About the Playwright
Christopher Marlowe (1564–1593) was an English playwright, poet, and translator of the Elizabethan era, widely regarded as one of the most significant figures of English Renaissance theatre. Born in Canterbury, Marlowe studied at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, where he earned his MA degree. He was a contemporary of William Shakespeare, and many scholars consider him the dominant playwright of the English stage before Shakespeare rose to prominence.
Marlowe is credited with establishing blank verse — unrhymed iambic pentameter — as the standard form for English dramatic writing, a form that Shakespeare would later perfect. His major works include Tamburlaine the Great (Parts I and II), The Jew of Malta, Edward II, and The Tragical History of the Life and Death of Doctor Faustus. These plays are unified by their exploration of overreaching protagonists — characters who challenge the limits imposed by God, society, and mortality.
Marlowe's own life was shadowed by controversy: he was suspected of atheism, worked as a government spy, and died under mysterious circumstances at the age of 29. His brief career nonetheless left an indelible mark on English literature, establishing the tragic hero as a figure defined by ambition, transgression, and inevitable downfall.
Background & Context
Doctor Faustus was written approximately between 1592 and 1593, during the height of the English Renaissance. The play is based on the German legend of Faust — a historical figure, Johann Georg Faust, a wandering alchemist and magician reputed to have sold his soul to the Devil in exchange for knowledge and power. This legend circulated widely in Europe and was compiled into a prose narrative, Historia von D. Johann Fausten (1587), which Marlowe used as his primary source.
The Elizabethan period was a time of intense intellectual ferment: the Renaissance was challenging medieval religious orthodoxy, humanism was elevating human reason and ambition, and the Reformation had reshaped Christian theology. Against this backdrop, Marlowe's Doctor Faustus engages directly with the tension between human aspiration and Christian doctrine — between the new Renaissance spirit of limitless inquiry and the older Christian framework of sin, repentance, and divine judgment.
The play also inherits the tradition of the Morality Play — a medieval dramatic form in which allegorical figures representing virtues and vices battle for the soul of a central Everyman figure. While Marlowe transforms this structure into a humanist tragedy, the foundational Christian moral framework remains intact and operational throughout the play.
Key Concepts Explained
1. Dr. Faustus as a Morality Play / Christian Play
The video explains the question: "Is Dr. Faustus a Christian play?" — a standard BA English Honours Semester 2 assignment question. The answer is yes, and the following elements demonstrate why.
What to include in the assignment answer:
2. The Play's Setting: A Christian Universe
The world of Doctor Faustus is entirely framed within a Christian cosmological environment. As the transcript explains, in this play:
This cosmic framework is not incidental; it is the very architecture of the play's moral universe. The struggle for Faustus's soul is conducted within the terms of Christian theology.
3. The Battle Between Good and Evil
The most prominent Christian element in the play is the allegorical battle between Good and Evil — a defining feature of the Morality Play tradition. Throughout the drama, a Good Angel and an Evil Angel appear at key moments to pull Faustus in opposite directions:
This conflict externalises Faustus's internal moral struggle, making visible the Christian drama of temptation and the possibility of redemption.
4. The Theme of Sin
The central sin in the play is pride (hubris). As explained in the transcript, Faustus's primary transgression is that he became excessively proud and arrogant ("bahut zyada pride aa gaya tha, ghamandi ho gaya tha"). This connects directly to Christian teaching: pride is the deadliest of the Seven Deadly Sins — it is the sin of Lucifer himself, who fell from Heaven because of his refusal to submit to God.
Faustus desires knowledge beyond all human limits — he wishes to be "as great as Lucifer," to command the elements, to know all things, and to exercise godlike power. This ambition, while intellectually compelling, constitutes a direct violation of the Christian principle of humility before God.
5. The Theme of Redemption
Redemption — the possibility of being forgiven and saved — is central to Christian doctrine and runs as a persistent undercurrent throughout the play. The Good Angel repeatedly offers Faustus the chance to repent and be forgiven. God's mercy, within Christian theology, is available to any sinner who genuinely repents.
However, the tragedy is that Faustus never takes this chance in earnest. He wavers, considers repentance, but is always pulled back by Mephistopheles, his own pride, or the allure of the pleasures his pact affords him.
6. The Christian Doctrine of Repentance — and Its Limits
The transcript makes a crucial theological distinction central to understanding the play's ending:
> "In Christianity, as long as a person is alive, there is the possibility of repentance and salvation. BUT — if a person is still in the state of sin at the moment of death, there is no second chance. It is straight to Hell."
This is precisely what happens to Faustus. In his final soliloquy — one of the most powerful passages in Elizabethan drama — Faustus desperately pleads with God, expresses regret, and wishes to repent. He prays for mercy. But:
This is the tragic irony: Faustus wanted to be saved at the end, but the time for choosing salvation had passed. The play enacts the Christian moral that delay in repentance is spiritually fatal.
7. The Tragic Ending as Christian Moral Warning
The ending of the play — Faustus dragged to Hell by demons — functions as a moral exemplum in the Christian tradition. The play's basic message, as stated in the transcript, is:
> "A human being should stop doing wrong deeds. One should not be arrogant. And one should repent in time — not at the last moment."
This is the fundamental Christian moral lesson that the play dramatises. It is not merely a secular tragedy of wasted genius; it is a Christian cautionary tale about the consequences of pride, the necessity of timely repentance, and the reality of divine judgment.