The title character in Christopher Marlowe’s play
Doctor Faustus is more complex than the title character in the
medieval morality play Everyman in a number of ways, including the
following:
- Faustus is very well educated,
whereas Everyman apparently is not. Faustus’s education makes his involvement with the
devil even more blameworthy than Everyman’s sins. Faustus’s education should have made
him know better than to sell his soul to Satan. - In
particular, Faustus has studied theology, whereas Everyman’s knowledge of the teachings
of the church seems to be quite rudimentary. - Faustus
actively chooses to consort with evil and to embrace it, whereas Everyman seems (at
first) largely ignorant of his shortcomings. - Faustus
actively chooses evil, whereas Everyman’s main failing seems to be an insufficient
number of good deeds. - Faustus is warned by Mephastophilis
about the dangers of selling his soul to Satan, but he chooses to ignore such warnings.
Everyman, in contrast, responds almost immediately and positively to the teachings he
receives, from Death as well as from other characters. - At
the end of Doctor Faustus, the title character cannot seem to
decide how to behave. He feels tempted to ask for God’s help but never really does. He
is extremely conflicted. In contrast, by the end of Everyman the
title character has fully embraced his good deeds and walks into the grave with her
without hesitation and indeed with real anticipation and joy. Everyman has learned his
lessons well; Doctor Faustus, in contrast, never expresses genuine or deep regret for
the evil he has chosen. - Ironically, Doctor Faustus is the
more complex of the two characters (especially intellectually), but in some ways he is
also the more obviously foolish and stupid.
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