DOCTOR FAUSTUS

Christopher Marlowe is the most prominent among the “University Wits”, who paved way
for the Romantic Dramas of Sh.

The credit of using blank verse as a medium of dramatic presentation goes to Marlowe. He
freed the English drama from the shackles of classical conventions and elevated ordinary
mortals to the level of a tragic hero.

His famous tragedies are Tamburlaine, the Great, The Jew of Malta, The Tragical History of
Doctor Faustus and Edward II.

Marlowe’s tragedies are one man tragedies. The heroes of his plays are towering
personalities who dwarf all other characters in the play.

A typical Marlowean hero is as ‘over-reacher’. He aims at the superhuman or the

impossible. In the process of achieving the Renaissance ideals “greater power, prestige,
wealth and knowledge” he ruins himself.

There are two ways of looking at Doctor Faustus. We can view it as a Christian play in the
Morality tradition or as a play glorifying the renaissance concept of the ‘superman’.

If we approach the play as a typical renaissance drama Faustus is a martyr to everything

Renaissance valued – power, knowledge, free enterprise, wealth and beauty.

Faustus’s tragedy is that he believes “knowledge is power” and by attaining power he can
equal God. Like Icarus with his waxen wings, he flies above his reach and is ruined in the
process.

When the play opens we find Faustus contemplating which branch of knowledge he should
pursue in order to attain superhuman power. He rejects traditional subjects one by one as
they do not suit his requirements.

He rejects theology, law, metaphysics and philosophy because they do not give him power
equal to God, i.e. the power to control the world.

At last he turns his attention to black magic which he believes will give him “power, honour
and omnipotence”.

He makes a pact with Mephistophilis. He vows his allegiance to Beelzebub and Lucifer.

For 24 years of voluptuous life he sells his soul to Lucifer. For 24 years Mephsitophilis will
be his servant, obey all his commands and satisfy all his desires.

In the end of the 24th year Lucifer will claim his soul.
Faustus signs this covenant with his own blood and says “consummatum est”, the words of
Christ on the cross.

Faustus leads a voluptuous life. He makes Mephistophilis bring Helen of troy and kisses her.
His joy knows no bounds.

“Was this the face that launched a thousand ships?

And burnt the topless towers of Ilium?

Sweet Helen, make me immortal with a kiss.”

What has Faustus gained by selling his soul? Has the kiss of Helen made him immortal?

With the help of Mephistophilis, Faustus does many things. But many of them are trifles like
playing practical jokes on popes and inn-keepers.

Was this the power he earned for? There is a disparity between his aspiration and his
achievements. The irony is that Faustus’s union with the spirit disguised as Helen does not
make him immortal, but ensures his damnation.

When Lucifer comes to claim his soul Faustus turns his eyes to Saviour Christ:

Now thou hast but one hour to live,

And then thou must be damned perpetually!

Stand still, thou ever-moving spheres of heaven,

That time may cease, and midnight never come;

Fair Nature’s eye, 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!

It shows the agony of a soul to save itself from eternal damnation.

The play is written in the Morality tradition. The characters have allegorical significance.
The good and the bad angels are only different aspects of Faustus’s mind. They show the
conflict between repentance and despair.

Marlowe is more a poet than a dramatist. Doctor Faustus has a superb beginning and a
magnificent end, but it has no middle.
The middle scenes of the play show only low comedy and Faustus degenerates into the level
of a street magician.

The dramatic tension is not sustained in the middle scenes.