I quite enjoyed this scene. I believe Mephistopheles is finally coming out of his shell. First impressions, he seemed honest, reliable and someone the audience could trust (due to him warning Faustus of the horrors of hell). Now, it seems that since he's got Dr F's soul, which he craved immensely, he's being short, denying Faustus of what he was promised.
Ir doesn't look good for Faustus, lets be honest. He wanted knowledge beyond the human reach- and it was given to him in a book. He wanted to know the secrets of the universe, yet Meph holds back, telling him things he knew in the first place. So Faustus asks for a wife, Meph then tells him not to have one, but to have many prostitutes each morning.
It could be argued that Mephistopheles is denying him each of Dr F's wishes to show trickery, Meph is a devil and a servant of Lucifer after all. Another, perhaps weaker argument is that Meph denies Dr F these wishes because of jealousy. Meph has made an attachment, a relationship with Faustus, and is jealous of the Doctor's earthly life. Perhaps Meph craved his soul so he could re-create the life Meph wanted. Or, cast your minds back to last lesson, is there connotations of Mephistopheles having homosexual lusts for Dr F, backed up with the evidence that Meph denied the Doctor a wife.
No comments:
Post a Comment