Nina Katz

1007143048

Dr. T. Nikki Cesare Schotzko

DRM220Y1 TUT0104

14 December 2021

DRM220Y1 Midterm Test

I. Identification: Option 2

This excerpt is from The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus by Christopher Marlowe. It is

spoken by the character Mephistopheles, a demon who Doctor Faustus has just summoned to

serve him. The context of this excerpt is that Faustus has just signed and given the contract to

Mephistopheles that entitles him to twenty-four years of worldly pleasure, after which he must

surrender his soul to Lucifer and suffer in hell for eternity. After this contract is sealed, Faustus

immediately begins asking Mephistopheles questions about hell, specifically inquiring where

Hell is physically located. Mephistopheles answers by revealing how Hell is not confined to one

physical space; rather, it is the absence of Heaven that defines Hell. Faustus, who does not yet

comprehend the devastation of damnation, dismisses Hell’s horrors as petty fiction. This excerpt

is significant because it illuminates a major theme of the play: the dichotomy between Heaven

and Hell, and by extension, between good and evil. One either goes to Heaven or stays in Hell,

which is any place that is not Heaven. Ultimately, nothing is worth more than going to Heaven,

because if one does not go to Heaven, they automatically end up in Hell, which is a grim

alternative. In this system of morality, the choice is between salvation or damnation; there is no

in between.
 II. Comparative Character Analysis

It is productive to examine the characters in Snow in Midsummer and The Bacchae through

the lens of faith in fate and the gods. How does their belief in a higher power develop or falter

throughout the respective plays, and does their faith adhere to or challenge cultural norms? In

The Bacchae, Cadmus and Agave’s faith in the might of the Olympians is reaffirmed by the

tragedy that befell their kin, Pentheus. The moral of the tragedy adheres to the Ancient Greek

cultural norms of its time. Conversely, Snow in Midsummer’s Dou E is initially firm in her belief

of fate and godly intervention, but the abuse she undergoes unravels her faith, which was

subversive to the prevailing Confucian belief in fair, divine justice.

The Bacchae opens with a monologue by the god Dionysus, who explains to the audience

why he has driven all the women in the house of Cadmus mad: to punish them for spreading a

rumour that his mother, Semele, had become pregnant by a mortal rather than Zeus, thus

insinuating the Dionysus is not Zeus’s son and therefore not a god. He also decries Cadmus for

anointing his grandson, Pentheus, as his heir, because Penthius is a non-believer:

And Cadmus has given the kingship and its prerogative to his daughter’s son Pentheus. This

man is a god-fighter where my worship is concerned, forcibly excluding me from libations

and making no mention of me in prayer. (Euripedes 16)

This quotation demonstrates how at the beginning of the play, Pentheus does not respect

Dionysus’ godhood, and how Cadmus rewards him for his impiety. However, they are punished

for their disbelief; Dionysus drives Pentheus’ mother Agave insane, and she and the women of

Thebes decapitate him and present his head to Cadmus. When she comes to her senses, she is

horrified by what she has done, and both she and Cadmus resolve to never disrespect Dionysus

again, for now they comprehend the extent of his wrath. These character arcs adhere to the
morals of Ancient Greek society, which valued piety and devotion towards the gods, and warned

against those who would defy them and their fates.

Unlike the initial non-believers of The Bacchae, Dou E from Snow in Midsummer is a

staunch follower of Confucian morals; when Zhang dies from the poisoned soup, Dou E does not

mourn because she believes that fate dictates that everyone must die eventually. Her faith in the

existence of fate is unwavering. However, her perspective shifts when she is unjustly sentenced

to death for the murder that she did not commit. Dou E rages against heaven as she realizes that

the gods do not care for justice: “Yet Heaven cannot tell the innocent from the guilty;/ And

confuses the wicked with the good!” (Hanqing 497). Dou E’s doubt in the divine justice of

Heaven is a subversion of the Confucian belief of ultimate, predetermined balance. Her character

begins to operate by the content of her tragic life experiences, rather than the Confucian values

she has always believed.

III. Comparative Play Analysis

The two plays that I especially resonated with this term are Nôkhom by Michael Greyeyes

and Atsumori by Zeami Motokiyo. Both rely heavily on music and dance as forms of

storytelling, which I cannot access through a script, but appreciate as a stylistic choice,

nonetheless. Despite not being able to see the music and dance, I can still marvel at the beauty of

the scripts’ language. I also think that the respective endings of the two plays are beautiful, albeit

in different ways. Nôkhom is a meditation on what cannot truly be known, and Atsumori is a tale

of reconciliation and forgiveness. The latter is more resolved, but the former’s intentional

ambiguity has its own power.

 Nôkhom is told through the voice of the Narrator as he recollects his father’s stories about his

grandmother, Maggie, who passed away when he was still a child. He recounts the trauma that

both she and his father survived as they struggled to make it through a brutal Canadian winter.

Maggie’s relationship with Longneck, her lover who brought her family food in exchange for

sex, is expressed through dance stage directions:

MAGGIE and LONGNECK dance as the NARRATOR stands facing away from them.

MAGGIE and her lover intertwine, twisting themselves together. They finish their dance,

breathing heavily, sitting, facing each other. (Greyeyes 10)

The way that dancing is described in this script is beautiful. The impression of what the audience

is supposed to take away from this scene is clear: Maggie and Longneck are in a passionate

entanglement, but there is some distance between them, as represented by how after they have

sex they sit apart. However, the specific choreography is not described in detail, which leaves the

theoretical creative team working on this show a lot of freedom. It is a lovely balance of

expression and suggestion.

Similarly, Atsumori is heavily related to song and dance because of the theatre tradition it is a

part of. Noh performance relies on stylized movements that imbue the poetry sung or spoken

with greater meaning. In Atsumori, the Shite (principle actor) plays the titular Atsumori in Act 2.

Atsumori is a ghost returning to confront his murderer, a warrior turned priest, who is played by

the Waki (supporting actor). The role of the actor is referenced in the stage directions, as it is

more convenient to do so than to refer to them by character names: “(Sung with the SHITE

standing at the shite spot and the WAKI sitting at the waki spot)” (Motokiyo 515). These

stage directions do not elucidate what a “shite spot” or “waki spot” is because the text assumes

that the team working on the piece has enough experience in Noh tradition to understand what
they are. As a result, when read by the uninformed, the stage directions do not paint a clear

picture of what is happening on stage, but when read by one with Noh experience, it is very

clear.

Nôkhom ends with the Narrator questioning the narrative of Maggie that he has just given the

audience. Because he only knows this story from bits and pieces from his family, and not from

Maggie himself, he realizes that he will never be privy to the whole story:

I’ve come to question much of the truth of my grandmother’s story. As that time falls away

into air and the land itself, as memories falter and the people who hold them leave us, it

raises more questions than my dad had answers for. (Greyeyes 16)

The Narrator is acknowledging that the answers to his questions cannot be answered because the

holders of the answers are gone. He accepts the partial truth that he has been given, fully aware

that what he has is incomplete, and cannot be mistaken with Maggie’s real story. Nôkhom does

not offer tidy solutions; it accepts and honours complexity.

Comparatively, Atsumori has a more clear-cut ending. After the Shite and Waki recollect

their past together and realize that Buddha would want them to reconcile, the Chorus sings about

in their next life, they will live together peacefully: “The priest performs services and prays/ that

in the end they will be reborn together/ on a single lotus petal” (Motokiyo 518-519). The play

ends with the hopeful moral that everyone, even mortal enemies, can reconcile and find harmony

in their next life. The conflict between the two characters of the play is resolved and a brighter

future for them lies on the horizon.