{"id":4447,"date":"2021-01-06T03:30:11","date_gmt":"2021-01-06T03:30:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/brendans-island.com\/catholic-citizen\/?p=4447"},"modified":"2024-12-13T18:49:28","modified_gmt":"2024-12-13T18:49:28","slug":"rereading-christopher-marlowes-doctor-faustus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/brendans-island.com\/catholic-citizen\/rereading-christopher-marlowes-doctor-faustus\/","title":{"rendered":"Rereading Christopher Marlowe’s “Doctor Faustus”"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a><\/p>\n

“Dr. Faustus” keeps coming back.<\/p>\n

Christopher Marlowe’s play, I mean, not Johann Georg Faust.<\/p>\n

J. G. Faust lived five centuries back. Give or take a bit. Extracting his biography from folk legends, chapbooks and assorted other retellings? I’ll leave that for someone else.<\/p>\n

I haven’t read or discussed “Faustus,” since 2012. So I’ll be rereading the play, looking what I wrote then, thinking about it and sharing the results. Together with whatever else comes to mind as I go along.<\/p>\n

\n

<\/a>“…A Sound Magician is as a Mighty God…”<\/h3>\n

I’ll say this for Marlowe’s Dr. Faustus. He had high self-esteem:<\/p>\n

All things that move between the quiet poles
\nShall be at my command: emperors and kings
\nAre but obeyed in their several provinces,
\nNor can they raise the wind, or rend the clouds;
\nBut his dominion that exceeds in this,
\nStretcheth as far as doth the mind of man;
\nA sound magician is a mighty god:
\nHere, Faustus, tire thy brains to gain a deity.
\n(“Faustus,” Marlowe (1604) Edited by The Rev. Alexander Dyce)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I figure “hubris” is more accurate. Along with unreasonable expectations.<\/p>\n

Marlowe’s “Dr. Faustus” involves hearty helpings of magic and science: as presented in Elizabethan theater. Since I’m not an Elizabethan Englishman, I’d better talk about how I see magic and all that.<\/p>\n

<\/a>“Magic?”<\/h4>\n

<\/a>
\n(From Stanley De Brath, John Lobb; via Wikimedia Commons; used w\/o permission.)<\/span>
\n(Left, “Supernormal Portrait” taken at the British College of Psychic Science (1924);
\nright, alleged spirit photography by Thomas Everitt (1909).)<\/p>\n

I think magic is a bad idea. And I think magic is harmless entertainment. Or it’s unfamiliar technology. Or something exciting, like “Disney on Ice.”<\/p>\n

Which definition applies depends on context. And who’s talking.<\/p>\n

“Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.”
\n(A. C. Clarke’s Third Law (ca. 1962))<\/p>\n

\n

“…’For this is what your folk would call magic, I believe: though I do not understand clearly what they mean; and they seem to use the same word of the deceits of the Enemy. But this, if you will, is the magic of Galadriel.’…”
\n(“The Fellowship of the Ring,” J. R. Tolkien (1954))<\/p>\n

\n

“Faustus.<\/strong>…How pliant is this Mephistophilis,
\nFull of obedience and humility!
\nSuch is the force of magic and my spells:
\nNo, Faustus, thou art conjuror laureat,
\nThat canst command great Mephistophilis:
\nQuin regis Mephistophilis fratris imagine.”
\n(“Faustus,” Marlowe (1604) Edited by The Rev. Alexander Dyce)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

<\/a>Definitions<\/h4>\n

<\/a>One person’s “sufficiently advanced technology” might be another’s word processor and spreadsheet.<\/p>\n

I suspect that uneven distribution of IT skills contributes to my culture’s technophobic undercurrents.<\/p>\n

That, and the steep learning curve we’ve been on since upgrades of Edmund Cartwright’s power loom destabilized the weaving industry.<\/p>\n

Magic that’s harmless entertainment includes sleight of hand and levitation illusions: the sort of thing Howard Thurston did.1<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n

I’m not sure why his promotional art showed him getting Mephistophelian assistance. Cincinnati’s Strobridge Lithograph company made that “Mr. Kellar Says” poster in 1910.<\/p>\n

My guess is that Howard Thurston was appealing to America’s taste for seances, spirit photographs and the like. I wouldn’t be comfortable with his marketing strategy, but I’m not a stage magician trying to make a living.<\/p>\n

Sleight of hand, card tricks, prestidigitation and Otis Elevator technology isn’t the sort of magic I think is a bad idea.<\/p>\n

Neither is prayer. That might take some explaining.<\/p>\n

<\/a>Prayer isn’t Magic<\/h5>\n

\"Lenten<\/a>Prayer is part of being Catholic. (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2558<\/a>–2565<\/a>, 2566<\/a>–2567<\/a>, 2568<\/a>–2589<\/a>, …)<\/p>\n

Some of my regular prayers, like the Divine Mercy chaplet,2<\/a><\/sup> involve saying the same words each time.<\/p>\n

But the Divine Mercy chaplet isn’t<\/strong> magic.<\/p>\n

I’m not making something happen by performing a set ritual. And I’m sure not making God do anything. If I thought that’s what I was doing, I’d be believing in “magic,” superstition. And that would be a bad idea. (Catechism, 2111<\/a>)<\/p>\n

With the Divine Mercy chaplet, I’m asking God to “have mercy on us and on the whole world:” so it’s an intercessory prayer. Or maybe a prayer of petition, since I’m included in “us” and “the whole world.”<\/p>\n

Intercession and petition are two of the five varieties of prayer, along with blessing and adoration, thanksgiving and praise. (Catechism, 2623<\/a>–2643<\/a>)<\/p>\n

I talked about that last August, in connection with the blast in Beirut. (August 11, 2020<\/a>)<\/p>\n

I figure the Divine Mercy chaplet is a prayer of meditation and contemplation, too; and that’s another topic. Topics.<\/p>\n

\n

<\/a>Reality and Reputation<\/h3>\n

Tales grow in the telling. Someone said that first, I have no idea who. I figure the idea, if not the exact words, was ancient beyond measure when Sneferu didn’t quite make the first smooth pyramid.<\/p>\n

Here are two real people whose biographies became \u2014 embroidered.<\/p>\n

<\/a>Albertus Magnus: Posthumous Reputation Based (Loosely) on Actual Events<\/h4>\n

\"Liebig's<\/a>
\n(From Chemical Heritage Foundation, via Wikimedia Commons, used w\/o permission.<\/span>
\n(Albertus Magnus: featured on a 1929 trading card.)<\/p>\n

Backing up a bit, technology isn’t bad, or good, by itself. Neither is science. Each of us decides how we use knowledge and tools. Whether they help or hurt depends on us. (Catechism, 2292<\/a>–2295<\/a>)<\/p>\n

Technology isn’t “magic,” except in a metaphorical sense. And neither is science.<\/p>\n

That didn’t keep St. Albertus Magnus from getting a posthumous reputation for practicing magic. And alchemy.<\/p>\n

The “alchemy” prestige, or maybe notoriety, was ‘based on actual events.’<\/p>\n

Albertus Magnus studied alchemy: the sort that got rebranded as “chemistry” a few centuries later. (October 18, 2018<\/a>; January 12, 2018<\/a>)<\/p>\n

\"Mr.<\/a>I very strongly suspect that tales about Albertus Magnus getting help from rogue spirits reflect an uneasiness regarding study of the natural world.<\/p>\n

I’ve talked about that before, and will again.<\/p>\n

St. Albertus Magnus was a natural philosopher, the sort we started calling “scientists” after William Whewell’s 1834 book review. (July 20, 2019<\/a>)<\/p>\n

The Albertus Magnus in European tall tales is mostly fiction. But St. Albertus Magus was and is real.3<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n

And that, finally, gets me back to “Dr. Faustus.”<\/p>\n

<\/a>“Dr. Faustus:” Based on Actual Stories<\/h4>\n

\"Frontpiece<\/a>Marlowe’s Faustus is fiction. But “Dr. Fausus” is based, loosely, on a real person.<\/p>\n

Johann Georg Faust lived, bamboozled and died around 1500. Part of his stock in trade was posing as a magician and\/or alchemist.<\/p>\n

Think of him as a German Renaissance bunco artist.<\/p>\n

He enjoyed a measure of success until someone or something wrung his neck.<\/p>\n

Lurid tales of J. G. Faust’s alleged Satanic connections and wretched end eventually inspired Christopher Marlowe’s “The Tragicall History of the Life and Death of Doctor Faustus.”<\/p>\n

Faust’s fictional fame didn’t end there. Marlowe wrote his “Dr. Faustus” in 1590, give or take a couple years.<\/p>\n

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe started writing “Urfaust” between 1772 and 1775. By 1831 he’d finished “Faust. Eine Trag\u00f6die” and “Faust. Der Trag\u00f6die zweiter Teil in f\u00fcnf Akten:” “Faust Part One” and “Faust Part Two.”<\/p>\n

There’s been no shortage of Faust reboots since then.4<\/a><\/sup> Highlights include:<\/p>\n