Course: - M.A. English
Semester: - 1
Batch: - 2015-2017
Enrolment no:- PG15101003
Submitted to: - Smt. S.B.Gardi Dept. of English MKBU
Email id: - yeshab68@gmail.com
Paper no: - 1 The Renaissance Literature
Topic: - Myth, psychology and Marlowe’s
Dr. Faustus
Myth, Psychology, and Marlowe’s Doctor
Faustus:-
Introduction:-
Many critics have tried to solve the mysterious
mind of Faustus that how a knowledgeable scholar could think in this way, and
wanted to take a place of God. Faustus should not follow the theory of God
while he has the power of knowledge.
According to Jung, the death of
meaning in mythic symbols of Christianity was beginning during the
Renaissance-Reformation period, the age of Dr. Faustus. Mankind then began to
lose something which, in the form of another, is necessary for psychic health.
“Mankind has never lacked powerful images to lend magical aid against all the uncanny
things that lives in the depths of the psyche.”
That was the time of
renaissance and people was discovering new theories in various areas. This
concept by Jung suggests the mindset of people at that time. Dr. Faustus has a
strong desire in his mind to become superior, and ruled over the world. This
desire has destroyed him.
Ø The Renaissance man:-
That age was the age of Reformation, men were
thinking in new and innovatively. It was an age of knowledge, people believed
in science and new theories more than myths and old theories of ancients and
Marlowe’s hero Dr. Faustus was also one of them. There was a development in
various fields like medicine, law philosophy, and psychology. Dr. Faustus was a
scholar and he has successfully passes all the academic disciplines, and after
achieving success in all these fields now he had a question,
“What now?”
Faustus has gain
all the knowledge he wanted in his life, now he wanted to earn the superior
position, and the idea of being at the top was entered in his mind with this
question.
Faustus has
himself answered this question in the opening scene with his soliloquy, in his
answer there is an “ego-inflation”. He has gain all kind of knowledge and that
make him proud. He became more attentive towards his knowledge. This was the
most common element in the nature of a Renaissance man as well as modern man
and Faustus represents is very well. He thought that with the help of knowledge
he can get everything.
Faustus had
strong belief that with the help of all kind of knowledge God is over powering
the world and he also wanted to do so. He was a man of logic and has not
believed in any miracles though he believes in God, so he himself accepts that
somewhere god exists. This theory of existence of God and to overpower the
authority of God itself suggests the spirit of Renaissance and the mind set of
people at that time. The play also suggested the theories and inventions of
that time. For example, there is a scene in the play which describes the sun,
the earth and its revolutions. The play is showing the reformation age at every
scene and the central character is also represents the nature of a modern man.
Ø Myth of Icarus:-
As a person gets
power and position, he suppressed the things and other people. Faustus is also
that kind of a person. As he gets knowledge he tried to overpower the things,
without knowing the exact result he jumped into the well, from which he never
came out, like Icarus in the ancient myth, placed in danger of enantiodromia, in which Icarus flies
near to the sun with the wings of wax and because of the sun heat wax melted
and he falls down from the sky. His fall can be perfectly compared with the
Fall of Faustus. As Icarus fall down from the heights of sky, Faustus also fall
down from the heights of his ego, disobedience, over greed of knowledge, and
choosing bad path to get his goal.
Myth of Icarus
also suggests that if you want something, and precious, you have to have
patients, and pure devotion towards it. If you fly high without knowing
distance you must be careful toward harms of it. As it is said, “The Fall was
great because the climb was high.”
Ø Pride of
Faustus:-
Faustus’s pride
towards his knowledge in opening speech has destroyed the charm of his genius
qualities. He has spent his life for knowledge, but it has no value with the
touch of pride. Faustus has still desires to get more and more, he wants the
position of top, as there is in the human nature. Faustus has saved whole
cities from the plague but he is not happy with what he has done because he did
not get a proper credit for it and he is still Faustus, a man, who has not any
power to raise the dead or to induce immorality. And because of his this
feeling of inferiority, his desires and thoughts has flowed unboundedly, and
his expectations run wild, and it causing him to lose the ability to see the
whole concept which he is going to follow and the results of his wild desires.
His pride led him towards Mephistopheles and signs the contract with him. Just because
of his pride he has to live in hell and serve the king of hell Lucifer.
Ø Psychology in the character of Faustus:-
As
A. N. Okerlund points out, Faustus
“Profanes the intellectual
process after selecting only those data which substantiate a conclusions
predetermined by desires. He hears “only the evidence that confirms his
pre-established vision”
As Dr. Faustus
is a renaissance man, because of his ability of finding knowledge, he refused
Christianity and the concept of God. He did not see the eternity and the result
of being good, rather he has given more importance to sin and death. He has
rejected Christianity because it was a kind of a hurdle for him in his
boundless desires, but the problem with him was that he also could not escape from the Christianity.
Further the sense of sin and
guilt leads a man to despair, as per the law of psychology,
“Genius to madness is near
allied”
The psychological element is
there, and the relativity explained by Jung between conscious and unconscious
mind is connected with the character of Faustus. The character of Faustus shows
the lack confidence oh human nature at once and suddenly in another situation
he comes out as a hero and fights back. Faustus in one scene is “a demi-God”,
and in another, a self-pitying slave totally lacking in self confidence. In an
opening scene, Faustus comes as a very strong character with power, sense and
knowledge of whole world, but as he rises, he became very different, he loses
his dignity and behaves thoughtless, childish and as a nonsense person. He continuously
loses his knowledge as his power rises, and when he realizes his sin, awareness
takes him towards his Fall and he lost everything, even his soul. It is a part
of human psychology that as power comes, all senses used to vanish.
Faustus at one point can be
called as a victim of “Split-personality” he behaves and thinks in two
different ways. He has a strong connection between his conscious mind and
unconscious mind and it reflects as a “Double thinking” as every modern man
used to think, in both aspects logically and miracles. As Jung and Freud said,
that conscious mind is not really separated with unconscious mind and
awareness; it exists side by side and operates together. As Faustus asks
Mephistopheles,
“Where is the place that men call hell?”
And Mephistopheles answers that,
“Hell to be, as it were, a psychic shadow, that goes with the damned soul
wherever it goes.”
He explains the concept of hell in very few
lines with very effective way and it can be called as a modern thought that,
“The mind is its own place, and itself, can make a heaven of hell, a hell
of heaven.”
This was a hint for Faustus to
warn his mind to stop and think with his idea of being superior with the help
of wrong way, but power has controlled his mind just like as opium. And he
replied very surprisingly,
“I think hell’s a fable”
Faustus was in hurry to get the
magical power, he has signed the contract and gave his soul to Lucifer and said
that,
“Think’st thou that Faustus is so found to imagine, that after this life there
is any pain? No, there are trifles and mere old wives’ tales.”
Faustus thought logically, his
words like ‘fable’ and ‘old wives’ tales’ suggests that hell does not exists,
and was not capable to face the truth that he has given his soul to the king of
hell Lucifer.
Ø
Conclusion :-
Marlowe has very well presented
psychological elements of mind which works very strongly in human nature though
lies in deep inside in the unconscious mind of human. The elements of
psychological nature has presented with modern men’s perspective, and new
theories of that time. Myth has also depicted with the rejections of Dr.
Faustus. With the help of a character of an Old man, Marlowe presented that god
comes to save his child at every point, and the concept of Good angel and Bad
angel is also suggested with the spiritual effect. Thus psychology and mythical
views are the soul of the play.
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