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Doctor Faustus And Macbeth Essay

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How is the idea or representation of death constructed in Doctor Faustus and Macbeth?
Although we know nothing for certain about the meaning of death, nothing stops us from making our own answers. Some of the most intriguing answers have come from the literary works of play writers who – in their own way – attempts to comprehend and to work through this real-life circumstance. Playwrights make it entertaining by introducing a new perspective regarding the portrayal of death, and in doing so, inviting the audience to ponder upon and even to add new meaning to it.
Elizabethan drama and Jacobean drama, including Doctor Faustus by Christopher Marlowe and Macbeth by Shakespeare, famously explore the idea of death through their characters. …show more content…

I’ll have them read me strange philosophy,
And tell the secrets of all foreign kings;
I’ll have them wall all Germany with brass,
And make swift Rhine circle fair Wittenberg”

As written by Jill Barker in Doctor Faustus (Advanced York Notes), “the persistent use of liquid ‘I’ sounds in the repeated words ‘all’ and ‘I’ll’ makes the list of Faustus’ ambitions sound charming and benign. The ‘I’ sounds are especially languorous in combination with other consonants, for example in ‘Resolve’, ‘gold’, ‘world’, ‘fly’, ‘peasant’”. As a result, the audience, together with Faustus, is engaged with what capacities the world of magic has to offer. It is in this dialogue that Faustus renews his beliefs, killing the beliefs he used to hold as a scholar, before moving on to reveal his actual desires.
Shakespeare, on the other hand, makes use of the Witches to reveal Macbeth’s deepest and darkest desires. In the third scene of the play, as Macbeth and Banquo enter on their way home from their victory, the Witches gather to meet Macbeth. They greet him as ‘Thane of Glamis’, ‘Thane of Cawdor’, and king to be, and they also tell Banquo that he will produce heirs who will become Kings. When it is revealed later on that the Witches’ prophecy came true, in his asides, Macbeth reveals a deeply disturbed mind:
“This supernatural soliciting
Cannot be ill, cannot be good. If ill,
Why hath it

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