Doctor Faustus (Marlowe) Literary Elements

drama; tragedy; allegory

Medieval Wiitenberg, Germany; Rome; Kingdom of Holy Roman Empire

Doctor Faustus features a Chorus who acts as a narrator and commentator on the events of the play. This element of the play was adopted from Ancient Greek Tragedy.

dark, doomed, tragicomic

The protagonist of Doctor Faustus is Faustus, while the antagonist is Lucifer and his servants.

The central conflict of the play is that Faustus rejects Christianity and makes a pact with the Devil, promising his soul to Lucifer.

The climax of the play occurs fairly early, when Faustus signs his contract with Mephistopheles and seals his fate as a servant of the Devil.

When Faustus signs the contract with Lucifer in blood, his blood congeals on the page. This is an example of foreshadowing because it suggests that his own body is rejecting the agreement and that he should repent instead to save himself.

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The play features a number of allusions to Ancient Greek and Roman mythology and philosophy. It also alludes to various historical figures like Agrippa of Germany and Alexander the Great.

Important imagery in the play includes devils, sins, blood, and portraits of dominion or omnipotence.

One of the primary paradoxes in the play is the fact that Faustus aligns himself with the Devil while still relying on Christian paradigms and vocabulary to assess and describe the events of his life.

Two plots run parallel to one another throughout the play: Faustus's interactions with Mephistopheles and the antics of Wittenberg's peasants – Robin, Dick, and Wagner.

Lucifer, or Satan, often appears metonymically in the play, as his various servants like Mephistopheles come to represent him.

In a parade of the Seven Deadly Sins, each sin is personified as a real entity and brought on stage to explain their origin story. This was a common trope in Medieval English morality plays and early modern audiences would have likely recognized these characters right away.