Dr faustus- Tragic Hero
“A hero is one who not only has many good aspects, but many flaws.” Critic Solomon Short stated that one is not a hero through great qualities, but through flaws, and how one will overcome them. In the novel Dr. Faustus, by Christopher Marlowe, Faustus represents a great man with stature and personality, but is also a man with many sins. Dr. Faustus sells his soul to Lucifer and pertains to black magic in order to become powerful and influential in the world. He gives up his scholarly beginnings in order to pursue the opposite for more power. We learn that Faustus’ desires control him and his nature by manipulating him to take the easy, yet fearful road, instead of the steady, heavenly process. Dr Faustus goes from a man who wants more “of power, of honor, [and] omnipotence” (1.1.52) the moral way to obtaining these possessions in a hasty and deceitful manner through black magic and the Dark Side. His tragic hero qualities are revealed through his bad desires for honor and authority; his fatal flaw for power, his self-enlightenment as he realizes that his mistakes caused him the misery and suffering, and through the provoking catharsis that the reader engages as Faustus is pitied for in the finale.
Dr. Faustus is a simple, common man who possesses good and bad desires through various actions and features of his personality. These desires overpower his true abilities in obtaining authority and recognition. Faustus portrays a vast amount of sinful desires and feelings that will not allow him to repent himself when he makes a mistake later on in the novel. He ponders to himself if “Canst thou not be saved! What boots it then to think on God or heaven?” (2.1.2-4) His mind is now leaning towards the view that God cannot be our savior unless we have a sign or something significant to show us we will be saved. Faustus questions why must we rely on God and the heavens to save us? Why can’t one attain power another way? He bel...
In the novel...