Doctor Faustus as Apollonian Hero :: Doctor Faustus

Doctor Faustus as Apollonian HeroHow long will a man lie i th earth ere he rot? - Hamlet, V, i, 168 The Tragic write up of Doctor Faustus is Marlowes misreading of the drama of the morality tradition, the Faust legend, and, ironically, his own Tamburlaine plays. In the culture of the character of Doctor Faustus, we find one of the supreme fine achievements of face asidestanding literature, a milestone of artistic creativity and originality. The force of Marlowes dramatic poetry resonates with lyrical intensity in its dialectic between orbit and will. Not only is Faustus the first true dramatic character of any(prenominal) psychological, moral, and philosophical depth in English literature of the modern period, scarcely in his creation of this unique character we see Marlowe on the termination of Shakespearean characterization, that supreme artistic achievement that Harold rush calls the invention of the benignant personality. The play itself is a study of the development of the inner self of a character, the evolution from a shell who unfolds into a soul who develops. Bloom calls Marlowe Shakespeares eyeshade precursor and rival Ovidian (xx). All of Marlowes major characters are of one type each strives single-mindedly and obsessively towards one ever-evasive end. Faustus is the most philosophically orient of this motley band, the one who comes closest to embodying the incredible vastness of human personality. Bloom nones that Marlowe never developed, and never would have, even had he seen thirty (xxi-xxii). While this nous may be argued true, we must not regard his want of artistic maturity against Marlowe for the characterization he does achieve remains unprecedented in English literary history. The Faustus that we come to know, to loathe, and, at times, to idealize is both a human figure in all of his flaws and a natural force, not so much intelligence as energy (Steane 131). Marlowes tragedy stands in a uniquely transformative relationship to the tradition of Englands morality plays more than just now an evolution, the play assimilates, incorporates, and creates new uses for the conventional elements of the morality play. The morality play, the most touristy examples of which include Everyman and Mankind, was rooted in the didacticism of medieval Christian theology and developed as a means for the conveyance of Biblical truth to the masses. Its basis, as a literary work, was an archetypal human perception the fall out of innocence into experience (Potter 9).