So you have in front of you yet another classic, an old book, you have never heard about Dr. Faustus before, let alone Marlowe, ancient names. But it somehow got your attention and it is now time to read and see what it has to offer. The name is “The Tragic Story of Dr. Faustus” it is a tragic story then, we all know how those end. What is important here is that after reading it, you’ll dissect the book, extract its essence, curate it in the form of a brief essay, showcase it like a painting in a museum, surrounded by other elements that accentuate its qualities, and portrait it in a way that it will allow you to grasp its lasting effects. For that end, let’s use five perspectives.
First, the most obvious and the one most telling, first reaction, as any other classic old book, the first thing you encounter is an old language, lots of words that sound funny, and many thou’s, thy’s, and thine’s, which as you go by, you get used to, also, and this is new, many Latin phrases, if you think about it, this is a book about a scholar, Dr. Faustus, in the 1400’s of so, so it is normal that he uses a lot of Latin since it was the language of the instructed people back then, and you yourself can use a bit of it but later I’ll discuss more on the language. The other thing you encounter right away is Faustus, a learned man, tired of logic, of law, of medicine, he has learned all that, now he wants something new, and he is not afraid of the Devil, his resolve is such, that he does not care for consequences, you tend to admire people that go so boldly forth, but it also fills you with a sort of fear and apprehension, he is told, "the shortest way of conjuring is stoutly to abjure all godliness/ And pray devoutly to the prince of hell" He does take you spiraling through the events that follow.
The second way to look at it is by content, so we know Faustus, "bene disserere est finis logices/ Is, to dispute well, logic’s chiefest end/ Affords this art no greater miracle?" and there are other characters, of course, he has his servant Wagner bring up Valdes and Cornelius, who help him with a book about the dark arts and after some heavy Latin conjuring, “Sint mihi dii Acherontis propitii! Valeat numen triplex Jehovoe! Ignei, aerii, aquatani spiritus, salvete! Orientis princes Belzebub, inferni ardentis monarcha, … et per vota nostra, ipse nunc surgat nobis dicatus Mephistophilis!” Mephistophilis appears, the Devil’s warden, he bargains with him to trade his soul for some superpowers. Which after the signing of a contract with his own blood he gets it. Twenty-four years of unearthly power and pleasure on earth for his soul at the end.
The third way of seeing this is form. This is a play and has many characteristics that you can only find in a play. in one part, Mephistophilis talks to the audience, and tells them that he would give anything to get his soul, creating thus a dramatic irony, there is also a chorus, sort of singing, or simultaneous talking of the actors narrating what has happened or giving a sort of moral of the context, but most important is Marlowe's skill in writing, you can actually feel Faustus unquenchable desire for power and knowledge. His inner struggles are represented by two angels, this is straight out of cartoons, or the other way around, a good angel and an evil one, after some time, doing his thing, learning the secrets of the world, these two appear to him, and warn him it’s not too late, he can still save his soul if he just repents and gives in to God, but he is resolved, and Mephistophilis who is by his side all the time pressures him not to betray the Devil, not to call God's name o pray for that hurts him and to put aside those feeling and enjoy the power he has, otherwise, he will cut poor Dr. Faustus into pieces. After this he is presented with a book of conjuring from hell itself, with it, he could do magic and confabulate with demons, he is introduced to the seven sins, which are to be his friends, and with the help of Mephistophilis wreak havoc in the world for that so pleaseth the Devil.
The fourth approach would be the historical context, after promising to comply with the Devil he goes and sees Pope Adrian, who is presented as an arrogant man, full of pride, and Faustus and Mephistophilis play with him, this is of course also a way of making protestant Englishman happy and appealing to his audience, they make themselves invisible, and help a rival Pope be set free, this really pleases the German Emperor, which was Carolus, another great historical figure, and the Emperor then sees Faustus, and asks him if he could let him see Alexander Magno, which he does, but this Nobel man that was there, Benvolio, disbelieved Faustus, thus he put horns on him. Benvolio then gathers up other three people and cuts Faustus head, but he cannot be killed until his twenty-four years are up, so he send the four of them on dragon’s back ride and are thrown from a mountain, and given horns once more.
And in the fifth and final, a giant piece of the puzzle is missing, the personal context, who was Marlowe, little is known about the author's life, shrouded by mystery and speculation, “if Shakespeare didn’t exist we would have been studying him” that’s what everybody says, it is known that he was killed at a young age, stabbed in the head during a bar brawl, he was supposedly gay, some say he was a spy for the queen, maybe this led him to be fascinated by the myth of Dr. Faustus, which is a very real person who lived in Germany, around 1466, master in philosophy at the age of 21, the minimum for that degree, after that he made himself a name as a soothsayer, someone who reads palms, and astrologists, later referred by Martin Luther to be a magician, and thus his myth grew. Back to the story, at the end of his twenty-four years, you find Faustus with other three colleague scholars, who tell him to repent, it is his last hour, and of course he does, time seems to him an eternity, he pleads to God for mercy, he has his scholars pray for him, in the end we find him dismembered and his soul thrown to hell as was promised. Terminat hora diem; terminat auctor opus.
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