is a form of metaphysical experiment for him and he views himself from a distance as he can’t really repent because he wishes to see what will happen to his soul.
Faustus does not, indeed, believe the evidence of his own eyes when he sees ‘Christ’s blood’ in ‘the firmament’, even knowing that ‘One drop of blood will save me’. This is, perhaps, a hallucination at the point of death or, perhaps, a sion to the sacrament of the eucharist and the saving blood of Christ which he cannot freely receive as he cannot sincerely repent before reception. This results in the blood disappearing (“Where is it now?”) for it is only an illusion to a man who cannot repent. Thus, the bargain with his soul that he is able to repent at any moment and thus gain salvation is one that in his final moments, he realises he cannot fulfil.
Indeed, so complete is his realisation of this inability to repent that he asks the ‘Mountains and hills’ to fall upon him in order that he can be hidden from the ‘heavy wrath of heaven’ However, God is powerless to intervene if he cannot exercise his free will to repent his sins. He craves divine influence to assist him and allow ‘my soul to mount’ and, indeed, wished to bargain once more even with the devil that he might ‘Impose some end on my incessant pain’ the contradiction here (i.e. to create an ‘end’ to the ‘incessant) is used to demonstrate his predicament, that he has nothing left to bargain with but his soul. Indeed, he wishes even to become a beast rather than a man at this point, believing, according to the accounts of ‘Pythagoras’ metempsychosis’ that the souls of animals are ‘dissolved in elements’ unlike his own.
However, his problem once more here is that he cannot divorce himself from a questioning intellect that, even at the hour of his doom, cannot realise his predicament and act sincerely but instead has to seek theological loopholes. He cannot become a beast quite simply because he is human, and has an intellect which, rather than being pure and simple like that of an animal, is questioning and inquiring.
Even at the moment of his being dragged to hell, Faustus still takes no responsibility for his actions or sincerely repents, asking his soul to be ‘changed into small water drops’ that might ‘fall into the ocean’ in order to avoid capture and, when this does not work, his final words are the claim that he will, finally, divorce himself from his intellect (I’ll burn my books’) but, at this point, the bargain that he has made proves too late and, where he mig might have performed this act and repented sincerely, he has left his negotiations too late and his soul is torn from a body that is ‘torn asunder by the hand of death’.
13. How does Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus compare to Shelley’s Frankenstein?
Ans: Both Christopher Marlowe’s play Doctor Faustus and Mary Shelley’s novel Frankenstein treat some of the same themes, specifically the question of intellectual pride. In Doctor Faustus, the title character, after seeking power in the knowledge available in the normal courses of study (philosophy, theology, natural philosophy, et al.), makes a bargain with Mephistopheles, a representative of the devil. According to this bargain, Doctor Faustus would have access to the forbidden knowledge of magic, the only kind of knowledge that grants him power for the period of 24 years. Doctor Faustus feels that he deserves to have this knowledge; he expresses no gratitude for having it.
The power that Doctor Faustus has as a result of this bargain is literally the power to shape the world to alter God’s creation. He even goes so far as to alter the course of the river Rhine. In Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, the title character seeks comparable knowledge. In the search for that knowledge, he displays the same kind of intellectual pride that Doctor Faustus does. In successfully reanimating human tissue, Frankenstein assumes the power of God to create life. Ultimately, like Doctor Faustus, Frankenstein alters God’s creation.
The respective demises of the two characters serve as warnings to the readers. Doctor Faustus squanders his “power,” and in the last lines of the play, finally expresses regret for what he has done, going so far as to warn the reader to heed his example. Fran-kenstein, in a very similar way, is made to regret his presumption, as his creation kills him. His pride, or the result of that pride, punishes him.
14. How is God portrayed in Doctor Faustus by Marlowe?
Ans: As to how God is portrayed, some critics say that Faustus confuses the Old Testament representation of a vengeful God with the New Testament merciful God and fails to seek forgiveness because of this confusion. Other critics hold that this position isn’t supported in the text. Faustus’s conversations with the Old Man indicate a clear understanding and portrayal of Christ as the emissary of a merciful, forgiving God. Further, Faustus’s last speech portrays God clearly as a loving God who is ever present with the offer of forgiveness.
FAUSTUS. See, see, where Christ’s blood streams in the firmament!
One drop would save my soul, half a drop: ah, my Christ!-
Ah, rend not my heart for naming my Christ!
Yet will I call on him: O, spare me, Lucifer!
Where is it now? ’tis gone: and see, where God
Stretcheth out his arm, and bends his ireful brows!
What keeps Faustus from seeking forgiveness is not a portrayal of God as vengeful but the other portrayal, the one of Lucifer, that is reflected in the same quote above: “[Lucifer, ah], rend not my heart for naming of my Christ!” What stops Faustus is the torment begun by Mephistophilis, begun even while Faustus is still alive and promised for after he is dead.
MEPHIST. Thou traitor, Faustus, I arrest thy soul
For disobedience to my sovereign lord:
Revolt, or I’ll in piece-meal tear thy flesh.
FAUSTUS…. God, whom Faustus hath blasphemed! Ah, my God, I would weep! But the devil draws in my tears. Gush forth blood, instead of tears! yea, life and soul! O, he stays my tongue! I would lift up my hands; but see, they hold them, they hold them!
The portrayal of God by the Old Man, the Three Scholars and the Good Angel offers an easier way of determining how God is portrayed since their portrayals are less confusing than the meta-physical interchanges between Faustus and Mephisto.
Scholars: They portray God as having limitless mercies and an unlimited readiness to forgive where forgiveness is sought.
SECOND SCHOLAR. Yet, Faustus, look up to heaven, remem-ber God’s mercies are infinite.
Old Man: He portrays God in a way that accords with and expands upon the Scholars portrayal. He declares God is offering His grace to Faustus and is ready to give it freely. All that is required is a contrite heart and tears of repentance
OLD MAN. I see an angel hovers o’er thy head, And, with a vial full of precious grace,
Offers to pour the same into thy soul:
Good Angel: The Good Angel is the bearer of the message of sin and blasphemy to Faustus. Later though, the Angel promises God’s pity and mercy
GOOD ANGEL. And heap God’s heavy wrath upon thy head! … that is blasphemy! Faustus, repent, yet God will pity thee
15. What did Doctor Faustus want in Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus?
Ans: The question of what Doctor Faustus wanted is critical to understanding whether his plan failed or succeeded and, in correlation, whether the price he paid was worth the gain he procured. This, by extension, is critical to understanding Marlowe’s central thematic point in Doctor Faustus.
In Act I, Scene i, Faustus is debating with himself over what field of knowledge to make a life practice of Settle thy studies, Faustus, and begin.
To sound the depth of that thou wilt profess [teach/practice] One by one, he rejects every field of knowledge from “divinity” (religion) to “physic” (medicine) and every field in between. What he finally decides upon is the metaphysics of magicians,
And necromantic books [of]
Lines, circles, scenes, letters, and characters;
A sound magician is a mighty god:
Here, Faustus, tire thy brains to gain a deity. In the entire passage, Faustus reveals that what he wants most along with “a world of profit,… of power, … of omnipotence, “command” over all that “moves between the quiet poles” of Earth: and “dominion” that exceeds that of “emperors and kings”-is to be “a mighty god” as he uses his “brains to gain a deity” [divinity] In other words, Faustus wants knowledge and power that exceeds the bounds of humankind’s natural limitations; knowledge and power that rivals the most exalted of the cosmos. The answer to what Faustus wants is compared to what he ultimately receives, true understanding of his story may be gained.
16. How could one interpret Doctor Faustus from Christopher Marlowe’s play of the same name as a tragic hero?
Ans: A tragic hero is one who has both good and bad qualities, but inevitably allows their negative qualities to cause their downfall. The literary term for this fatal flaw is “hamartia.”
While Faustus seems to be content utilizing his newfound knowledge and power to cause havoc and amuse the upper echelons of society, he did originally have more noble intentions. Before he obtained the power, he wanted to have spirits “fly to India for gold” and “Ransack the ocean for orient pearl” (Marlowe). He then wanted to use the money to hire mercenaries, build a wall of brass around Germany, and free them from the Prince of Parma. Faustus also imagined he would have demons read him unknown philosophy, which could have made him a better leader and expanded his knowledge of the universe.
Faustus also wanted to “fill the public schools with silk” (Marlowe). This was probably figurative silk, meaning great teachers, teaching materials, and all of the knowledge he had obtained. If it was literal silk, it would have been an expensive fabric that teachers and students in public schools would have been unaccustomed to. Either way, Faustus’ vision was for education to be of the utmost importance.
His hamartia, however, was selfish. All of his noble plans went by the wayside as soon as he gained power. He spent his 24 years with knowledge that could have ended world hunger, war, and the overreaching of the Catholic Church, but used it instead to gain favor by amusing royalty and playing practical jokes. At one point, he turns invisible and harasses the pope at a banquet, taking his food and striking him. If he really had a quarrel with the Catholic Church, he could have used all of his knowledge and power to put t an end to it, instead of just playing practical jokes.
The renaissance view is that Faustus was heroic because he sought knowledge forbidden to men by God and the Church. In a time when knowledge of the world and of oneself was a pursuit, no knowledge should have been off limits. noble
Since Faustus did originally have some good intentions, and sought knowledge, he could have been a hero; however, he disregarded all of the good he could have done for his personal amusement, making him a tragic hero.
17. What are some religious issues associated with Chris-topher Marlowe’s play Doctor Faustus?
Ans: Religious issues of various kinds play very important roles in Christopher Marlowe’s play Doctor Faustus.
Among those issues are the following:
As the prologue makes clear, Faustus is highly trained “In heavenly matters of theology” (19). He has studied not only the Bible but numerous commentaries on the Bible, and thus he has little excuse for his later irreligious behavior in the play.
Religion is one of the many kinds of studies Faustus explicitly rejects in the opening scene of the play. Rather than continuing to study religion and devote himself to God, Faustus turns aside from religion as a way of life and as a focus of his thinking (1.38-48). In the process of rejecting religion, Faustus misquotes the Bible. If he does so deliberately, his behavior is shocking. If he does so because he doesn’t know the Bible well, his behavior is still shocking. By making Faustus learned in religion, Marlowe makes Faustus all the more responsible for his misconduct.
When Mephastophilis, a devil, appears, seemingly in response to Faustus’s summons, Faustus finds this devil “too ugly” Faustus’s servant. Faustus therefore commands the devil,
Go and return an old Franciscan friar,
That holy shape becomes the devil ‘s best. (25-26)
This comment suggests another way in which religion figures in this play: the play is full of references to the conflicts during the sixteenth century between Catholics and Protestants. This split within the Christian religion was one of the most important events in the whole history of Christendom, and Marlowe deals with the issues quite explicitly.
Faustus’s decision to commit his soul to the devil is the most crucial way in which religion plays a part in this play. Faustus behaves in ways that are foolish and impious, and he does so in a spirit of enormous pride the root of all sin, according to contemporary Christians.
Yet another way in which religion is emphasized in this play involves the appearance of the Seven Deadly Sins themselves (5.278ff).
Faustus’s final speech (13.57ff) is full of religious implications Thus, he claims that he must be “damned perpetually” (59) although he never actually asks God for forgiveness. Although Faustus sees a vision of God that might inspire him to repent, his attempt to call out for mercy only leads him to ask for mercy, ironically, from Lucifer (73). Faustus seeks to hide from the “heavy wrath of God,” although he should know that such hiding is impossible (77). Faustus suggests that God may choose not to have mercy on Faustus’s soul, although Faustus never actually asks for such mercy (89). Throughout this final speech, Faustus wastes precious time and reveals an astonishing ignorance of standard Christian theology.
As the play ends, the Chorus reminds us that Faustus’s “hellish fall” is relevant to the lives of everyone, including the audience Thus religion is emphasized literally up until the very last line of the play, which warns against practicing “more than heavenly power permits” (8).
In short, there is hardly a line in Doctor Faustus that is not relevant to religious issues in one way or another. Marlowe’s original audience would have been especially alert to the manifold religious implications of this play.
18. Compare and contrast Christopher Marlowe’s play Doctor Faustus with the medieval morality play Everyman. How is Marlowe’s doctor more complex?
Ans: The title character in Christopher Marlowe’s play Doctor Faustus is more complex than the title character in the medieval morality play Everyman in a number of ways, including the following:
Faustus is very well educated, whereas Everyman apparently is not. Faustus’s education makes his involvement with the devil even more blameworthy than Everyman’s sins. Faustus’s education should have made him know better than to sell his soul to Satan.
In particular, Faustus has studied theology, whereas Everyman’s knowledge of the teachings of the church seems to be quite rudimentary.
Faustus actively chooses to consort with evil and to embrace it, whereas Everyman seems (at first) largely ignorant of his shortcomings.
Faustus actively chooses evil, whereas Everyman’s main failing seems to be an insufficient number of good deeds.
Faustus is warned by Mephastophilis about the selling his soul to Satan, but he chooses dangers of ignoring such warnings Everyman, in contrast, responds almost immediately and positively to the teachings he receives, from Death as well as from other characters.
At the end of Doctor Faustus, the title character cannot seem to decide how to behave. He feels tempted to ask for God’s help but never really does. He is extremely conflicted. In contrast, by the end of Everksman the title character has fully embraced his good deeds and walks into the grave with her without hesitation and indeed with real anticipation and joy. Every man has learned his lessons well; Doctor Faustus, in contrast, never expresses genuine or deep regret for the evil he has chosen.
Ironically, Doctor Faustus is the more complex of the two characters (especially intellectually), but in some ways he is also the more obviously foolish and stupid.
19. Discuss Doctor Faustus as a morality play.
Ans: While the Renaissance period play Doctor Faustus has some characteristics of a Medieval val period Morality Play, it has some striking and significant differences that remove it from the genre of morality play. Marlowe constructed Faustus as an Aristotelian tragedy intended to inspire fear and pity. Audiences feel fear of the situation and pity for Faustus, whom Marlowe characterizes as a complex sympathetic character who develops and does not remain static. This points out two important differences between this and a morality play. A morality play (1) is intended to teach the difference between virtue and sin; between good and evil. A morality play (2) has allegorical characters who are named for what they allegorically represent (e.g., Everyman, Pride, Angel, Fear) and who are therefore static having character development. no
One similar characteristic between Faustus and a morality play is the themes of sin and redemption, though Faustus does not personify Sin and Redemption as a morality play would do. Another similarity is the presence of a Good Angel and an Evil Angel and various Devils, yet these are specific characters with specific relationships or functions in Faustus’ struggles; they are not allegorical personifications.
Another similar characteristic is the presence of the Seven Deadly Sins, who appear as devils dancing for Faustus (Marlowe changed to this from the devil’s pageant in the original 1592 English translation Faust Chapbook), and the presence of the Devil as Mephistophilis against whom Faustus struggles even while collaborating with him. Yet both of these are related to the plot and plot development instead of to the morality message as in a morality play.
[Exeunt the SEVEN DEADLY SINS.]
LUCIFER. Now, Faustus, how dost thou like this? FAUSTUS. O, this feeds my soul!
LUCIFER. Tut, Faustus, in hell is all manner of delight.
FAUSTUS. O, might I see hell, and return again,
How happy were I then!
LUCIFER. Thou shalt; I will send for thee at midnight.
20. Discuss Doctor Faustus as a tragedy.
Ans: Understanding of Christopher Marlowe’s Elizabethan tragedy, Dr. Faustus, can be framed in terms of the Renaissance philosophy and the Elizabethan tragedy, which takes a different tum on some points from the Aristotelian tragedy, for instance such as the Elizabethan tragedy’s requisite death of the tragic hero. Dr. Faustus demonstrates the Renaissance philosophy that pits the dichotomy of good, angelic humanity against evil, depraved humanity. Marlowe’s play also is a model of the Elizabethan tragedy,
Marlowe constructed the character of Dr. Faustus to represent within himself both characteristics of the Renaissance view of humanity as divinely good and hellishly evil. First, Dr. Faustus is presented as a scholar of all things including divinity, the highest Renaissance scholarly discipline. Then, Faustus is shown as dissatisfied with the limitations of humanity and grasping for unlimited knowledge, which is a Biblical allusion to Adam and Eve who ate of the Tree of Knowledge. Throughout the play, Faustus descends to lower and lower planes of knowledge in his pursuit for the “power” and “omnipotence” that comes from knowledge.
At the beginning, Mephistopheles answers all Faustus’ questions but draws the line on talk of the universe, which can be seen to stand for astronomical and cosmological studies-the very studies that science is deeply involved in today: CERN; Hubble; SoHo; etc). Faustus must be content with merely mapping the universe instead of understanding it. Marlowe ultimately shows in Dr. Faustus the futility of the quest for ultimate knowledge and the inevitable end result of abandoning moral integrity for omnipotent knowledge.
Dr. Faustus also represents a Classic Elizabethan tragedy. First, the tragic hero has a flaw or makes an error in judgment that leads to his own doom. It’s hard to say whether Faustus had a fatal flaw in his character or whether he was doomed by a faulty understand-ing that led to a fatally disastrous error in judgment. All along the way, Faustus has doubts and hesitations which speak for an integrity of his moral character. If he has a fatal flaw, it might be that he did not reckon the power of evil highly enough, that he thought that with omnipotent knowledge, he could free himself from the chains of evil he wrapped so blithely around himself.
Adam and Eve also fell to the punishment from the lure of knowledge. Of course, quite often Faustus’ fatal flaw is said to be greed and irreverent disregard for goodness. One clue to forming a literary stance on the question lies in examining his hesitations and second thoughts.
21. Discuss Doctor Faustus as a typical Renaissance Man.
Ans: Renaissance man is a modern term, first found in the written word in the early 1900s, that stands for an individual who is proficient in many fields and endeavors of knowledge, at times rivaling the proficiency of experts. The concept is based, however, on the great thinkers of the 1300s and 1400s who were masters of a vast number of fields of knowledge. The prime example of this sort of master is Leonardo da Vinci whose notebooks and art works show that he excelled in many divergent fields of knowledge.
Doctor Faustus, of the legend and of Marlowe’s drama, was similarly proficient in every field of academic knowledge open at the time. He mastered such areas as divinity, law, economy, and mathematics. When Marlowe’s play opens, Faustus is debating which field to cling to:
Settle thy studies, Faustus, and begin To sound the depth of that thou wilt profess: The end of the debate is that he will deepen his knowledge of the art of magic and summon demons to do his bidding and give him the unlimited power he covets. Thus he will add one more area of proficiency to his breadth of knowledge.
A sound magician is a mighty god: Here, Faustus, tire thy brains to gain a deity. From the descriptions above, it is clear that Doctor Faustus does indeed fit both the concept of a man of learning living during the 14th and 15th centuries as well as fit the modern construct of the Renaissance man.
22. Discuss Doctor Faustus as a Renaissance play.
Ans: This play cannot be viewed as solely being about the Renaissance age. Rather, Marlow presents the clash of Renaissance values and medieval values in this play and through the person of Doctor Faustus. The Renaissance was a movement that began roughly in the 15th century and replaced the medieval worldview with its insistence of God being at the centre of the world and mankind and nature being dependent on God. Instead, the Renaissance worldview celebrated the individual and what could be achieved through science and learning.
Faustus is definitely shown to be a man who captures the spirit of the Renaissance in his self-aggrandising and arrogant speech in Act I scene 1. In turn Faustus dismisses the various examples of tradition and authority, eventually declaring his determination to accept no limits on his learning and the power-he hopes to gain through his magic:
O, what a world of profit and delight,
Of power, of honour, and omnipotence,
Is promis’d to the studious artizan!
Note the way Faustus sees study and rational inquiry as the way to gaining “profit and delight” and “omnipotence.” God is displaced as mankind’s hunger for power and ambition takes centre stage. Ultimately, however, as Act V clearly demonstrates, Faustus has to acknowledge the ultimate supremacy of God and that he has overreached himself, representing the failure of the Renaissance age in terms of its inability to realise that it went too far in placing the emphasis on the potential inherent in humans. The play therefore does present the audience with an epitome of the Renaissance ideal in the character of Doctor Faustus, but it does this as part of a wider conflict between Renaissance and medieval values that ultimately shows the dangers of the Renaissance worldview.
23. Discuss Marlowe’s Dr. Faustus as a morality play.
Ans: It is important first to understand the purpose of a morality play:
This type of play essentially depicted a battle between the forces of good and evil in the human soul.
A dramatic descendant of mystery and miracle plays of the medieval period, a morality play’s purpose was to allegorically point out good and evil, and the dangers mankind faced in participating in sinful behaviors, and to highlight the cost of pursuing such immoral actions.
In Marlowe’s Dr. Faustus, Faustus (a great scholar) grows bored with life, believing he has learned all he can of this world. So he summons Mephistopheles to make a deal with Lucifer to sell his soul to the devil for twenty-four years of service from Lucifer’s demon. He tells Mephistopheles:
I charge thee wait upon me whilst I live,
To do whatever Faustus shall command… (1.i.38-39) Even in the face of Mephistopheles’ warnings of his experiences of hell…
Why this is hell, nor am I out of it:
Think’st thou that I who saw the face of God,
And tasted the eternal joys of Heaven,
Am not tormented with ten thousand hells,
In being deprived of everlasting bliss? (81-84)
…and Faustus’ own misgivings, he goes ahead and makes his deal with Lucifer. In this one section, several things are highlighted: mankind’s inherent temptations, its natural goodness and wisdom that try to guard against committing grave sins, and mankind’s persistence to have what it wants rather than pursue the more difficult path to fight that which it knows to be dangerous and/or wrong. Another concept comes from Mephistopheles: that hell is being absent from the presence of God and the glories of Heaven.
The story continues to describe Faustus’ pursuits. He learns (as does the audience) of the “seven deadly sins,” or sins that were seen by the Catholic Church as wrongdoings that could lead to eternal damnation, including: wrath, greed, sloth (laziness), pride, Just, envy and gluttony.
By the story’s end, Faustus’ time (the twenty-four years) have come to an end. Still there seems to be opportunity for Faustus to repent and he has no doubt what lies ahead if he does not. However, he is so far removed from a state of grace (good-standing with God) that he says there is no hope for him, and he doesn’t even bother to try:
But Faustus’ offences can never be pardoned: the serpent that tempted Eve may be saved, but not Faustus.
The Third Scholar (as do others) tells Faustus to “call on God.” But Faustus replies:
On God, whom Faustus hath abjured! on God, whom Faustus hath blasphemed! Ah, my God, I would weep, but the Devil draws in my tears.
The scholars learn of Faustus’ deal with Lucifer and ask him why he did not ask them to pray for him. He notes that Lucifer threatened “to tear me to pieces if I named God,” but certainly his fate when Lucifer takes him will not be any better: it seems just another excuse which is yet another human character flaw in Faustus. He does not assume responsibility for his actions; he lacks faith; and, he does not believe in the power of God over evil.
Faustus rejects theology because of a misunderstanding of the relationship between divine justice and Christian mercy.
This is a morality play in that it uses Faustus’ story and his fate to warn others of what will happen if they follow his immoral behaviors, and commit sins against God.
24. In Christopher Marlowe’s play Dr. Faustus, is Faustus a doomed cypher in a morality play, or a tragic Renaissance hero?
Ans: In Christopher Marlowe’s play Dr. Faustus, the title character comes closer to being a figure of tragedy rather than a doomed cypher in a morality play. Faustus certainly does not seem “doomed” in the sense that his fate is predetermined or unaffected by choices he freely makes. In fact, Marlowe seems to go out of his way, repeatedly, to show Faustus making such free choices, often against the best advice of those who attempt to counsel him.
In this sense, Marlowe’s play seems relevant to W. H. Auden’s famous distinction between ancient Greek tragedy and Christian tragedy:
“Greek Tragedy is the tragedy of necessity; i.e., the feeling aroused in the spectator is ‘What a pity it had to be this way.
Christian tragedy is the tragedy of possibility, “What a pity it was this way when it might have been otherwise.”
The fact that Faustus has many opportunities to make choices is emphasized throughout the play. Examples include the following Lines 20 and especially 27 of the Prologue emphasize his free choices.
His free choices are also emphasized in the following lines from the opening scene: 10, 14, 27, 36, 37, 48, 52, 63. In all these instances, Faustus considers various options, rejecting most of them, until he finally decides to choose to pursue black magic. The fact that he continually contemplates different courses of behavior before finally settling on the worst possible choice makes it absolutely clear that Faustus is responsible for his own behavior.
Later, when he summons Mephastophilis, Faustus rejects even the sound advice of this devil, who is very personally and intimately familiar with the sufferings of hell. Mephastophilis urges him,
O Faustus, leave these frivolous demands,
Which strikes a terror to my fainting soul. (scene 3, lines 81- 82)
Faustus, however, is too proud (and too stupid) to take this intelligent counsel. Once again Marlowe stresses that Faustus is entirely responsible for his own choices and thus for his own “fate.”
Later, an old man also tries to dissuade Faustus from continuing his foolish and potentially tragic behavior. Faustus ultimately asks Mephastophilis to torment the old man, an evil course of action that even the devil himself had not thought of pursuing until Faustus demanded it (scene 12, lines 66-68). Once more, Faustus’s free will is emphasized.
Finally, throughout the final scene, Faustus continually rejects the opportunity to repent. He continually claims that he “must be damned” (59), but nothing could be less true. He has repeated chances to repent, right up until his last moment, but he fails to act on any of them.
Faustus’s responsibility for his own tragedy is emphasized by the Chorus in the Epilogue when the Chorus says, “Cut is the branch that might have grown full straight” (1). Even in the very final lines of the Chorus’s comments, Faustus’s freedom of choice is implied.
One way to interpret Faustus is to argue that he is not so much a tragic figure as he is a figure in a dark, bitter, sardonic, black comedy of his own invention. Faustus often seems less a tragic hero than a fool who deliberately misuses his great intelligence.
25. What is the main theme of Dr. Faustus?
Ans: A major theme of the play is the sin of excessive ambition. Faustus, a clever scholar, wants too much; he seeks to gain knowledge and power beyond normal human limits. In the end, he cannot be allowed to do this; although he enjoys a brief ascendancy, he is ultimately consigned to hell and everlasting punishment, literally dragged offstage by devils. His final words, at the end of a long and despairing soliloquy, rise to sheer agony:
My God, my god, look not so fierce on me! Adders and serpents, let me breath awhile!
Ugly hell, gape not! Come not, Lucifer!
I’ll burn my books!
Faustus thus vainly entreats the dark powers not to claim him, and attempts to renounce his sin ‘I’ll burn my books!! It was his overweening desire for knowledge that has brought him to this pitiable and tragic end. Now he repents of it but only when it is far too late. He has to pay for daring ‘to practise more than heavenly power permits, as the Chorus solemnly pronounces in the very last lines of the play.
In his vaunting ambition, Faustus resembles other Marlovian protagonists such as Tamburlaine, the historical conqueror who built a great empire, and Barnabas, the title figure of The Jew of Malta, who aspires to unlimited wealth.
26. Who is the hero of Dr Faustus? Who is the hero of Dr Faustus?
Ans: Dr. Faustus, believe it or not, can be categorized as a hero, only he would be a Tragic Hero.
He is a hero because, as all heroes denote, they are born with unique qualities, amazing potential, immense power and a wealth of knowledge. However, a TRAGIC hero uses all these innate elements to destroy himself, and make his life miserable.
In the case of Faustus, here we have a superbly intelligent scholar with tremendous influence among the academic community. He has a talent for arts, music, everything. He has a great job, he lectures, teaches, travels…he is the epitome of the Renaissance man: One who can do it all.
Yet, he completely overrules all these great qualities and opts for aspiring to “have it all” through becoming a magician. An illusionist that could bring about anything he ever thought of…but..for what reason exactly? He didn’t even know himself!
He wandered through life, and even made that ridiculous pact with the devil, also not knowing exactly why, until he finally died in fear, loneliness and misery. If anyone was a winner, it was the devil himself. Faustus was also victorious: Victorious in ending his quest of destroying his life.
Hence, here we have the typical tragic hero tale of a man too big for himself, and too smart for any capacity of common sense
27. What is the importance of studying Dr. Faustus?
Ans: As other postings on this question acknowledge, discuss. Being of absolute importance is impossible. Why does anyone need to study or know anything in particular?
If we move out of that merely self-serving pragmatism of “how will I use this in my real life” thinking then we can look at the play as a cultural artifact, the knowledge of which adds cultural value to those who know it.
On a purely pragmatic level there, knowing the works that are considered part of the concept of “Great Books” allows one to garner a certain amount of social capital. One knows things that other people think are important, and the people around the world that have gathered lists of important titles are often influential in other ways (arguing which lists is another matter). But to know as much as one can about what other people know pulls the curtain back on certain assumptions. The English Renaissance, Christopher Marlowe, and Dr. Faustus tend to make a lot of those lists of titles that indicate social capital.
Because the play holds that place, it has influenced other thinkers. It is often the case that we don’t know how much we don’t know or how much we miss in culture until we learn a new word or new artifact. Only once we have that piece in our repertoire do we see how often if is used. The Faustus archetype is common from the reuse of the full blown story to the phrase “sell one’s soul to the devil.” These later allusions work like hyperlinks, if one has them in one’s mind, one is able to access more relevance. Even The Simpson’s devoted an episode to the story.
If one wants to think about less mercenary uses of the work and explore its value on its own merit, the play is incredibly interesting as a meditation of death and free will. If one is interested in aesthetics, Marlowe is the playwright who most contributed to creating a theatrical tradition that would produce Shakespeare. Marlowe’s “mighty line” is the sound of English heroism, his overreaching protagonists are the template for Western notions of ambition, his irony is the irony of postmodernism, his jokes are both lewd and erudite. Marlowe wrote better than almost anyone in the history of English theater, and knowing how he did that can be a source of great pleasure.
If one cares about history, this play hits hard at the core issues of its (and our own) day: metaphysical uncertainty, religious discord, human mortality, and fear of the afterlife. He wrote in a time when the world was becoming unmistakably modern but still felt the vestiges of the old ways of thinking.
Few people would make the case that Dr. Faustus is the most important play, but few who know the history of modern thinking would find the play too far down the list. Staged well, it is also a lot of fun to see.
28. What do you think is the cause of the tragedy in Doctor Faustus?
Ans: The tragedy that befalls Doctor Faustus is ultimately caused by what the ancient Greeks called hubris, or overweening pride. Faustus is profoundly dissatisfied with life. He’s an excep-tionally intelligent man, a polymath with a genuine hunger for knowledge. Yet he feels frustrated with the limits of mere human knowledge; he wants to do more; he wants to have magic powers. This gaping void at the heart of Faustus’s intellectual life makes him vulnerable to corruption by the devil. So desperate is Faustus to practice the black arts that he agrees to sell his immortal soul to Lucifer in exchange for twenty-four years of Mephistopheles’s service.
Faustus’s pride will simply not allow him to accept that he’s just a human being, with all the necessary limitations that that involves. By engaging in sorcery he hopes to turn himself into some kind of super-human, almost a god. And though he knows what he’s doing is fundamentally wrong, he still does it anyway. His overweening pride, his hubris, is too strong for him to turn back and repent of his sins. A man of great intelligence has overreached himself, and the consequences for his immortal soul are catastrophic in the extreme.
29. What is the significance of Faustus’ blood congealing in Doctor Faustus?
Ans: “My blood congeals and I can write no more”.
Thus speaks Faustus, on trying to sign his contract with the devil, which Mephistopheles has told him already, has to be signed in blood. The second time, Mephistopheles brings fire to dissolve the blood and allow him to sign, but not before Faustus has considered the congealed blood as an ominous sign:
What might the staying of my blood portend?
Is it unwilling I should write this bill?
Why streams it not that I may write afresh?
Faustus gives to thee his soul.
Ah, there it stay’d. Why shouldn’t you?
Is not thy soul thine own? Then write again.
Faustus gives to thee his soul.
Is it a scary moment designed to warn Faustus at the last moment before it’s too late? Who knows what to think of it – but it’s a significant moment in the play: it marks the last chance Faustus has to go back on the deal.
30. What are the various stages of Doctor Faustus damnation in Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus?
Ans: This is a large question for a limited format. I can give an overview of the first and last stages of Faustus’s damnation. The first stage began when Faustus was “swoln with cunning, of a self-conceit” after having mastered all studies and sciences of his era. Undoubtedly, Faustus had a great and extraordinary mind used, again undoubtedly, for the wrong aims. Being “glutted now with learning’s golden gifts,” Faustus, based upon a real Doctor Johann Faust (1488), turned his considerable mental powers to magic, sorcery, “necromancy”:
CHORUS: He surfeits [overindulges] upon cursed necromancy; Nothing so sweet as magic is to him,
Which he prefers:
Faustus’s reason for this gorging on magic is that he desires things beyond the scope of humanity. He desires power over all things of earth;he desires deity (to be a god), which is ironic because (1) desiring to be like God is what caused Lucifer to be cast out of heaven to start with and (2) compared to the pantheon of gods, Faustus would be insignificant as a god. This was the beginning stage of his damnation.
FAUSTUS: All things that move between the quiet poles Shall be at my command:
A sound magician is a mighty god: Here, Faustus, tire thy brains to gain a deity.
The final stage of Faustus’s damnation is a painful one.
The Old Man comes to Faustus to try to lead him back to God through repentance. Faustus agrees with him and desires to seek repentance:
FAUSTUS: Accursed Faustus, where is mercy now?
I do repent; and yet I do despair:
Hell strives with grace for conquest in my breast:
What shall I do to shun the snares of death?
But-Mephistophilis appears, having heard the whole conversation, terrifies Faustus and threatens him grievous pain, thus Faustus recants his desire to be guided to repentance by the Old Man:
MEPHIST: Thou traitor, Faustus, I arrest thy soul
For disobedience to my sovereign lord:
Revolt, or I’ll in piece-meal tear thy flesh.
FAUSTUS: Sweet Mephistophilis, entreat thy lord
To pardon my unjust presumption,
And with my blood again I will confirm
My former vow I made to Lucifer.
Thus begins the final stage of Faustus’s damnation. He is later to confess to the Scholars what he has done and that he is in his last hour of life. They plead to pray with him yet, in concern for their safety, Faustus regretfully sends them away. Though Faustus sees sings outside in the sky that repentance might yet be his, he talks about it without knowing how to accept it. At the clock’s stroke of midnight, the Devils come to remove Faustus to Hell. The Chorus concludes the tragic drama by warning to stay away from practicing magic, one of the “unlawful” things;
CHORUS: Cut is the branch that might have grown full straight,
Faustus is gone: regard his hellish fall,
Whose fiendful fortune may exhort the wise,
Only to wonder at unlawful things,
Whose deepness doth entice such forward wits.
31. Discuss elements of conflict in Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus.
Ans: One central conflict in this play is the battle for the soul of Faustus and the way that he throws himself willingly down the path towards total damnation rather than taking the opportunities he has to repent when he has those chances. This struggle is interestingly presented through the presence of the Good and Evil Angels, who both try to get Faustus to heed their warnings and blandishments. However, by the end of the play, in spite of the many opportunities Faustus has had to repent, his systematic ignoring of God and of repentance means that he has passed the point of no return. Note how he recognises this in his final speech from Act V:
The stars move still, time runs, the clock will strike, The devil will come, and Faustus must be damned.
O I’ll leap up to my God! Who pulls me down? See, see where Christ’s blood streams in the firmament!
One drop would save my soul, half a drop: ah my Christ-
Ah, rend not my heart for naming of my Christ; Yet will I call on him-O spare me, Lucifer!
Here, Faustus recognises that “half a drop” of Christ’s blood would be enough to save him through the self-sacrificial work of Christ’s death on the cross. However, he realises that “Faustus must be damned” and there is no escape. Note the reference to stars moving and clocks ticking indicating the inevitability of this process. The conflict for his soul is one that has ended with victory for Lucifer. This is a very interesting concept, as the play presents Faustus as a man who is damned whilst still alive. Christianity argues that people have a chance to repent up until their death, but the play ultimately appears to be more tragic than the Christian world view, as it presents the audience with a man who has to face the fact that he is damned whilst still alive. The conflict for his soul has ended, and he has to face unimaginable horrors lasting for all eternity.
32. Discuss Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus with regard to temptation.
Ans: In Christopher Marlowe’s play, The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus, there seems to be one temptation that leads Faustus astray. Faustus is already a religious scholar, but turns his back on this knowledge and considers the black arts. He has friends that practice necromancy, and he sends Wagner, his assistant, to bring them to him. In the meantime, two angels appear: one is good and the other is evil. The Good Angel warns Faustus to stop reading about the black arts, to read the Bible instead, and avoid temptation. However, the Evil Angel speaks to Faustus’ ego, telling him he can be as important on earth as Jove (God) is in heaven.
Go forward, Faustus, in that famous art Wherein all Nature’s treasure is contained: Be thou on earth as Jove is in the sky, Lord and commander of these elements.
Doctor Faustus eventually calls forth Mephistophilis, a servant of Lucifer (the Devil). The dark “angel’s” appearance is so “ugly,” that Faustus sends him away, telling him to return looking (ironically) like a Franciscan friar. Mephistophilis goes to do his bidding, and the usually wise Faustus allows his ego to overpower his intellect: he believes he holds sway over this servant of the Devil, praising himself for his power.
How pliant is this Mephistophilis,
Full of obedience and humility!
Such is the force of magic and my spells:
No, Faustus, thou art conjuror laureat,
That can’t command great Mephistophilis…
This concept of man being tricked into believing that he can control beings more powerful than himself-which leads to his doom is seen also (as one example) in Shakespeare’s Macbeth, when Macbeth believes that he controls the three witches. The Goddess of the Witches, Hecate, declares that a false sense of security leads one’s soul to damnation. Faustus is as foolish as Macbeth.
Faustus talks with Mephistophilis about the fall of Lucifer, Faustus’ lack of fear of eternal damnation (he thinks hell is a “fable”), and d his his willingness to sell his soul to the Devil in exchange for Mephistophilis’ service for twenty-four years. Even Mephistophilis tries to tempt Faustus to change his mind, knowing himself the suffering of being kept from the presence of God:
O, Faustus, leave these frivolous demands,
Which strikes terror to my fainting soul!
Faustus ignores him, and makes his deal. He wants riches, “control [of] the elements,” and a “knowledge of nature.” Several times, Faustus considers repenting, but the powers of darkness convince him there is no hope and Faustus agrees. At the end, as Faustus’ life approaches its end, the scholars speak to Faustus just before he must relinquish his soul, telling him to appeal to God and ask forgiveness.
SECOND SCHOLAR:
Yet, Faustus, look up to heaven; remember God’s mercies are infinite.
But Faustus sees no hope for himself.
FAUSTUS. But Faustus’ offence can ne’er be pardoned: the serpent that tempted Eve may be saved, but not Faustus.
Faustus is taken by Mephistophilis, and then the Chorus enters.
The Chorus tells us that while Faustus was a branch that “might have grown full straight,” instead he yearned to learn “unlawful things… [and] to practice more than heavenly power permits.”
The Chorus warns others not to make the same mistake. Faustus is tempted by his desire to rise above his place in this world, and by the time he realizes his foolishness, it is too late for him to redeem his soul and he is carried off to hell.
33. What are the comic and tragic scenes in Doctor Faustus by Marlowe, and why are they important?
Ans: Despite the fact that Christopher Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus is ultimately a tragedy, much of the first half of the play (and some of the latter) are driven by dark comedy. Faustus is both well-studied and completely full of himself, and this produces comic effect from the beginning. In the former half of the play, we meet several comic characters Robin, Rafe, a clown, etc. Robin and Rafe, for example, attempt to practice magic in one scene, but it goes horribly awry. The clown, in another scene, is chased around by taunting devils. Dramatically, both of these scenes can be played to great comedic effect. Faustus’ travels, after he makes the pact with Mephistopheles, are also comedic gold for audiences. In one scene, Faustus and Meph become invisible and visit the Pope, wreaking havoc on the Pope’s banquet by lifting dishes and food off the table.
This, of course, frightens the Pope and his guests to a point of retreat. In another scene, a so-called Horse Courser (who laughably calls Faustus “Fustian”) threatens to get revenge on Faustus for selling him a horse that turned into straw upon entering water. Faustus had originally warned the Horse Courser not to ride into the water (this shows that Faustus’ powers, despite being super-human, have limits) but the Horse Courser pays him no mind and starts to tug on Faustus’ leg, trying to rip it off. The Horse Courser succeeds, shocked at his ability to pull the leg off so easily. He runs away, frightened and aghast. Faustus then reveals to the audience that (magically) he still has both legs, and laughs the Horse Courser out of the scene.
Although the foreboding scene in which Faustus seals a contract with Lucifer in the first half of the play could be seen as tragic, most of the tragic scenes occur near the end of the play. Faustus slowly begins to sense his mortality settling in on him, and as he nears the end of the earthly time he asked for, Meph and Lucifer arrive to collect their prize-that is, to drag Faustus to his rightful place in hell. One of the play’s most tragic moments comes when Faustus tries to plead for his life as the clock is striking, each resounding gong speeding him closer toward death and eternal punishment. It would seem, ultimately, that the comic scenes in Faustus serve to not only relieve us from the weight of the tragic scenes, but to evoke Faustus’ own blissful ignorance at his impending doom, and to show that Faustus’ power, despite being great, is used for petty tricks of little consequence.
So, the comic scenes in Faustus are certainly important for entertainment value, as Marlowe’s work is a dramatic one. But they function on a higher level too-just as Faustus is putting off his eventual demise by performing useless magic tricks around the world, the comic scenes serve to prolong the inescapable dread Faustus will face in his final moments.
34. How does his behavior constitute a compromise of his nobility?
Ans: In Christopher Marlowe’s play, The Tragical History of the Life and Death of Doctor Faustus, written about 1590, the audience learns that Faustus wasn’t born into the German nobility.
CHORUS. Now is he born, his parents base of stock, In Germany, within a town called Rhodes:
Of ripercars, to Wertenberg he went,
Whereas his kinsmen chiefly brought him up. (Chorus 1, 11. 14)
Despite his notably humble birth, Faustus nevertheless achieves noble heights in his scholarly endeavors, at which he excelled in medicine, law, logic, and theology.
CHORUS. So soon he profits in divinity, The fruitful plot of scholarism graced, That shortly he was graced with doctor’s name, Excelling all whose sweet delight disputes In heavenly matters of theology… (Chorus 1, 15-19)
Faustus’s nobility arises from his learning and knowledge, his intelligence, his genius, and the nobility of his soul, all of which he compromises in pursuit of pleasure, wealth, and fame.
Although Faustus possesses extreme nobility of mind and the inherent nobility of his soul, Faustus lacks nobility of character. He revels in the pleasures of the flesh, and he uses his intellectual gifts not for the betterment of himself or mankind, but to seek fame and fortune.
Faustus expends his time and energy in foolish and frivolous pursuits. He conjures up historical figures to amuse Emperor Charles and his court, and he makes himself invisible to play practical jokes on the Pope.
Faustus also suffers from excessive arrogance. Faustus is able to redeem his soul from Lucifer at the last minute, even after twenty-four years of self-degradation, simply by asking God for forgiveness, but his pride won’t allow him to save himself from eternal damnation.
35. What is the function of the chorus in Doctor Faustus?
Ans: The Chorus in Marlowe’s Dr. Faustus, the inspiration for Goethe’s Faust Parts I & II, serves two purposes. First, it is transitional and, second, it is expository. The first purpose of the Chorus is to provide transitions into and/or out of elements of the play, reminiscent of Greek Choruses.
The second purpose is to provide enlightenment into Dr. Faustus’s behavior and character in addition to giving the audience information that Faustus himself doesn’t have, thus serving in a prescient and foretelling capacity. The objective of the Chorus’s function is to increase suspense as the audience moves through the saga with Dr. Faustus.
36. What is the significance of the chorus in Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus?
Ans: The Chorus in Christopher Marlowe’s The Tragical History Of Doctor Faustus performs many of the same functions as the Chorus in ancient Greek plays, as well as in other Elizabethan plays, such as the plays of William Shakespeare.
The primary function of the Chorus is to provide information to the audience that will help them to understand the play.
At the very beginning of Doctor Faustus, the Chorus provides information about Faustus himself-where he was born, where he went to school, how he excelled in theology, and his interest in the forbidden study of magic and “cursed necromancy”-and sets the scene for the play.
The Chorus serves essentially the same purpose in the plays of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, and in Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, Henry V, and Pericles.
As a side note, in some versions of Doctor Faustus, Faustus’s comic servant, Wagner, is assigned the Chorus’s lines. It’s likely that at some time in the performance history of Doctor Faustus the actor who played Wagner also played the part of the Chorus, and this doubling of characters made its way into printed versions of the play.
As the play continues, the Chorus advises the audience about changes of location, brings the audience up to date on Faustus’s increasing fame and fortune, and describes any events involving Faustus that the audience didn’t see for themselves. This occurs between scenes 6 and 7, and between scenes 9 and 10.
CHORUS. Learned Faustus,
To know the secrets of astronomy,
…Did mount himself to scale Olympus’ top,
…He now is gone to prove cosmography,
And, as I guess, will first arrive at Rome,
To see the Pope and the manner of his court… (Chorus 2)
CHORUS. When Faustus had with pleasure ta’en the view
Of rarest things, and royal courts of kings,
He stayed his course, and so returned home;…
Now is his fame spread forth in every land;
Amongst the rest the Emperor is one,
Carolus the Fifth, at whose palace now
Faustus is feasted ‘mongst his noblemen. (Chorus 3)
At the end of the play, the Chorus mourns the death of Faustus, and tells the audience the moral of the play.
CHORUS. Cut is the branch that might have grown full straight,
And burned is Apollo’s laurel-bough,
That sometimes grew within this learned man.
Faustus is gone: regard his hellish fall,
Whose fiendful fortune may exhort the wise,
Only to wonder at unlawful things,
Whose deepness doth entice such forward wits
To practice more than heavenly power permits. (Epilogue)
37. Explain the characteristics of Doctor Faustus in the play by Christopher Marlowe, Doctor Faustus.
Ans: This format doesn’t allow for a complete discussion of Doctor Faustus character traits, but I can explain the two most important and competing ones, that of arrogance and that of despair. In the beginning of the tragedy, the Chorus makes it clear that Faustus is highly gifted, intelligent and talented. He excels in his studies and quickly earns his doctoral degree in theology. Not stopping there, he continues to study-and master-other fields like medicine and law and logic. In fact, there is nothing left for him to study and he is satiated with it all. As a result, in his growing arrogance and conceit at his own powers and accomplishments, he turns to the one unmastered and most enticing field-necromancy, or magic.
FAUSTUS:
These metaphysics of magicians,
And necromantic books are heavenly;
A sound magician is a mighty god:
Here , Faustus, tire thy brains to gain a deity.
He arrogantly dreams of being the supreme magician, able to command even the wind and oceans. Thus he calls on the devil Mephistophilis. In his arrogance, he believes he can command Mephistophilis and have from him anything he wants. This is the first painful lesson his arrogance and conceit bring him to: Mephistophilis takes orders from Lucifer, and Lucifer won’t tell everything he knows. For example, after asking for knowledge of the cosmos, Lucifer offers him an entertainment by the Seven Deadly Sins and a book about how to change his shape. This adequately sketches and explains Faustus’ character trait of arrogance.
LUCIFER:
In meantime take this book; peruse it thoroughly, And thou shalt turn thyself into what shape thou wilt.
Farewell, Faustus, and think of the devil.
The contrasting and competing trait of despair enters most strongly into Faustus’ characterization in Act IV when his days are dwindling, although his despair begins to effect him after his revealing encounter with Lucifer. As Faustus feels his designated years coming to an end and the time when he will serve Mephistophilis in hell for eternity fast approaching, his yearnings for repentance and redemption begin to overwhelm him. He is visited by an Old Man who tries to teach him how to repent and accept redemption, then by his friends the Scholars who are aghast at Faustus’ misfortune and importune with him to seek Christ’s mercy and seek to have his soul yet saved.
SECOND SCHOLAR:
Yet, Faustus, look up to heaven; remember God’s mercies are infinite.
THIRD SCHOLAR:
Yet, Faustus, call on God.
It is this despair that Faustus feels-coupled with an ironic new-found awareness of ignorance-that prevents him from acting and seeking redemptive forgiveness. His despair, which competes with and overcomes his arrogance, leads him to his ultimate doom, doom stemming from the one point on which he is ignorant and doom hemmed in by crippling despair. This adequately sketches and explains Faustus’ character trait of despair.
FAUSTUS:
The stars move still, time runs, the clock will strike, The devil will come, and Faustus must be damn’d. O, I’ll leap up to my God! Who pulls me down?
38. Could Doctor Faustus be considered a Renaissance man in Doctor Faustus by Christopher Marlowe?
Ans: A common definition of the term “Renaissance man” is someone who is accomplished in many areas of his life, including the arts, learning, and physical pursuits. Another way to define the term is for someone to be a man of the Renaissance; that is, being a man whose thinking and actions are typical of Renaissance actions and thinking. Using the latter definition, Doctor Faustus is, indeed, a Renaissance man in Doctor Faustus by Christopher Marlowe.
One of the primary differences in thinking between the early Renaissance man and a Medieval man was how he sees religion. While Medieval thinking was God-centered, Renaissance thinking was man-centered. The Renaissance man spent his time pursuing knowledge and exploration of all kinds, particularly scientific exploration, with little regard for God or religion. That is exactly how Doctor Faustus lives his life, in the pursuit of knowledge, wealth, power, and the mystical arts.
In his first speech, Doctor Faustus outlines the key areas of learning, citing Aristotle (for logic), Galen (for medicine), Justinian (for law), and the Bible (for religion). These were fine for another time (the Medieval period), but he rejects these as worthless notions for his world (Renaissance England). Instead he dismisses God and says he wants to pursue his own desires: magic and the search for things that matter to him, such as riches, knowledge, and power.
What doctrine call you this: Che sera, sera
What will be, shall be? Divinity, adieu.
These metaphysics of magicians
And necromantic books are heavenly;
Lines, circles, letters, characters.
Ay, these are those that Faustus most desires.
O what a world of profit and delight,
Of power, of honour, and omnipotence
Is it promised to the studious artisan?
All things that move between the quiet poles shall be at my command. Emperors and Kings, Are but obeyed in their several provinces, But his dominion that exceeds in this, Stretcheth as far as doth the mind of man:
A sound magician is a demi-god.
It may seem ironic, then, that the primary conflict of this story is the conflict between God’s decrees (of everlasting life and eternal damnation) and man’s quest to be god, or at least a god. story
Marlowe seems to be warning his audience that taking this new way of thinking (the pursuit of personal glory, knowledge, and riches) apart from spiritual concerns is destined to end badly. Doctor Faustus gladly agrees to sell his soul for these things and he gets them; however, his life degenerates into cruelty and unhappiness. He does have opportunities to make different choices (repent) but does not; Mephistopheles comes for him and Doctor Faustus forfeits his life for things that mean nothing in the end.
As a Renaissance man who represents the thinking of his time (the Renaissance), Doctor Faustus does fit this description.
39. Explain the characteristics of Doctor Faustus in the play by Christopher Marlowe, Doctor Faustus.
Ans: This format doesn’t allow for a complete discussion of Doctor Faustus’ character traits, but I can explain the two most important and competing ones, that of arrogance and that of despair. In the beginning of the tragedy, the Chorus makes it clear that Faustus is highly gifted, intelligent and talented. He excels in his studies and quickly earns his doctoral degree in theology. Not stopping there, he continues to study-and master-other fields like medicine and law and logic. In fact, there is nothing left for him to study and he is satiated with it all. As a result, in his growing arrogance and conceit at his own powers and accomplishments, he turns to the one unmastered and most enticing field-necromancy, or magic.
FAUSTUS. These metaphysics of magicians, and necromantic books are heavenly;
A sound magician is a mighty god:
Here, Faustus, tire thy brains to gain a deity.
He arrogantly dreams of being the supreme magician, able to command even the wind and oceans. Thus he calls on the devil Mephistophilis. In his arrogance, he believes he can command Mephistophilis and have from him anything he wants. This is the first painful lesson his arrogance and conceit bring him to: Mephistophilis takes orders from Lucifer, and Lucifer won’t tell everything he knows. For example, after asking for knowledge of the cosmos, Lucifer offers him entertainment by the Seven Deadly Sins and a book about how to change his shape. This adequately sketches and explains Faustus’ character trait of arrogance.
LUCIFER. In meantime take this book; peruse it throughly, And thou shalt turn thyself into what shape thou wilt.
Farewell, Faustus, and think of the devil.
The contrasting and competing trait of despair enters most strongly into Faustus’ characterization in Act IV when his days are dwindling, although his despair begins to effect him after his revealing encounter with Lucifer. As Faustus feels his designated years coming to an end and the time when he will serve Mephistophilis in hell for eternity fast approaching, his yearnings for repentance and redemption begin to overwhelm him. He is visited by an Old Man who tries to teach him how to repent and accept redemption, then by his friends the Scholars who are aghast at Faustus’ misfortune and importune with him to seek Christ’s mercy and seek to have his soul yet saved.
SECOND SCHOLAR:
Yet, Faustus, look up to heaven; remember God’s mercies are infinite.
THIRD SCHOLAR:
Yet, Faustus, call on God.
It is this despair that Faustus feels-coupled with an ironic new-found awareness of ignorance-that prevents him from acting and seeking redemptive forgiveness. His despair, which competes with and overcomes his arrogance, leads him to his ultimate doom, doom stemming from the one point on which he is ignorant and doom hemmed in by crippling despair. This adequately sketches and explains Faustus’ character trait of despair.
FAUSTUS:
The stars move still, time runs, the clock will strike,
The devil will come, and Faustus must be damn’d.
O, I’ll leap up to my God! Who pulls me down?
40. In Christopher Marlowe’s play Doctor Faustus, how might one trace Faustus’ gradual downfall as a tragic hero?
Ans: The central character in Christopher Marlowe’s play Doctor Faustus undergoes a gradual tragic downfall in a number of ways during the course of the play. Consider, for instance, these examples:
In the prologue to the play, Faustus’s potential is stressed. His downfall is foreshadowed, but he is compared to Icarus, a memorable and literally lofty figure from classical mythology.
When Faustus himself first appears on stage, his focus is still mainly intellectual, especially as he considers how he should spend his life as a philosopher, theologian, doctor, or lawyer. Finally, ironically, he makes an especially bad choice: to dabble in black magic.
Dabbling in black magic is bad enough, but Faustus soon actually summons up a demon from hell to serve as his assistant.
When that demon actually appears and tries to warn Faustus not to proceed with his hellish plans, Faustus not only rejects this advice but actually mocks the demon who gives it.
As evidence that he is willing to commit his soul to Satan, Faustus even stabs his own flesh so that he can sign his Satanic contract with his own blood.
Later, having attained magical powers, Faustus uses them not in any grand ways but rather to present himself as a kind of cheap entertainer in the courts of powerful people.
Later still, Faustus not only rejects the advice of a wise old man but even calls on devils to attack the man. This is perhaps the low point of Faustus’s ethical behavior. Speaking to Mephastophilis, Faustus says,
Torment, sweet friend, that base and crooked age [in other words, the old man]
That durst dissuade me from thy Lucifer,
With greatest torments that our hell affords.
In seeking to visit pain on another person, Faustus reaches, in some ways, the nadir of his moral existence.
Whereas the play began with Faustus at least pretending to be an intellectual, late in the play he has become obsessed with the ephemeral flesh, as when he asks a demon to summon from the dead the legendary and legendarily beautiful Helen of Troy.
Finally, in the closing scene, Faustus not only wishes that he were an animal rather than a human being but also even curses his own parents for engendering him.
In short, Faustus, much like Satan in Milton’s Paradise Lost, undergoes a slow but steady process of spiritual degeneration, a process which one might see, in some ways, as a tragic downfall. As W. H. Auden famously said, when one reads a classical tragedy, one thinks, “What a pity it had to be this way.” When one reads a Christian tragedy, such as Doctor Faustus, one thinks, “What a pity it had to be this way when it could have been otherwise.”
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