Christopher Marlowe's Doctor Faustus

While it is not certain exactly when Doctor Faustus was written, it is known that the work was completed between the late sixteenth and early seventeenth century. This time period was a transition phase in England, a Renaissance of thought. As social and economic conditions pushed for science development, an increasing number of technologists and scientists, such as Cornelius Agrippa, began to blur the line between science and magic, thus causing conflict amongst the realms of modern knowledge, occult tradition, and religion. Christopher Marlowe uses the protagonist, Doctor Faustus, to present and explore these clashes, but problematically, without a definite stance or resolution to cement the overall message of the work. As Harry Levin's The Overreacher suggests, many now refer to The Tragedy of Doctor Faustus as a morality play in which Faustus is the Renaissance Everyman. The play does indeed have many features of a morality play, including the conflicts between conscience and sin, and the forces of good and evil, but to say that the work itself serves only the purpose of a morality play or Christian tragedy is an oversimplification. Good and evil in the play take on visible forms of angels and demons but what brings them about is beyond mere sin or wrongdoing. These forces of good and evil arise from within Faustus and the turmoil caused by his hunger for infinite knowledge and desire to overcome humanness.

By presenting the limits of the disciplines of his time and rejects authorities such as Aristotle and the Bible, Faustus shows his need to free himself from the constraints of convention so that he may develop and own his intellect. Ironically, to do so, Faustus must sell his soul to the Devil, and thereby give up the ownership of himself for independence. In the end, Faustus is damned for he pleads for salvation but never truly repents. Faustus takes charge of his life but loses power over his own destiny. John Mebane discusses this idea in his Renaissance Magic and the Return of the Golden Age, proposing that Dr. Faustus uses the symbol of magic to ambiguously address the question of the limits of human nature. Ultimately, Faustus is a victim of his thoughts, unable to escape the confines of who and what he is. The central struggle and point of the work, then, does not concern what constitutes good and evil or their consequences but rather, The Tragedy of Doctor Faustus illustrates the irreconcilable nature of the conflicts that arise from the pursuit of independent knowledge and presents the inescapable limits of human thought.

From studying Marlowe, Harry Levin comes to the conclusion that Doctor Faustus is a regress to morality after tragedies of ambition and revenge, for the play uses the traditional coordinates of heaven and hell with the central conflict of conscience between good and evil. Levin reads the dialogues between Faustus and Mephostophilis as characteristic reminders of morality characters' debates with evil, emphasizing that in the end, Faustus' plight is a reminder of "…that fall of the angels, that tragedy of tragedies which brought original sin" (Levin, 138). Faustus is thus a simple human sinner who is not truly remorseful at the end, which Levin believes because Faustus is shown blaming his alma mater rather than repenting, which remains to be a controversial topic in itself.

In addition to being a morality play, Levin believes that Doctor Faustus is "…an Atheist's tragedy, an Epicurean's testament, a mirror for University Wits" that expresses scientific negativity as well as the results of impiety (Levin, 133). As the title suggests, Levin's Christopher Marlowe The Overreacher interprets Faustus as an overreacher, or a hero who has an exaggerated appetite for achievement, and in this case, knowledge as power. The play, then, shows the tragic results of attempting to attain divinity through knowledge and the sinful nature of trying to achieve God-like powers, which coincides with Levin's discussion of Marlowe's movement towards traditional Christianity. Faust is consumed by pride and arrogance which fuels him to become an overreacher who does not obey the forces of heaven but joins the demons and devils of hell and is damned for his actions and denouncement of god. Faustus is driven by intellectual curiosity but as Levin states, "it cannot finally be detached from the secondary motives that entrammels it, the will to power and the appetite for sensation" (132).

Levin views the work through stylistic analysis and believes that the plot is presented in an ethical perspective that comes from Marlowe himself and his humanistic aspirations. Faust's attempts to defy humanness are likened to Icarus who flew too close to the sun, for Faustus wants to fly to what is beyond his reach, and falls, just like the outcome of the Miltonic struggle in which original sin and suffering of man came about from curiosity and disobedience to God.