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How does the final scene of Doctor Faustus show Faustus’s despair?
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Christopher Marlowe
Detail of a portrait thought to be of Christopher Marlowe, dated 1585, artist unknown; in the collection of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, England.
In the final scene of Christopher Marlowe’s The Tragicall History of the Life and Death of Doctor Faustus, Faustus’s despair is expressed through his frantic, agonizing realization that his time has run out and his soul is irrevocably claimed by the devil.1
His desperation manifests in several ways:
- Urgent Entreaties: Faustus makes desperate, final pleas to be saved by Christ, acknowledging that even a single drop of Christ’s blood could offer salvation, yet he feels physically restrained from reaching it.1
- Awareness of Divine Wrath: He experiences a terrifying vision of God’s "ireful brows," which highlights his profound sense of abandonment and the weight of his impending judgment.1
- Desire for Annihilation: Overcome by the horror of his fate, he begs the mountains and hills to fall upon him, hoping to be hidden from the "heavy wrath of God".1
Marlowe uses these moments to portray Faustus’s intellectual ambitions as ultimately futile and self-destructive, capturing the tragic grandeur of a soul caught between the desire for redemption and the reality of his damnation.1