LECTURES 6-7 CHRISTOPHER MARLOWE (1564-1593)

Life. Christopher Marlowe was born in Canterbury in 1564 (the same year of birth as Shakespeares). Though only a shoemaker, his father supported him financially to attend the Kings School in Canterbury, wherefrom, having gained a scholarship, the young Christopher continued his studies at the Corpus Christi College in Cambridge. During his years at the university, Marlowe wrote short plays and literary works that suggested an early interest in drama. Although he was awarded his B.A. in 1584, it was only in 1587, after Elizabeth Is Privy Council intervened, that he could get his M.A. degree. The reluctance of university authorities to confer him this second degree was largely motivated by Marlowes long absences from college. A document sent to the university by the Privy Council seemed to suggest that, far from becoming a convert to Roman Catholicism and choosing to study at Rheims, as rumour went about, he was actually sent in France on a mission of political importance, in other words, he was a government spy. After leaving Cambridge, Marlowe moved to London where he became a playwright and led a turbulent, scandal-plagued life. He produced seven plays, all of which were immensely popular, in which he pioneered the use of blank verse, which many of his contemporaries (including Shakespeare) later adopted. Yet, in 1593, his career was cut short. Accused of maintaining beliefs contrary to those of the approved religion, he was arrested, brought before the Court of the Star Chamber and then put on a sort of probation. On May 30th, 1593, shortly after his being released, he got involved in a tavern fight and was stabbed to death. After his death, rumours were spread accusing him of treason, atheism, and homosexuality, and some people speculated that the tavern brawl might have been the work of government agents. Nevertheless, little evidence has come to light to support these allegations. (For a more detailed presentation of Marlowes biography, see Jump, 1968: xvii-xxi and Honan, 2007) Works. While still in Cambridge, Marlowe wrote his first play Dido, Queen of Carthage (possibly in co-operation with Thomas Nashe Roston, 1982: 159) and perhaps even outlined the first part of Tamburlaine the Great. Marlowe also turned out to be an excellent translator in verse of Ovids Amores and of the first book of Lucans Pharsalia, as well as a gifted poet (see The Passionate Shepherd to His Love, a short love lyric suffused with genuine feelings set forth in a simple language which occasioned Walter Raleighs response in The Nymphs Reply; and Hero and Leander, consisting of about 800 lines of heroic couplets of remarkable sensuality and musicality, completed by George Chapman) (See Gavriliu, 2000: 108). After having settled in London, working with Lord Admirals Men, Marlowe wrote for the stage the following plays: - Tamburlaine the Great, parts 1 and 2 (written and performed in 1587-8 and published in 1590); - The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus (written perhaps in 1588-9); - The Jew of Malta (about 1589-91); - Edward II (about 1592) - The Massacre at Paris (1593). Each of Marlowes plays is, in a sense, a tour de force, a special creation (despite the fact that some of the plays like The Jew of Malta, Dido and The Massacre at Paris are not, according to some scholars, as well written as the others). Marlowes first and most important service to drama was the improvement of blank verse. Robert Greene had condemned its use as being unscholarly; Sackville and Norton had used it, but were not able to lift it above commonplace, confining it to isolated lines, all made after one rhythmical pattern, with the same number of feet and the csura always in place, following one another, with no grouping according to thought. Marlowe invented numberless variations while still keeping the satisfying rhythm within a recurring pattern. Sometimes he left a redundant syllable, or left the line one syllable short, or moved the position of the csura. He grouped his lines 1

according to the thought and adapted his various rhythms to the ideas. Thus blank verse became a living organism, plastic, brilliant, and finished. (Bellinger, 1927) Marlowes second best gift to drama was his conception of the heroic tragedy built on a grand scale, with the three-fold unity of character, impression, and interest, instead of the artificial unities of time and place. Before his time, tragedies were built either according to the loose style of the chronicle, or within the mechanical framework of the Senecan model; but, in either case, the dramatic unity attained by the Greeks was lacking. Marlowe (), with his disregard of the so-called classic rules, [was] in fact much nearer the spirit of Aeschylus and Sophocles than the slavish followers of the pseudo-classic schools (Bellinger, 1927) (And so was William Shakespeare.) Marlowe appears to have been fascinated by challenge of the established order in its cosmic and human dimensions. We sense in this () the projection of a self that was no less daring, yet at the same time caught up in guilt and remorse. (Bevington and Rasmussen, 1998: vii) Thus, coming to London obsessed with fantastic aspirations, Marlowe painted gigantic ambitions, desires for impossible things, longings for a beauty beyond earthly conception, and sovereigns destroyed by the very powers which had raised them to their thrones. Tamburlaine, Faustus, Barabas are personifications of arrogance and insatiable ambition, lust for power and wealth. Despite the touch of the extravagant or bombastic, or even of the puerile, that sometimes characterises his plays, and his inability to portray women (none of his plays deals with love as the main theme), or the fact that his world is not altogether our world, but a remote field of the imagination, his plays managed to impose a standard upon all succeeding theatrical compositions and to pave thus the way for the rise of the greatest drama of English history (Bellinger, 1927). In England, Marlowe was the first to give expression to that fascination with human power in its magnificence and its temptations, its splendour and its corrupting influence. His major plays, in fact, explore in sequence four aspects of such power imperial power in Tamburlaine, acquisitive in The Jew of Malta, monarchal in Edward II, and demoniacal in Dr. Faustus. His purpose, it would seem, is not to subvert the established order. It is rather that in his imaginative conjuring up of such awesome might, swept along by the excitement of the vision, he transgresses at times the narrower bounds imposed by conventional religious or hierarchical norms. (Roston, 1982: 162) TAMBURLAINE THE GREAT, Parts I and 2 (c. 1587-8) The play opens with a Prologue in which Marlowe announces his intention of shaking off the dramas vulgar bonds of rhyme and doggerel and appeals to the audience for the appreciation of heroic themes heroically expressed (Gavriliu, 2000: 105). Drawing upon a Spanish account, translated into English in 1571, of Timur the Lame (known commonly as Tamerlane), Marlowe presents the spectacular rise to power of a humble shepherd whose marshal prowess and brilliant generalship eventually win him the command of the entire Mongol empire. (Roston, 1982: 160) Both the vastness of Tamburlaines achievement and the bloodiness of his acts are manifest in the description of him on the 1590 title page: Tamburlaine the Great, who from a Scythian shepherd, by his rare and wonderful conquests became a most puissant and mighty monarch, and for his tyranny and terror in war was termed the scourge of God. (Bevington and Rasmussen, 1998: ix) Tamburlaine is an ambitious Scythian Shepherd who, endowed with great physical strength, fierce looks and irresistible powers of speech, comes down from the hills of Samarqand to conquer the Middle East. In Part I, he first appears as the leader of a group of caravan robbers. In one of his raids, he captures Zenocrate, the Sultan of Egypts daughter, who was on her way to her nuptials with the King of Arabia. Tamburlaine falls in love with her and is determined to make her his wife when he would conquer an empire worthy of such a fair princess. Meanwhile, Mycetes, the King of Persia, has heard of Tamburlaines designs on the throne of Persia and sends one of his lords, Theridamas, with a thousand horsemen, to take Tamburlaine prisoner. Yet, Tamburlaine makes excellent use of his eloquence and convinces Theridamas and his 2

cavalry to join his ranks. Cosroe, Mycetess brother, hopes to take advantage of Tamburlaines power to take his brothers crown; so, he promises Tamburlaine preferment if he helps him overthrow Mycetes. Tamburlaine and his followers agree with the pact only to turn on Cosroe, after defeating Mycetes, and take Persia for themselves. Though Zenocrate is in love with Tamburlaine and he got the Persian crown, Tamburlaine still thinks that he has too little to offer to Zenocrates great beauty. His insatiable ambition impels him next to go against Bajazeth, the Emperor of Turkey. Taken prisoners, Bajazeth and his wife Zabina are carried around in a cage, with cruel taunts till they dash out their brains against the bars of the cage. In spite of Zenocrates pleas, Tamburlaine marches against her native Egypt that is defended by her father, the Sultan, and her former betrothed, the King of Arabia. The latter is killed, while the former is spared and becomes one of kings that pay tribute to Tamburlaine. Finally, Tamburlaine feels ready to marry Zenocrate and crowns her Queen of Persia. The subversive thrust of Part I of Tamburlaine begins with its portrayal of life at the top. None of the rulers whom Tamburlaine overthrows is worthy to occupy a throne. () Authority, as practiced in the Middle Eastern world by autocratic rulers, is corrupt and incapable of defending itself. Tamburlaines opportunity for limitless self-advancement arises from the universal failures of the present power structure. Tamburlaine is not slow to meet the challenge. He knows he is destined for great things, though of humble origin. () To be human is to climb always after knowledge infinite, restlessly exerting ourselves Until we reach the ripest fruit of all,/ That perfect bliss and sole felicity,/ The sweet fruition of an earthly crown. (24-9) () A great part of Tamburlaines enormous appeal for an audience lies in his embodying the idea that we can make of ourselves what we will, and that a dying patrician social order will fall before us. The idea galvanizes us even as we see its revolutionary implications. Human aspiration is potentially both constructive and destructive; most of all, it is an irreducible fact. Tamburlaines appeal manifests itself in his mesmerizing ability to win followers, in his serene self-consistency in the art of war or wooing, in his utter loyalty to those who serve him, in his vision of greatness. () He is inhumanly cruel, and laughs at the suffering of his victims. His self-vaunting can easily turn to rant, as when he boasts: I hold the Fates bound fast in iron chains/ And with my hand turn Fortunes wheel about (I.2.174-5). He is both a darling of the gods and a terrible scourge; he both acts in the name of the powers above and seeks their overthrow. () He is alternatively a god, or fiend, or spirit of the earth (15). (Bevington and Rasmussen, 1998: x-xi) Evidently written at a later date due to the immense popularity of Part I (partly owed to the actor Edward Alleyn who played Tamburlaines part), Part II of Tamburlaine the Great is anticlimactic and details Tamburlaines subsequent victories and inglorious death. Time passes. Tamburlaine has three sons. His wife Zenocrate, prematurely aged, dies in the second act. The cowardice of his own son Calyphas, whom he kills, shakes Tamburlaines confidence. The last act of his blazing career is an insane orgy of atrocity that ends in death. Tamburlaine harnesses the captive kings of Trebizond and Soria to his chariot. In his ultimate expression of outrageous hybris (excessive pride or self-confidence; arrogance), Tamburlaine defies Muhammad himself by burning the Koran and he dies of illness as he plans a triumphal feast in Persia. Tamburlaine pronounces his own sentence, as though the author of his own fate at last: For Tamburlaine, the scourge of God, must die (V.3.248). Both parts of Tamburlaine dramatize the limitless assertion of the individual will, even if they also perceive the ironies and paradoxes of human striving. (Bevington and Rasmussen, 1998: xii) Understandably perhaps, the romantics saw in Marlowe a Promethean rebel against divine authority, and in subsequent years he was widely regarded, partly on the basis of the charge of atheism, as a man inwardly committed to Machiavellianism and only outwardly conforming for safetys sake to the requirements of Christian belief. () We are therefore left with the strange phenomenon of a dramatist apparently challenging the moral assumptions of Christian belief and yet at the same time basically conforming to them. (Roston, 1982: 161) 3

() the Senecan tradition of off-stage action reported by a messenger was clearly being deserted, while the goriness of those Senecan off-stage scenes, heightened to blood-curdling effect by the need to recreate them verbally, was retained now that they were being performed in full view. (Roston, 1982: 164) Influences of Tamburlaine the Great may be identified in Shakespeares Richard III, a play which displays similar concentration on the unity of character. Richard, like Tamburlaine, seeks exceptional power and is deterred by no moral or religious scruples from attaining his ends. In creating Tamburlaine, Marlowe innovated the old pattern of the stage hero and created the prototype of the Renaissance egoist, the audacious villain, a figure as enthralling as Miltons Satan (Gavriliu, 2000: 105-6). THE TRAGICAL HISTORY OF DOCTOR FAUSTUS (later published as THE TRAGICAL HISTORY OF THE LIFE AND DEATH OF DOCTOR FAUSTUS) (date of composition uncertain about 1588/ 1592) Date of composition: Considering the dates of publication of the texts that served, directly or indirectly as sources to Marlowes play, i.e., 1587 for the prose work, in German, of an anonymous Lutheran, entitled Historia von D. Iohan Fausten, and 1592 for its translation into English, by an unidentified translator P. F., under the title The Historie of the damnable life, and deserved death of Doctor Iohn Faustus, scholars have advanced several possible hypotheses about the plays date of composition. Thus, assuming that the play was based on the English translation of the German source, some have concluded that it must have been written about 1592. Others have claimed that the play could have been written three or four years earlier, but such a claim is not entirely valid if one takes into account the remarkable emotional maturity of the best scenes of this play, so different in tone and atmosphere from those in Tamburlaine the Great. Last but not least, starting from documentary references to A ballad of the life and death of Doctor Faustus the great Cunngerer, which was mentioned in the Stationers Register on February 1589 and to a certain performance of Doctor Faustus at the Theatre in Shoreditch in 1590-1, certain scholars have suggested 1588-9 as the possible date of composition. However, none of the theories has been sustained by irrefutable evidence, so the date of composition of Doctor Faustus must be held as only provisional. (Jump, 1968: xxii-xxiv) Sources: The idea of an individual selling his/her soul to the devil for knowledge is an old motif in Christian folklore. It seems that, in early sixteenth century, it came to be attached to the historical persona of Georgius or Johannes Faustus, a strolling scholar and reputed magician whose public career extended from about 1510 to about 1540 (Jump, 1968: xxxviii). The stories that were associated with his name spread widely taking different textual forms in ballad and prose, either as a folkloristic lesson not to dabble in devilry or for the entertainment offered by the farcical tricks he plays on others when in possession of supernatural powers (Roston, 1982: 169). In England, the legend was first mentioned in 1572 in the English translation of Lewes Lauateruss Of ghostes and spirites walking by nyght. In the spiritual climate of the time, the legend acquired a strongly anti-papal colouring; and it was evidently a Lutheran who compiled the German Historia von D. Iohan Fausten in 1587. His moral tale achieved immediate popularity and within only five years, in 1592, its English translation was issued (Jump, 1968: xxxviii). More of a free adaptation, The Damnable Life took obvious liberties with the German original. On the one hand, it added considerably to the record of Faustuss travels across Italy and to the account about Rome. On the other hand, P.Fs version departed from the German original by ascribing to Faustus genuine intellectual ardour. By touches of this kind, [the translator] was already beginning to modify Faustus in one of the ways in which Marlowe was completely to transform him. (Jump, 1968: xl) In addition, several scholars suggested that a number of other, minor sources may have determined Marlowes presentation of Faustus. In this respect, reference was made to the European 4

literature of witchcraft, which Marlowe was familiar with and might have used to enrich Faustuss portrait as found in The Damnable Life, as well as to John Foxes Acts and Monuments better known as The Book of Martyrs (as short passages from scene viii indicate). (See Jump, 1968: xli) Editions: 1604 a black-lettered quarto bearing the title The Tragicall History of D. Faustus: the earliest and most authoritative print of what is generally known as the A-text of Doctor Faustus (re-issued in 1609 and 1611); 1616 another black-lettered quarto bearing the title The Tragicall History of the Life and Death of Doctor Faustus: a radically different text distinguished as the B-text (re-issued in 1619, 1620, 1624, 1628 and 1631). Differences between the A-text and the B-text: The A-text (1,517 lines) is much shorter than the B-text (2,212 lines), most likely an abbreviated version of the B-text. (The B-text includes elaborated versions of Faustuss arrival in Rome and of the incidents of the last three scenes of the play.) The A-text contains scenes of clownage elaborated in a manner that would strengthen their appeal to unsophisticated audiences, suitable for acting on a bare stage. Some of them were preserved but re-written in the B-text. Authorship: Inconsistencies in Faustuss evolution as a character and in the style of the scenes have drawn attention upon the play most likely being the result of the collaboration between Christopher Marlowe and a so far still anonymous author: [The plays] characteristic subject leaves us in little doubt that it was [Marlowe] who conceived the play; and the verse style of its most important scenes, together with the occasional echoes of his other works found in them, makes it clear that these scenes came from his pen. But they show us a tragic Faustus oscillating between arrogance and remorse, a very different Faustus from the cheerful anti-papist wonder-worker of the scenes at Rome, at the imperial court, and at Vanholt. This second Faustus is the creation, surely, of another author. (Jump, 1968: xlii) In their attempts at discovering the identity of Marlowes collaborator in this play, scholars have come to the conclusion that the likeliest seem to be Samuel Rowley and Thomas Nashe. Marlowes collaborator, whoever he was, or his collaborators, whoever they were, evidently worked in subordination to him. Marlowe had presumably conceived the play; and, writing its crucial scenes himself, he made essentially his own. (Jump, 1968: xlv) Morality play elements: Faustus the mankind figure of his own morality play; characters grouped in pairs that either offer Faustus wise counsel or drive him to temptation and despair: the Good and Evil Angels; the Old Man and Mephistopheles; the Scholars and Valdes and Cornelius, Faustuss fellow magicians; comic scenes: the alternation of serious action with scenes of buffoonish revelling in sin. (vezi Bevington and Rasmussen, xii-xiii) Play synopsis and analysis: The opening speech of the Chorus announces his purpose. Faustus, a man of humble origin, has acquired great learning; but his arrogance will cause him to overreach and ruin himself. We are to witness a tragedy of presumption. This motive held a strong attraction for the poet whose most favoured character had declared that Nature Doth teach us all to have aspiring minds (I Tamburlaine, II. vii. 20). The attraction makes itself felt from the beginning of the play. In the first scene, Faustus dismisses the traditional subjects of study and turns instead to magic. With impatient scorn, he rejects philosophy, medicine, law, and divinity; and with almost breathless eagerness he contemplates the world of profit and delight, of power, of honour, of omnipotence (i. 52-3) which he expects to enjoy as a magician. The whole earth, and the winds and clouds above it, will be subject to his control. While waiting for 5

his friends Valdes and Cornelius, who are to instruct him in concealed arts (i. 101), he swiftly reviews some of the widely varied uses to which he intends to put the skill he seeks. These testify to his ardent curiosity, his desire for wealth and luxury, and his nationalism, as well as to the longing for power which he has already voiced. Such qualities mark him unmistakably as a man of the Renaissance; and a whole series of allusions maintains throughout the scene our sense of the extended horizons of that age of discovery. Faustus craves for gold from the East Indies, for pearl from the depths of the ocean, and for pleasant fruits and princely delicates (i. 84) from America; Valdes refers to the Indians in the Spanish colonies, to Lapland giants, to the argosies of Venice, and to the annual plate-fleet which supplied the Spanish treasury from the New World. There was much here to fire the imaginations of English theatregoers; and they would heartily approve of Faustus determination to chase the Prince of Parma from the Netherlands. After all, only the defeat of the Spanish Armada had prevented Parma from invading England in 1588. Nor were Englishmen ignorant of the fiery keel at Antwerps bridge (i. 95). Its Italian inventor had been in the English service in 1588; and the Spaniards had recalled his hell-burner when the fireships were loosed against them off Calais. So Faustus dream of power includes much that must have appealed strongly to the people for whom Marlowe wrote; and the liveliness and zest with which it is expressed show that much in it must likewise have appealed strongly to the poet himself. At the same time, Faustus declaration, A sound magician is a demi-god (i. 61), forces us to recognize the presumptuous nature of his ambition. He evidently aspires to be something more than a man. Without surprise, we learn that his conscience is uneasy. Not that he admits as much at this stage; but the internal conflict is externalized for us in the admonitions of his Good and Bad Angels. The first sentence of the Good Angel, a warning against incurring Gods heavy wrath (i. 71), crystallizes our fears for one who has much of our sympathy; and these fears are augmented when, in the following scene, the two Scholars perceive the danger of his soul (ii. 31). Faustus, however, persists in his chosen course. In scene iii, he succeeds in calling up Mephostophilis and proposes his bargain with Lucifer; in scene v, he signs his soul away to Lucifer and questions Mephostophilis about hell; in scene vi, he questions Mephostophilis about astronomy and is later entertained by an infernal show of the Seven Deadly Sins which is designed to distract him from thoughts of repentance. But matters go less smoothly than this summary suggests. During these three scenes, Faustus suffers a number of rebuffs. Having performed the ritual by which, he believes, the spirits are enforcd to rise (iii. 13), he naturally regards the appearance of Mephostophilis as a proof that he can order him about. He proceeds to do so with a quite absurd arrogance. Mephostophilis disillusions him. Faustus charms, he explains, did not compel him to come; they merely drew his attention to Faustus attractively sinful frame of mind, and he came of his own accord, in hope to get his glorious soul (iii. 51). In scene v, after the signature of the bond, Faustus asks for a wife. Marriage is a sacrament, however; so Mephostophilis cannot give him one. Moreover, it may well be that Faustus presumptuous isolation of himself from his fellow-men is making him incapable of marriage. Mephostophilis reply takes the form of a crude practical joke, followed by a promise of concubines galore. In scene vi, when Faustus questions him about astronomy, Mephostophilis tells him nothing Wagner could not have told him; and, when Faustus asks who made the world, Mephostophilis, reluctant to acknowledge the Creator, refuses to say. His refusal provokes a crisis in their relations. Anyone less infatuated than Faustus might have inferred from these rebuffs that the power he was acquiring so presumptuously fell far short of the omnipotence of which he had dreamed. Faustus, however, brings himself to disregard not only these checks but also several quite explicit warnings. Of these, the most obvious is provided by the congealing of his blood, and its forming the words Homo fuge (v 77), when he is busy signing the bond with it. Even Lucifers grotesque show of the Seven Deadly Sins, with Pride appropriately at their head, can be seen as potentially admonitory in effect, whatever may have been the impresarios intention and Faustus actual response to the performance. But the most eloquent warnings come from that melancholy, somber, tortured and surprisingly truthful fiend, Mephostophilis himself. Within fifty lines of their first 6

meeting, Faustus asks him what caused the fall of Lucifer. Mephostophilis ascribes it correctly to aspiring pride and insolence (iii, 70), that is, to factors such as are visible in Faustus himself. And what are you, inquires Faustus, that live with Lucifer?
Meph. Unhappy spirits that fell with Lucifer, Conspird against our God with Lucifer, And are for ever damnd with Lucifer. Fau. Where are you damnd? Meph. In hell. Fau. How comes it then that thou art out of hell? Meph. Why, this is hell, nor am I out of it. Thinkst thou that I, who saw the face of God And tasted the eternal joys of heaven, Am not tormented with ten thousand hells In being deprivd of everlasting bliss? (iii, 72-82)

Mephostophilis, no doubt, means only to voice his own anguish. But his words would have conveyed a warning if Faustus had been capable of receiving one. It is the same after the signing of the bond in scene v. Faustus asks where hell is. Mephostophilis first locates it in the centre of the sublunary, elemental part of the universe, then goes on to speak of it, as he did in scene iii, as the spiritual condition of those who are entirely separated from God:
Hell hath no limits, nor is circumscribd In one self place, but where we are is hell And where hell is, there must we ever be; And, to be short, when all the world dissolves And every creature shall be purifyd, All places shall be hell that is not heaven Fau. I think hells a fable. . Meph. Ay, think so still, till experience change thy mind. (v. 122-9)

Faustus does not merely neglect these warnings. He sweeps them aside with impatient, flippant arrogance. When his blood congeals to prevent his signing away his soul, he asks himself indignantly: is not thy soul thine own? (v. 68). Admittedly, the injunction Homo fuge shakes his complacency for a moment. But he receives the Seven Deadly Sins with unreflecting jocularity; and in his glib and insensitive retorts to Mephostophilis sombre speeches about hell he boastfully asserts his human self-sufficiency. To the first, he replies:
What, is great Mephostophilis so passionate For being deprived of the joys of heaven? Learn thou of Faustus manly fortitude And scorn those joys thou never shalt possess. (iii. 85-8)

In response to the second, he denies the existence of hell:

Meph. But I am an instance to prove the contrary, For I tell thee I am damnd and now in hell. Fau. Nay, and this be hell, Ill willingly be damnd: What, sleeping, eating, walking, and disputing! (v. 137-40)

Faustus, then, concludes an infamous bargain in order to enjoy the knowledge, the pleasure, and above all the power for which he craves. In scene i, we felt a certain degree of sympathy, and even of admiration, for him. This becomes more and more severely qualified as the play proceeds and his swallowing-down of rebuffs and refusals, together with his frivolous dismissal of one warning after another, exposes the inordinate appetite which dominates him. He is wilful, headstrong, and blind. His bargain requires him to abjure God. As early as in the original evocation of Mephostophilis, he is fully prepared to do this. At the beginning, he feels few misgivings. Indeed, scene iii ends with a further expression of the kind of elation which characterized him in scene i. But shortly before signing the bond he wavers. Again the Good and Bad Angels appear and externalize his internal struggle with his conscience. Contrition, prayer, repentance, which could reconcile him with God, are denounced by the Bad Angel as illusions, fruits of lunacy (v. 17-19). Such doctrine helps Faustus to silence the voice of conscience. Once more he achieves the heady 7

elation of scene i, Why, the signory of Emden shall be mine (v. 24), but not before he has glimpsed a further temptation to despair (v. 4). This temptation recurs momentarily when he first sees the words Homo fuge. It confronts him in full strength, however, at the beginning of scene vi. The Bad Angel then assures the man who has abjured God that he is beyond the reach of the divine mercy. Faustus confesses that his heart is hardened, that his conviction of his own damnation prevents him from repenting, and that he has thought of suicide: And long ere this I should have done the deed/ Had not sweet pleasure conquerd deep despair. (vi. 24-5) But fifty lines later, after Mephostophilis refusal to say who made the world, Faustus comes near to achieving repentance. For once, he seems to be listening to the Good Angel, and words of prayer begin to pass his lips. At this crisis, Mephostophilis invokes the aid of Lucifer and Beelzebub. They intimidate Faustus and, as soon as he again abjures God, gratify (vi. 103) him with the show of the Seven Deadly Sins. It is clear from this scene that the legalistic deed of gift which Lucifer required Faustus to sign is not really binding in other words, that his initial sin has not damned him once and for all. The utterances of the Good and Bad Angels on their two appearances would be pointless if it were not possible for Faustus to repent and by so doing to cancel the bond; and the emergency measures taken by Mephostophilis show that he certainly recognizes the possibility. For though [Faustus] had made [Satan] a promise, yet hee might haue remembred throughe true repentance sinners come again into the fauour of God (Damnable Life, xiii). In fact, the deed is validated from minute to minute only by Faustus persistent refusal to relinquish such power as he has acquired by his presumption. So Faustus, abjuring God in the hope of becoming something more than a man, succeeds in fact in separating himself from God, isolating himself in large measure from his fellows, and consigning himself to the hell so powerfully suggested by Mephostophilis in scenes iii and v. Repentance remains possible; he represses yet another spontaneous impulse towards it as late as in scene xv. But it is unlikely to develop in one so lacking in humility and so greedy for the satisfactions, incomplete though they tend to be, which his sin brings him. Incomplete they are indeed in comparison with what he felt able to promise himself in scene i. From scene viii to scene xvii, we watch him exploit his dearly-bought power. He goes on the rampage in the Vatican; he intervenes, effectively but inconclusively, in the strife between the Pope and the Emperor; he conjures for Charles V and revenges himself on a heckler; when the heckler retaliates, he takes a second revenge; he conjures for the Duke and Duchess of Vanholt; he tricks a horse-dealer; and, when the horse-dealer retaliates, he takes his revenge on him, too. For the world of profit and delight which these escapades represent, Faustus voluntarily barters his soul. Admittedly, these passages seem to be mainly the work of Marlowes collaborator; and the change of authorship no doubt accounts for the temporary transformation of Faustus from an ambitious but sometimes fearful sinner into a jaunty pope-baiter and practical joker. But we are entitled to assume that the authors were writing to an agreed scenario, drafted perhaps by Marlowe himself. If they were, they presumably wished us to see that Faustus had made an even worse bargain than had at first appeared; and they presumably meant the rebuffs and refusals which Faustus endures, as already described, in scenes iii, v, and vi to prepare us for this perception. The collaborator had little talent, however, and produced a Faustus who is a poor substitute for Marlowes. Nevertheless, the purpose embodied in the agreed scenario is still traceable in the text of the play. We have observed several crises of conscience on Faustus part. One more of these occurs towards the end of the twenty-four years allowed him in the deed of gift. In scene xviii, an Old Man exhorts him to repent before it is too late:
Though thou hast now offended like a man, Do not persever in it like a devil. Yet, yet, thou hast an amiable soul, If sin by custom grow not into nature: Then, Faustus, will repentance come too late, Then thou art banishd from the sight of heaven; No mortal can express the pains of hell. (xviii. 41-7)

As Greg remarks, this Old Man might almost be the personified abstraction Good Counsel from a morality play. Equally reminiscent of the same older form of drama are Marlowes use throughout of the two Angels, and of the diabolical characters and his taking as his theme the struggle between the forces of good and evil for the soul of a representative man. The good counsel has an immediate effect upon Faustus. But since he lacks faith in Gods mercy, this effect is merely to drive him towards despair: Damnd art thou, Faustus, damnd; despair and die! (xviii. 56) Mephostophilis hands him a dagger, and only the Old Mans intervention and his assurance that Gods mercy is still available prevent Faustus from stabbing himself. As he struggles to repent and fights against despair, Mephostophilis repeats the treatment which proved so successful in scene vi. First he terrorizes Faustus: Revolt, or Ill in piecemeal tear thy flesh (xviii. 76); then, when Faustus has submitted and has offered to renew the bond, he gratifies him with the sweet embraces (xviii. 94) of Helen of Troy. Naturally, this is not Helen herself. Just as the royal shapes/ Of Alexander and his paramour (xii. 45-6) were presented by spirits, so Helen, too, is impersonated by a spirit; and Faustus in embracing her commits the sin of demoniality, or bodily intercourse with demons. The Old Man, learning this, concludes that he can now do nothing for Faustus; and by the next scene, his last, Faustus has finally added to his original presumption and abjuring of God the further mortal sin of despair. Before he surrenders himself to Helen, Faustus utters his famous apostrophe, beginning: Was this the face that launchd a thousand ships/ And burnt the topless towers of Ilium? (xviii. 99100) Frequent allusions in Marlowes works show that he had fed his imagination on classical poetry and classical legend; and here, as already in ll. 23-32, he re-creates in highly evocative romantic terms the world of the Iliad. For this purpose he employs, perhaps for the last time, that formal, lyrical blank verse which he had developed in Tamburlaine. He shapes the latter part of the speech into two stanzas each consisting of three rhymeless couplets, and then adds a concluding unpaired line to take the full weight of the vow with which Faustus finally commits himself:
I will be Paris, and for love of thee Instead of Troy shall Wittenberg be sackd, And I will combat with weak Menelaus And wear thy colours on my plumed crest, Yea, I will wound Achilles in the heel And then return to Helen for a kiss. 0, thou art fairer than the evenings air Clad in the beauty of a thousand stars, Brighter art thou than flaming Jupiter When he appeard to hapless Semele, More lovely than the monarch of the sky In wanton Arethusas azurd arms, And none but thou shalt be my paramour. (xviii. 106-18)

Throughout this rhapsody we hear once more the note of elation which was so strong in the earlier scenes of the play; and the long continued popularity of the speech apart from its context shows that readers have been able without misgiving to take it as expressing a simple, eager aspiration. But the speech is actually addressed to a fiend who will indeed suck forth Faustus soul; it is the immediate prelude to the sin which plunges him into irremediable despair; and its significance is underlined by the presence during most of it of the Old Man, whose comment becomes vocal at its close. Arousing these conflicting responses, the incident may reasonably be regarded as epitomizing the basic theme of the whole play. By scene xix, then, Faustus has entirely lost hope. In a prose passage which must be one of the very few we have by Marlowe, he takes a moving farewell of the Scholars. Mephostophilis assures him that it is now it is now too late to repent; and when the Angels enter immediately afterwards they merely moralize upon the fact of his damnation. There follows the great soliloquy which expresses Faustus states of mind and feeling during his last hour. There is general agreement that this is Marlowes most mature passage of dramatic verse. It contrasts sharply not merely with the set speeches in Tamburlaine but even with the apostrophe to Helen. Whereas they are passages of more or less formal eloquence, this develops flexibly, 9

unpredictably, even disconcertingly Shrinking in terror, Faustus first addresses himself in a long series of monosyllables terminated emphatically by the polysyllable which focuses his dread: Now hast thou but one bare hour to live,/ And then thou must be damnd perpetually (xix. 134-5). He appeals for time, for A year, a month, a week, a natural day (xix. 140) in which to repent, thus implicitly admitting that his deed of gift did not make repentance impossible; and this culminates in his poignant quotation of a line of Latin verse. Ovid, whom he quotes, wished to lengthen out the pleasure of the night; Faustus wishes simply to postpone the anguish of the morrow. The uselessness of the appeal is conveyed in a two-line sentence which, starting with an almost stately slowness, accelerates sharply to allude again to his imminent damnation: The stars move still, time runs, the clock will strike,/ The devil will come, and Faustus must be damnd (xix. 143-4). Even as late as this, he has an intimation of the divine mercy, though it is now unattainable by him: See, see where Christs blood streams in the firmament! (xix. 146) and he seems to strain upwards in the broken alexandrine which immediately follows. Again he quails when tormented by the fiends; and by calling desperately upon Lucifer to spare him he surrenders himself afresh. Enough has been said, perhaps, to display something of the dramatic urgency and widely varied expressiveness of this great monologue, in which Faustus shows himself agonizingly aware of the heavy wrath of God (xix. 153) against which his Good Angel warned him in scene i. Towards its close, he forswears his humanism. Having prided himself on his self-reliance, and having even striven to be more than a man, he now longs to be less than a man; he wishes he could be a creature wanting soul (xix. 172), some brutish beast (xix. 176), which at death would face mere extinction and not eternal damnation. He curses his parents for engendering him. No doubt the books (xix. 190) which he offers to burn are primarily his books of magic. But the word reminds us of his exclamation to the Scholars earlier in the scene: O, would I had never seen Wittenberg, never read book! (xix. 45-6); and we retain the impression that Faustus is ascribing his downfall in part to his learning. Hearing or reading these concluding lines, and relating them to all that has preceded them, we can surely have no hesitation in thinking of Faustus as embodying the new inquiring and aspiring spirit of the age of the Renaissance, and of Marlowe as expressing in this play both his fervent sympathy with that new spirit and, ultimately, his awed and pitiful recognition of the peril into which it could lead those whom it dominated. Perhaps this is not quite the Faustus we should have expected from the Marlowe described in section 1 of this Introduction. But we must beware of assuming too simple a relationship between any artist and his work; and, even if the relationship was in this instance a simple one, Doctor Faustus apparently belongs to the last year of Marlowes life and therefore to the latest stage of whatever development he was undergoing. The farcical prose scenes call for little attention. Naturally, topics which are important in the more serious scenes tend to be echoed in them. Wagner, for example, asserts that Robin would give his soul to the devil for a shoulder of mutton (iv. 9-10); and in scene x Robin conjures up an irate Mephostophilis. No doubt there is a touch of crude burlesque in such places. But the current critical fashion ordains that we should go further and discern in them a profound, subtle, and sustained irony. (Jump, 1968: xlvii lviii) In brief, Dr. Faustus can be seen both as an object lesson of hubris and as a dark speculation on what is intolerable and tragic about divine limits placed on human will. (Bevington and Rasmussen, 1998: xii) [Marlowe] saw within [Faustuss] tale a parable epitomising a central spiritual dilemma of his time and one to which his own character made him particularly prone. () The Tragical History of Dr. Faustus gave voice on the one hand to the power of that temptation to explore uninhibitedly the new areas of knowledge and, on the other, to the dread of damnation which Christian doctrine accorded to the transgressor. Whatever his personal leanings, Marlowes ultimate commitment in this play is to the orthodox religious view, not only in the final scene of Faustus agony. () Yet within that traditional Christian framework the yearning for free intellectual enquiry and for the power which knowledge may bring is compelling, providing a dramatic ambivalence in which the plays appeal resides. (Roston, 1982: 169-70)

10

THE JEW OF MALTA (date of composition uncertain: 1589?, anyway before 1591) The question of Marlowes degree of identification with the ruthless and un-Christian self-interest of his main characters is less acute in Tamburlaine; for although firm in his commitment to his military principles the hero there rarely is vicious by Elizabethan standards of welfare. () The Jew of Malta, however, poses a different problem. Its central character, Barabas, is a figure of unredeemed evil, poisoning wells, destroying the sick, and deliberately driving men into bankruptcy and suicide. Yet he exerts a powerful fascination as we watch him at his machinations, free from the trammels of conventional moral sanctions. (Roston, 1982: 164) The Jew of Malta foregrounds themes of racial tension, religious conflict, and political intrigue, all of which connect, more or less explicitly, with aspects of life in sixteenth-century England. Although set against the background of a real event marking the history of a distant corner of Europe (the 1565 Turkish invasion of Malta), the play hints at the general sense of fear that many English Protestants felt toward those whom they considered outsiders, be they Catholics, Muslims or Jews. Actually, there were no professed Jews in England at that time; they had been banished in 1290 and would be readmitted in 1656 only as converts to Christianity. But, in the context of the religious tensions tearing Elizabethan England, the Jew was synonymous with Judas, an Anti-Christ figure (here bearing the name of the thief for whom Jesus was exchanged, Barabas) much like the villainous Judas figure of the mystery plays. (Roston, 1982: 165) At the same time, the play reflects the reaction to Machiavellianism in Elizabethan England. If the philosophy of ruthless self-interest was morally abhorrent to the audience, the uninhibited power to which it could lead was compelling to the imagination. (Roston, 1982: 165) Thus, one may admire Barabas for his duplicity but, at the same time, resent him for his unfeeling manipulation of human beings. Apart from that, reference should be made to the fact that, by the time Marlowe was writing his play, England was experiencing a late wakening to the challenges of exploration and the search for new sources of wealth. For instance, Walter Ralegh was urging the Queen to empower him to explore the East Indies in search for spoils similar to those brought to Spain by Cortez or to Portugal by Vasco da Gama. So, [i]f Tamburlaine had made the English stage aware of the spaciousness of empires, The Jew of Malta was responding to the infinite riches such expansion could pour into the coffers of the adventurer and the merchant. (Roston, 1982: 166) The play opens with a Prologue narrated by Machiavel, a caricature of Machiavelli (reflecting an English stereotypical and even hysterical view of the Italian author), which functions as a kind of cynical mentor in the art of expedient intrigue. () [T]his Machiavel insists that political rule is a matter of simple might, that religion is but a childish toy, and that there is no sin but ignorance. He is what many Englishmen professed to fear in Machiavelli, an atheist who believes that conscience and morality are mythologies which the crafty prince uses to keep his subjects in awe. When Machiavel recommends Barabas to us as one whose money was not got without my means, we are led to expect a gloating villain. (Bevington and Rasmussen, 1998: xvii) Act I opens by revealing the wealthy Jewish merchant Barabas in his counting house, waiting for news about the return of his ships from the east. Two merchants who join him inform him that the ships have safely reached Malta. Yet, three Jews arrive to let Barabas know that all the Jews in Malta are summoned to the senate-house to meet the governor Ferneze. There, Barabas finds out that, under the threat of invasion, the Maltese government must pay tribute to the Turks and that the money is to be raised from the Jews on the island. When Barabas protests at this unfair treatment that requires each Maltese Jew to give up half of his estate, the governor Ferneze confiscates Barabass entire fortune and decides to turn his house into a convent. Barabas vows revenge and tries to recover ten thousand portagues, besides great pearls,/ Rich, costly jewels, and stones infinite (I.2.245-6) that he had hidden in his house; so, his daughter Abigail must pretend to convert to Christianity and become a nun in order to enter the convent and smuggle her fathers jewels and gold. The end of Act I anticipates the subsequent emergence of a love triangle that Barabas will take advantage of in order to exact his revenge on Ferneze: two young Christian 11

gentlemen are in love with Abigail, Don Mathias and Lodowick, and the latter happens to be the governors son. Act II. Abigail manages to find her fathers treasure and, during the night, throws the bags of gold and jewels off the window so that her father could retrieve them. An encounter between Ferneze and Martin del Bosco, the Spanish Vice-Admiral, who wishes to sell Turkish slaves in the market place, brings about a radical change in the Maltese policy: Del Bosco promises to the Maltese the help and protection of the Spanish king, should they choose to break the alliance with the barbarous, misbelieving Turks (II.3.26). While viewing the slaves, Barabas meets Fernezes son, Lodowick, who seems to take great interest in Abigail. Seeing in that an opportunity to have his vengeance on the governor, Barabas feigns he might agree with such a match. As soon as Lodowick leaves happy that the Jews diamond, i.e. Abigail, will be his, Mathias and his mother Katherine join Barabas. Having purchased a slave, Ithamore of Thrace, the Jew approaches Mathias, already suspicious of Lodowick and Barabass conversation which he observed from afar, and promises to him Abigails hand in marriage. However, the young nobleman does not disclose that to his mother, as she obviously would resent such an alliance with a man cast off from heaven (II.3.159). Barabas is pleased to find out that his slave Ithamore hates Christians and is a villain, just like him; so, he realises that Ithamore could be the perfect instrument for his vengeful plans. An elated Lodowick comes to Barabass house to woo Abigail and, though in love with Mathias, the girl is forced by her father to keep him company. Mathias also arrives to meet Abigail and is tricked by the Jew into believing that Lodowick is determined to have her even against her fathers will. When he seen Lodowick and Abigail together, Mathias becomes jealous and the two young men start to fight. Though aware of his daughters affection for Mathias, Barabas carries on with his Machiavellian machinations and sends Ithamore to Mathias with a challenge feigned from Lodowick (II.3.376). Act III. Having spied on Barabas and discovered that he has still got gold, the courtesan Bellamira and her pimp Pilia-Borza plan to use Ithamore, who is in love with Bellamira, to get access to the Jews treasure and profit from it. Mathias and Lodowick kill each other in a duel and their bodies are found by Katherine, Mathiass mother, and Ferneze, Lodowicks father. The grieving parents decide to inquire the causers of their deaths in order to venge their blood upon their heads (III.2.27-8). Abigail finds Ithamore happy that his masters plan succeeded and laughing at Mathias and Lodowicks gullibility that led them to their death; he tells her of her fathers role in this tragic story. Afflicted by the news of Mathiass death and embittered by her fathers involvement in the events leading to it, Abigail decides to leave and renews her vow of converting to Christianity in front of Friar Jacomo who takes her to the convent. Enraged by his daughters actions, Barabas curses her and is determined to see her dead. So he sends Ithamore, whom he already considers his heir, to take poisoned rice to the nuns. In the next scene, Ferneze receives the Turks messenger, Callapine, but refuses to pay the tribute. Friars Jacomo and Barnardine are urgently called to confess the dying nuns, including Abigail. She tells Jacomo of her father engineering the circumstances under which Mathias and Lodowick died, but she reminds him that the truth was revealed under confession so he could not make that public knowledge. The friars, though, have no intention of really taking that into consideration. Thus, at the beginning of Act IV, while Barabas and Ithamore delight in the nuns deaths, Jacomo and Barnardine approach them with the intention of confronting Barabas. Barabas realises that Abigail has confessed his crimes to Jacomo. Then, the cunning Jew pretends that he wants to convert to Christianity and his promise of giving great sums of money to the order that he will join makes the two friars fight. At night, Barabas and Ithamore strangle Barnardine in his sleep and frame Jacomo for the murder. Bellamira and Pilia-Borza convince Ithamore to blackmail his master in order to get a good share of his money: the slave writes a letter in which he threatens to expose Barabas as a schemer and a murderer unless he sends him three hundred crowns. Barabas is stunned by his slaves arrogance especially since he receives, by the hand of same mediator Pilia-Borza, a second extortion letter in which he asked for five hundred crowns. Threatened by Pilia-Borza, the Jew gives him the money but vows to take his revenge. Happy to have obtained so easily the money, Bellamira, Pilia-Borza and Ithamore party and a drunken Ithamore tells the courtesan the 12

truth about Mathias and Lodowicks duel, the poisoning of the nuns and the friars death. Bellamira and Pilia-Borza decide to report to the governor, not before getting more gold from Barabas. Barabas arrives disguised as a lute player and poisons them by means of a poisoned flower, while they are planning to write a third letter asking for a thousand crowns. Act V. Bellamira and Pilia-Borza approach the governor and tell him about Barabass crimes. Barabas and Ithamore are brought in for questioning. Threatened with torture, the slave admits his and his masters guilt. The poison finally works and Bellamira, Pilia-Borza and Ithamore die. Barabas, who had taken a sleeping potion, tricks the officers into believing that he is dead too and they abandon his body. Upon regaining his consciousness, Barabas goes to the Turkish camp and promises to Calymath that he will help him conquer the town in exchange for the position of governor. The Turks triumph over the Maltese and Ferneze and his knights are taken prisoners. Lured with great sums of money for [his] recompense (V.2.88), Barabas tells to Ferneze that he will kill Calymath and free Malta. Ferneze is released. Barabas sends a messenger to invite Calymath and his men to a feast. Ferneze brings the promised sum of money to Barabas who instructs him on the whereabouts of the Turkish soldiers and on his plan of killing Calymath. As the Turk arrives, Ferneze initially hides, but soon comes out to warn Calymath of the trap laid for him. Barabas ends up boiled to death in the cauldron that he had prepared for Calymath, cursing () all/ Damned Christians, dogs, and Turkish infidels! (V.5.85). Ferneze announces Calymath that his army is defeated and that he is to remain his prisoner until the Ottoman Emperor agrees to free the island. Barabas is an alien figure revenging against an unfeeling society (Bevington and Rasmussen, 1998: xvii). He is an outsider within the Maltese society for several reasons: he is rich, Jewish and secretive. Initially, he appears quite far from the villain picture painted by Machiavel in the Prologue. He is immensely wealthy through commercial enterprise, proud of his success, shrewd, devoted to his daughter Abigail, and ready to settle for peaceful rule under Christian governors so that he can continue to gather in the plenty that heaven provides. (Bevington and Rasmussen, 1998: xvii) Gradually, however, discriminatory treatment of the Jews and the confiscation of his fortune by Ferneze make him loathe Christians and seek vengeance. He comes to personify the traits that the Elizabethans regarded as typically Machiavellian: he is strategic, dishonest, power-hungry (at least in the sense that he desires to have power over his enemies) and irreligious. As his authority is defied by the ones who should have obeyed and supported him, i.e., his daughter Abigail and then his slave Ithamore, he turns into a murderer; not only do Abigail and Ithamore fall victims of Barabass murderous rage but also all the Christians whose company they keep: the nuns of the convent where Abigail converted to Christianity, one of the two bigot friars (Barnardine) who tries to profit from Barabass (alleged) conversion, as well as the courtesan Bellamira and her pimp Pilia-Borza who manipulate Ithamore and blackmail Barabas. Altogether, Barabas appears as a slippery character of profound ambiguity, which complicates the audiences response to it: one may laugh at the glutton who smiles to see how full his bags are crammed (Prologue. 31), feel sympathy for the discriminated Jew and the abandoned father, or be appalled by his transformation into a vengeance-obsessed psychopath. Even when Barabas schemes and the spectators are outraged at his cold-heartedly sowing death wherever he goes, he continues to appear somewhat fascinating by his obviously being the least hypocritical character in a society of religious hypocrites: he is honest about his own motives and never attempts to justify his actions by religious doctrine. Thus, one could conclude that Marlowe creates a composite character, part victimized Jew but part generic villain. (Bevington and Rasmussen, 1998: xix) If Shakespeare wrote his Merchant of Venice to compete with Marlowes drama, the similarities between the two plays are less significant upon keener analysis. Unlike Barabas who is a paragon of hatred and selfishness from the outset, Shylocks hatred develops before our eyes and we feel a sympathy for him that is never granted to Barabas. (Gavriliu, 2000: 107) The Jews daughter, Abigail, is portrayed in an equally ambiguous manner. At the beginning of the play, she is the only character whose actions are not motivated by money or thirst for power but by love and loyalty. That may account for her fake conversion to Christianity in Act I meant just to serve her fathers ends (i.e., to retrieve the hidden gold and jewels from their house 13

turned into a convent). In Act III, though, bitter disappointment with her fathers vengeful character and grief at the death of her beloved Mathias cause Abigail to break with her father and to become a Christian convert. Her comments But I perceive there is no love on earth,/ Pity in Jews, nor piety in Turks. (III.3.47-8); But now experience, purchased with grief,/ Has made me see the difference of things. (III.3.61-2) cast doubt on the sincerity of her belief in the Christian doctrine and suggest that, for all her moral worth, Barabass daughter embraces Christian prejudice related to religious or racial difference rather than Christian virtues. The audiences ultimate response to Abigail is further complicated by III.6. where she tries to somewhat correct her mistakes before dying: her confession to Friar Barnardine is indicative of her intention of both observing the Christian rite and unburdening her soul before dying, and protecting her father, like a good daughter, from potential punishment (as she knows that the Christian canon forbids revealing confessions):
ABIGAIL. Be you my ghostly father. And first know That in this house I lived religiously, Chaste, and devout, much sorrowing for my sins. But, ere I came... BARNARDINE. What then? ABIGAIL. I did offend high heaven so grievously As I am almost desperate for my sins, And one offence torments me more than all. You knew Mathias and Don Lodowick? BARNARDINE. Yes, what of them? ABIGAIL. My father did contract me to em both: First to Don Lodowick; him I never loved. Mathias was the man that I held dear, And for his sake did I become a nun. BARNARDINE. So say, how was their end? ABIGAIL. Both, jealous of my love, envied each other, And by my fathers practice, which is there Set down at large, the gallants were both slain. BARNARDINE. Oh, monstrous villainy! ABIGAIL. To work my peace, this I confess to thee. Reveal it not, for then my father dies. BARNARDINE. Know that confession must not be revealed. The canon law forbids it, and the priest That makes it known, being degraded first, Shall be condemned, and then sent to the fire. ABIGAIL. So I have heard. Pray, therefore, keep it close. Death seizeth on my heart. Ah, gentle friar, Convert my father that he may be saved, And witness that I die a Christian. (III.6.12-40)

Like Zenocrate in Tamburlaine, Abigail is a true-hearted woman whose simple loyalties and belief in virtue [though occasionally undermined by her own decisions and actions n.n.] offer a rare perspective on the fierce amoral competitiveness of the male world around her. Once she has disappeared, all constancy and goodness die with her. (Bevington and Rasmussen, 1998: xix) Ferneze, the Governor of Malta, appears as Barabass opposite in many ways: he is Christian, law-abiding, and, allegedly, anti-Machiavellian. Ironically, though, events in the play undermine the dichotomy Barabas/Ferneze, suggesting that the governor is as morally corrupt and Machiavellian as Barabas. As a matter of fact, the beginning of the play reveals Ferneze as a sanctimonious hypocrite, the promoter of a discriminatory policy against the Jews, whom he compels to give up half of their wealth to pay the Maltese tribute to the Turks, and a dishonest politician who breaks the treaty with the Turks to side with the Spanish Catholic protectors. Ferneze is, it would seem, the very model of the Machiavellian prince. Using lofty pieties as a 14

good prince should do, publicly giving praise to heaven for the providential overthrow of Barabas, Ferneze knows when to bargain with Barabas and when to betray him. He is the Nemesis figure and the plays survivor, one who exemplifies the success of the Machiavellian policy that the Prologue proclaims and that the figure of Barabas seems to embody in caricature. Perhaps what is most subversive in Marlowes play is its readiness to punish Barabas for the same sort of kingly treachery and deceit that enable Ferneze to triumph. Marlowe conjures up a jarring sympathy for both the misunderstood stranger and the amoral prince. (Bevington and Rasmussen, 1998: xx) In brief, Marlowes play is centred on a network of interrelated themes and motifs including religious hypocrisy, Machiavellian strategy, deception and dissimulation, vengeance and retribution. The characters actions are set in a highly ambiguous frame in which there is no clear struggle between good and evil, despite the explicitly negative representation of Barabas from the Christian perspective as the greedy, villainous and vengeful Jew. Never troubled by his false actions, Barabas is at least honest about the reasons that drive him on and does not espouse false moral ideals. On the other hand, many Christian characters of the play e.g. Ferneze, the two friars Jacomo and Barnardine, the courtesan Bellamira and her pimp Pilia-Borza appear as frauds and hypocrites who conceal their own motives, as more or less able strategists and dissimulators ready to manipulate in order to attain or preserve their power position or to profit from the Jews wealth. That may also arouse the audiences interest in Marlowes approach to Machiavellianism, equally characterised by ambiguity and irony. Considering, for instance, Barabass capacity of anticipating other peoples moves and motives and of taking advantage of them in order to reach his selfish goals or Fernezes outmanoeuvring of Barabas to serve the interests of the Maltese state, one may wonder whether Marlowe believed in Machiavellian tactics or not, whether his intention was to correctly represent or to caricature them. The play establishes explicit contrasts partly in terms of religious or racial differences, partly in terms of gender and moral distinctions. Without any exception in Marlowes play, men deceive and dissemble for political expediency, financial gain or criminal purposes. Yet, the main female character, Abigail, remains an exception as she pretends to convert to Christianity in order to help her father recover his gold. Last but not least, one could say that vengeance is one of the basic mechanisms of the play. Initially, Barabas wants to take his revenge on Ferneze for having deprived him of his gold and jewels and the course of action that he cynically and cold-heartedly engages upon leads to the death of two young (Christian) men, Fernezes son, Lodowick, and Katherines son, Mathias. The discovery of their bodies by the grieving parents sets a new train of vengeful actions into motion that will culminate in Fernezes deceiving Barabas and witnessing his terrible end in the boiling cauldron prepared for Calymath. Therefore, to a certain extent, both Barabas and Ferneze could be regarded as avenger figures in Marlowes play. The difference is that Barabass obsession with revenge grows gradually in the play and turns from specific wrongs done him by Ferneze to focus on wrongs done him by Christian society and the world in general; in this process, even those who have been loyal to him, i.e., Abigail and Ithamore, or have brought him great advantage, i.e., Calymath, become his victims. THE TROUBLESOME REIGN AND LAMENTABLE DEATH OF EDWARD THE SECOND (c. 1592) Political life in Marlowes plays thus far, whether in the Middle East or Eastern Europe, in papal Rome, or in the Mediterranean, is amoral, ruthlessly competitive, and usually corrupt; government is perennially unstable, tyrannical, and vulnerable to challenge by self-assertive men. Marlowe chooses in all these cases to portray a world distant from England, in exotic and unfamiliar locations where Catholicism or pagan creeds prevail. In what may be his last major play, Edward II (c. 1592), Marlowe centres on the English political scene and finds it essentially the same. He selects as his protagonist one of Englands most notoriously weak kings, as did Shakespeare in the Henry VI plays, King John, and Richard II. But whereas Shakespeare allows dignified spokesmen in his plays to express their belief in the divine right of kings and the importance of regular 15

succession in reply to challengers of royal authority (whose point of view is no less cogently presented), Marlowe gives us conflict in which neither side lays claim to moral advantage. Instead, a political struggle is driven by the expression of sexual and self-interested desires that defy norms of social evaluation. (Bevington and Rasmussen, 1998: xxi) A chronicle play derived from Holinshed, Edward II was considered, for a long time, a model of how, according to Marlowe, history could be moulded to fit the plot form of drama. Recent scholarship has suggested that Shakespeare wrote his Henry VI trilogy before Marlowe could complete his Edward II, but it seems that the latter had, nevertheless, an important influence on the formers Richard II: both plays concern kings who, because of personal weaknesses, are unable to maintain order in the kingdom. (Gavriliu, 2000: 107) Edward II is infatuated with Gaveston, his favourite, recently returned from exile to please but also to manipulate the king by practising upon his homosexuality. This infuriates the barons (chief among which Mortimer junior, the self-asserting rebel) who loathe Gaveston as a parvenu and rival for influence with the Crown; so they capture and execute Gaveston. Edwards love for Gaveston is touching but also gullible: the king has his own reasons for hating the barons and sees in Gaveston an ally, but he misjudges the latters motives. The sentiment does Edward credit, but the person upon whom it is so recklessly lavished is, by his own wry admission, no less selfinterested and calculating than the barons who oppose him. The king of England is the victim of his own emotional fantasy. (Bevington and Rasmussen, 1998: xxi-ii) Edwards takes then a new favourite, Spenser, defeats the barons and has their leaders beheaded. Queen Isabel, at first the wronged wife, then the treacherous conspirator, also rebels against her husband, the king, supported by her lover, the young Mortimer. They capture Edward, make him give up the crown and put him to a miserable death. Mortimer, for his part, increasingly becomes the practised dissembler who can rig matters so that the gullible lords will thrust upon him the protectorship that he desires but pretends not to want, or order the murder of Edward by means of an ambiguously worded letter that will afford him deniability (V.4.6-71). He deals with villains like Lightborn, who has learned in Naples how to poison flowers or blow a little powder in his victims ears (ll. 31-6). In Marlowes dark portrayal, political rebellion uncovers much that is dismaying in human ambition and desire. (Bevington and Rasmussen, 1998: xxiii) Mortimer, who changes rapidly from a patriot into a usurper, is killed in his turn and Edwards son, the young Edward III, becomes king. His first royal actions, like Henry Vs, show that order will be restored in England. Even in this note of resolution, however, Marlowes play offers little assurance of providential harmony. The Crown is not a sacred institution but an object of contention for the possession of which human beings will use any means, however ignoble. Edward II is Marlowes last look at the self-destructiveness and inevitability of human striving after power and pleasure. (Bevington and Rasmussen, 1998: xxiv) The play displays Marlowes concern with order and marks a change in his style in the sense that his mighty line, so fit to the superhuman characters of the previous plays, acquires conversational ease, speech being suited to the person speaking. The brilliant generation of the University Wits paved the way for Shakespeares genius. Each of them influenced the Shakespearean universe more or less: John Lyly supplied Shakespeare the sparkling, scholarly dialogue; Kyd introduced the tragic pathos and sombre atmosphere; Marlowe taught him the heroes titanic nature and the lyrical effects of the blank verse; Greene provided the romantic framework and the gentle, delicate feminine characters. But for the joined efforts of the Renaissance playwrights the magnificence of Hamlet or Lear would not have been possible. (Gavriliu, 2000: 108) References Bellinger, Martha Fletcher (1927) A Short History of the Theatre, New York: Henry Holt and Company, pp. 221-222, available online from http://www.theatrehistory.com/british/marlowe002.html. 16

Gavriliu, Eugenia (2000) Lectures in English Literature I. From Anglo-Saxon to Elizabethan, Galati: Galati University Press. Honan, Park (2007) Christopher Marlowe. Poet and Spy, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Marlowe, Christopher (1968) The Tragical History of the Life and Death of Doctor Faustus, edited by John D. Jump, London: Methuen & Co, Ltd. Marlowe, Christopher (1998) Tamburlaine, Parts I and II. Doctor Faustus, A- and B-Texts. The Jew of Malta. Edward II, edited by David Bevington and Eric Rasmussen, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Roston, Murray (1982) Sixteenth-Century English Literature, London: Macmillan.

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