Really useful detailed essay plans for Dr Faustus A-level essays. These notes helped me get an A* in English Literature.
Includes plans for... Dr Faustus as a Tragic hero, illusion and reality, comic scenes, Mephistopheles and Faustus' relationship, magic, how Marlowe shapes the audiences' attitud...
Dr Faustus essay plans
Key:
o F = Faustus
o W = Wagner
o OM = Old Man
o L = Lucifer
o HofT = Helen of Troy
o V = Valdes
o C = Cornelius
1. Tragic hero
o First addition- ‘Tragical history of Dr Faustus’- presented as a tragedy.
o Aristotle’s definition = ‘neither good nor thoroughly bad’- question severity of F’s
punishment.
o Prologue ‘born of parents of base stock’- everyman figure.
o tragedy = describes downfall of a great man on account of his hamartia.
o ‘tragoida’ = Greek for goats play- sacrifices- sense of a great man sacrificed to appease
wrath of God.
o Kastan ‘is the tragic motor human error or capricious (unpredictable) fate?’
Tragic flaw that led F to his fate? - hubris
‘heavens conspired his overthrow’- universe governed by capricious deities?
o Kastan ‘is the catastrohpy (tragic outcome) a just, if appalling, retribution?’
Fate might be deserved but even so- cruel justice.
o Last soliloquy- God presented as almost tantalising (teasing him).
Audience encouraged to sympathise with F- methods evoke this.
o Is F a great man?
Encouraged to think great but Marlowe spends time undermining.
Through imagination/speculation of ambitions- link to humanists.
Ambiguity- parents of base stock- everyman figure.
While his greatness is questioned we do nevertheless have a sense of his fall.
Great chain of being- 16thC audience not see F as great but meddling with divine
order.
Pity- epilogue ‘cut is the branch that might have grown full straight’-F’s potential.
o F’s fall into mediocracy- strong sense when contrasted to initial ambitions- 1 st + last
soliloquy.
Increasingly degraded state- slapstick comic scenes- morality plays- socially
lower characters.
Contrasted to Chorus’ initial presentation ‘graced with doctor’s name’.
o Anagnorisis- recognition of some universal truth about humanity.
‘what art F but a man condemned to die’- contrast with ambitions- come to
terms with truth of human condition.
Towards end- repentance on his mind- ‘I do repent yet I do despair’- evokes
sympathy.
Keep ‘oath…made to Lucifer’- wanting to do right thing.
Last soliloquy- methods- enhance dramatic atmos monosyllabic words ‘now hast
thou’- mirroring striking of clock.
o Hero of his own imaginations.
‘I will be Paris’- sees himself as a hero.
Determined/resolute but play undermines his sense of heroism.
‘Hell’s just a fable’- can you be truly heroic if you don’t understand
consequences of your actions?
o Fuses morality + classical tragedy.
Creates tensions.
Kastan argues tragedy makes us question nature of the gods- just cruel?- at odds
with Christian view.
By employing Christian theme but putting in a tragic universe- Marlowe obliges
us to question God.
Compared to Icarus- ‘waxen wings’- in prologue- metaphor for attempt to usurp
role of god.
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