What is Doctor Henry Faust's contract with the devil? The Devil will be Faust's servant until Faust says "Abide, you are so fair," (I'm satisfied.) In other words, the devil will serve Faust, whereas Faust will serve the devil in afterlife. And the moment of Faust's death is decided when his happiness is so perfect that he wants to seize the moment into eternity. Faust thinks he will win this bet because he knows that he is naturally an insatiable person who will never find the moment of perfect satisfaction. The cornucopia of his knowledge is great enough but he always wants more and more. Is Faust's eternal craving and hunger what God calls "striving"? Mephistopheles is a fallen Archangel. He is inferior to God. Dante's Inferno indicates that God creates a hell not to punish humans but to punish fallen angels. If God's most meritorious, praiseworthy creature Faust cannot be satisfied by God, how can the devil? Humans are obliged to strive for something beyond themselves eternally and futily.
Goethe's Faust consists of several stories, 1) A learned, hoary doctor who did nothing but study in his life sells his soul to the devil in exchange for his rejuvenation, worldly glory and love. Hitherto, his profound study leads him to dissatisfaction and skepticism. But his learning is above his nature. He bargains with the devil. 2) With the devil incarnate's aid, Faust falls in love with a young girl Gretchen (Margaret). Gretchen suffers too much and becomes crazy in a prison as a result of Faust's seduction. She is doomed. I call the first part of Faust "Gretchen's Tragedy as a result of her liaison with Faust." The First Part of Faust ends here. In the end, Faust's lover ultimately saves him from the devil and leads him back to God. He lives wantonly and sinfully until her self-forgetting, self-donating love overcomes the devil's influence and power over Faust. Also, indifferent God finally intervenes on Faust's behalf when he is on the verge of becoming the devil's eternal slave.
Long time ago, I read Faust with Hesse's Demian, Goldmund and Narciss, Andre Gide's "The Narrow Gate," Hawthorn's "The Scarlet Letter," when I was a middle school student. Then, to my young mind, Gretchen's love only appeals to me. Now, Gretchen's suffering resonates with me. I used to admire Gretchen, but now I feel sorry for Gretchen.
HEAVEN
In God's holy presence, angels talk about the universe. Raphael mentions about the Sun, Gabriel about the Earth. Michael attributes celestial harmonies to God's splendor wonder. Thine aspect to the powers supernal Gives strength, though fathom thee none may; And all thy works, sublime, eternal, Are fair as on the primal day.
But Mephistopheles is envious and feels self-mortification in the presence of God. While God's staunchest angels praise God's creation, new born babies, newly built architecture, etc. the devil is the spirit of denial, degeneration, nothingness, barrenness and negation. FAUST Who are you? [May I ask whom I have the pleasure of speaking to?] MEPHISTOPHELES Part of that power which still Produceth good, whilst ever scheming ill. The spirit I, which will forever deny! Whate'er to light is brought Deserves again to be reduced to naught; Then better 'twere that naught should be.
Mephistopheles believes he can lure, tempt God's most faithful creature Faust away from the Lord. This part of the Devil's wager with God is similar to Job in the Bible.
In Goethe's Faust, GOD Does nothing on the earth to thee seem right? Is blame In coming here, as ever, thy sole aim? MEPHISTOPHELES Faust? What wilt thou wager? Him thou yet shall lose, If leave to me thou wilt but give, Gently to lead him as I choose!
In the Bible (Job 1:6~1:11), GOD said to Satan "Have you noticed Job? There is no one like him, blamless, and upright, God-fearing and sinless. SATAN: If God ceases to bless him, he will surely blaspheme you to your face. Job's only sin is his self-complacent conviction, his too-much self-confidence about his innocence. He wails and protests loudly that God is wrong to punish him, although he should just endure all quietly and uncomplainingly. Faust's sin is his discontentment and disillusionment. He doubts himself, his life, his God, his studies, etc. Both Job and Faust don't have virtues like humility. In his own mind, Faust thinks he is beyond and above all humans, but his reality does not correspond to his ego. He feels as if his study room were like a prison.
God may acquiesce to the devil's toying with Faust and Job at their expense because self-will is important to human beings. Humans appreciatively understand God's blessing only after they firsthand experience the devil's anathema. God's tolerance comes partly from his words. Humans ever errs, as long as they strive.
FAUST'S DEPRESSION, DISCONTENT
Bookish and academic Faust is glued to his chair all day, reading and studying in his windowless and prison-like room. In self-doubt, he is disillusioned and wonders what his studies amount to and how he can make use of his learnings. His rhapsodical monologue (soliloquy) reveals that his loneliness is somehow maddening, despite the perpetual presence of his inanimate friends such as books. He keeps brooding, moping away. Wagner's use of a time-honored phrase "Art is long. Life is short." does not encourage Faust.
FAUST I have neither goods nor treasure, No worldly honour, rank, or pleasure; Woe's me! still prison'd in the gloom Of this abhorr'd and musty room! Hemmed in by book-heaps, piled around, Worm-eaten, hid 'neath dust and mould, Where phantasy creates her own self-torturing brood, Around whose narrow jaws rolleth hell's fiery flood;
Faust continues to rant so vehemently that his unbridled (somewhat diseased) imagination conjures up and summons the Earth Spirit. Faust dubs the Earth Spirit his equal. But the Earth Spirit is no ill-wisher and has nothing to do with Faust. The Spirit snubs him point-blank and disappears. This is critical because Faust is fond of nature, the Earth Spirit. Even after this, Faust often takes refuge in nature and laments his temptation by the devil. Nature certainly induces Faust to appreciate God's creation and creatures. FAUST Shall I yield, thing of flame, to thee? Faust, and your equal, I am he! O'ersweep the world; how near I feel to thee! SPIRIT Thou'rt like the spirit, thou dost comprehend, Not me! FAUST I, God's own image! And not rank with thee! Spirit! I dare not lift me to thy sphere. What though my power compell'd thee to appear, My art was powerless to detain thee here. I am not like the gods! Feel it I must; I'm like the earth-worm, writhing in the dust,
Faust's self-absorption and depression gnaw away at his soul. Faust is an old, senile man. His declining life is numbered. Death is near. In sleepless nights, his thoughts verge on suicide. With glad resolve to take the fatal leap, Though danger threaten thee, to sink in endless sleep! Thus draws the [poison] goblet from my lips away? Announce the solemn dawn of Easter-day?
ON THE EASTER MORNING
When he is about to drink a sort of analgesic and fatal drug, he is stopped by churches' Easter pealing bells. He is infused with the Holy Spirit. Angels encourage him to strengthen his faith in Christ's salvation. CHORUS OF ANGELS You whom mortality,Earth's sad reality,Held as in prison. Blessed the loving one, Who from earth's trial throes, Healing and strengthening woes, Soars as from prison. Christ is arisen, redeem'd from decay. The bonds which imprison Your souls, rend away! Praising the Lord with zeal, By deeds that love reveal, Like brethren true and leal, Sharing the daily meal, To all that sorrow feel Whisp'ring of heaven's weal, Still is the master near, Still is he here!
When Faust thinks of himself, he is miserable. Yet, in outside worlds, people love Faust. On the Easter festival, he is an honored guest. People pay homage to him and bless him. Maybe when the Black Death plague or a similar kind of deadly disease is ubiquitous, Faust apparently helps so many dying people. But when a peasant praises him, Faust somehow ironically asks him to thank God instead. OLD PEASANT Doctor, 'tis really kind of you, to come this way, A highly learned man like you, To join us today. the fever's deadly blast, The fatal sickness stay'd at last. you sought each house,Where reign'd the mortal pestilence. Corpse after corpse was carried forth, But still unscath'd you issued thence. FAUST To Him above in homage bend, Who prompts the helper and Who help doth send.
But the devil's malice overpowers angels' exhortation and people's appreciation. In Goethe's Faust, Mephistropheles in disguise follows Faust and his sidekick Wagner. Although Faust may be said to be inflicted with morbidly acute imagination and sensibility, he seems to have second-sight or clairvoyance. Wagner only sees outward appearances, husk. WAGNER Naught but a poodle black of hue I see; 'Tis some illusion doth your sight deceive. FAUST Methinks a magic coil our feet around, He for a future snare doth lightly spread.
Faust tries to translate the New Testament. In his room, Faust's astray dog can't be still till it is metamorphosed into a devil. A dog growls, doubts, lays him on his belly, too, And wags his tail--as dogs are wont to do. Thou standest still, for thee he'll wait; Thou speak'st to him, the poodle fawns upon thee straight; Peace , poodle, peace! Scamper not thus; obey me! Behind the stove now quietly lay thee, Poodle, snarl not! with the tone that arises. Hallow'd and peaceful, my soul within, Accords not thy growl, thy bestial din. We find it not strange, that man despises To open the New Testament an impulse strong Impels me, to explore its sacred lore, And render into my loved German tongue. Real is it, or a phantom show? In length and breadth how doth my poodle grow! What spectre have I harbour'd thus! Huge as a hippopotamus. Are you, comrade fell, Fugitive from hell?
The following part is similar to the temptation of Jesus. While Jesus categorically dispells the devil by saying that he can't live by bread alone, that he shall never test God, Faust is insatiable, discontented and self-deluded. The devil pledges to be Faust's servant and to administer to his needs until Faust is so ecstatic and satisfied that he wants to seize the moment and to feel eternity in an instant. For Faust, rejuvenation and returning youth means a second chance. Does Faust have defective subnormal foresight? Faust seems very eager to finalize his covenant with the devil.
In Goethe's Faust, MEPHISTOPHELES But make The compact! I at once will undertake To charm thee with mine arts. I'll give thee more Than mortal eye has ever beheld before. A scrap is for our compact good. You under-sign merely with a drop of blood. FAUST: When to the moment I shall say, "Linger awhile! so fair thou art!" Then mayst thou fetter me straightway, Then to the abyss will I depart!
In the Bible, (Mark 1:12, Matthew 4:8 and Luke 4:1) DEVIL: Behold all the kingdoms of the world in their magnificence. All these I shall give to you, if you worship me. (Matthew 4:8)
Suddenly, a student visits Faust in the hope of becoming a great scholar. But Faust's environment seems too oppressive and suffocating. The student asks Faust's advice. Mephistopheles disguises himself as Faust and impersonates Faust. But after giving very sophisticated advices, the devil further enthralls him with double-meaning equivocations. He signs his autograph on the student's guestbook. STUDENT Here, I longed true knowledge to attain. yet These walls, this melancholy room, O'erpower me with a sense of gloom; The space is narrow, nothing green, No friendly tree is to be seen: MEPHISTOPHELES (aside) I'm weary of the dry pedantic tone, And must again the genuine devil play.
In Part 2, this student becomes a pretentious scholar. STUDENT I find you still as then when I began; But I am here again, another man! Confess: what men have ever known is stuff not worth knowing. What teacher has the grace To tell the truth directly to our face? MEPHISTOPHELES. The other time I valued you, an embryo, the chrysalis quite high; Is of the future, gaily-coloured butterfly. There is, indeed, a time to learn; You're ready now to teach, as I discern. I sought a hidden treasure, one of gold; 'Twas hideous coals when all my search was done. Bachelor of Arts. Confess it then! Your skull, now bald and old, Is worth no more than yonder hollow one. Mephistopheles [good-humouredly]. I see the learned man in what you say! You're ruder, friend, perhaps than you mean quite.
This student, graduate with a degree of Bachelor Art sounds like old egomaniac (self-complacent) Faust. Ironically, there is much truth in his well-said words. BACHELOR OF ARTS. This is youth's noblest message and most fit! The world was not till I created it. It is presumption that men old and hoar Seek to be something when they are no more. Man's life lives in his blood and where, forsooth, Does blood so stir as in the veins of youth? Ah, that is living blood, with vigour rife, Creating newer life from its own life. There all is stirring, there is something done, The weak fall out, the capable press on. While half the world we've brought beneath our sway, What have you done? Thought, nodded, dreamed away, Considered plan on plan- and nothing won. It's certain! Age is but an ague cold, Chill with its fancies of distress and dread. Once a man's thirty, he's already old, He is indeed as good as dead.
Mephistopheles belittles and renounces traditional Christian teachings and dogmas. I know it well, so rings the book throughout; Much time I've lost in puzzling o'er its pages, For downright paradox, no doubt, A mystery remains alike to fools and sages. Ancient the art and modern too, my friend. 'Tis still the fashion as it used to be, Error instead of truth abroad to send By means of three and one, and one and three. the Holy Trinity is ever taught and babbled in the schools. Who'd take the trouble to dispute with fools?
With Sibyls'' aids, Mephistopheles rejuvenates and reinvigorates Faust. MEPHISTOPHELES Again at eighty to grow hale and young. In truth, Nature giveth a method to renew thy youth:
FAUST'S BAITING BRIBE
After Faust gulps down (guzzle) a sort of magically concocted love potion, he imediately falls in love with Magaret (Gretchen). As if he were sexually-frustrated hitherto, he captures the first prey in view. To see if Gretchen is materialistically covetuous and acquisitive, Mephistopheles leaves jewelries unattended in her bedroom. He wants to shower Gretchen with jewelries, trinkets. FAUST Fair lady, may I thus make free To offer you my arm and company? FAUST [to Mephistopheles] Conduct me to her place of rest! Bring me a kerchief from her snowy breast, MEPHISTOPHELES Here is a casket, with a store Of jewels, which I got elsewhere. GRETCHEN How comes this lovely casket here? Jewels! which any noble dame might wear, This necklace--how would it look on me! These splendid gems, whose may they be?
FAUST'S VOYEUR
Does love-sick and lovelorn Faust invite a reader to peep through a keyhole with him while Gretchen is getting naked? But Faust thinks he means well. He wants to beautify Gretchen, the object of his love. GRETCHEN(While undressing herself she begins to sing.) There was a king in Thule, True even to the grave; To whom his dying mistress A golden beaker gave. (She puts jewels on and steps before the glass.)
In Gretchen's eyes, Faust is ennobled, enriched and empowered to the highest degree that she readily reciprocates and shares his tender feeling. GRETCHEN Just wait awhile! (She gathers a star-flower and plucks off the leaves one after another. She plucks off the leaves and murmurs to herself.) He loves me--loves me not-- (Plucking off the last leaf with fond joy.) He loves me! (embracing Faust, and returning his kiss) Gretchen's humor, mirth and light-heartedness at least take oppressive weight and depression off Faust's mind. (He kisses her hand.) GRETCHEN.. Nay! trouble not yourself! A hand so coarse, So rude as mine, how can you kiss! What constant work at home must I not do perforce! My mother too exacting is.
FAUST'S MURDER OF GRETCHEN'S MOTHER
But Gretchen's mother brings these unattended treasure to her church. By Faust's request, the devil brings more treasures as love tockens for the second time. Gretchen stashes away jewelry caskets at her friend Martha's house, lest her mother find and bring them to the church again. The gems for Gretchen brought, A glimpse of them the mother caught, "My child," she cries, "ill-gotten good Ensnares the soul, consumes the blood; With them we'll deck our Lady's shrine, She'll cheer our souls with bread divine!" At this poor Gretchen 'gan to pout; 'Tis a gift-horse, at least, she thought, Straight for a priest the mother sent, With what he saw was well content. The Church alone, be it confessed, can ill-got wealth digest."
FAUST'S PERJURY
Mephistopheles plays a role of a pandering pimp or sex monger or match maker. He accosts Martha and brings her unhappy tidings of her husband. Martha asks for any relics or bequests from her departed husband. She gets angry when her husband spends almost all money in asking for three hundred posthumous masses for his disembodied soul's rest in the churches. When Martha asks for more evidence of her husband's demise, Mephistopheles gladly says he will bring another witness, Faust. Gretchen often visits Martha and will see Faust. But when the devil gives Faust one mote of happiness, he asks Faust to commit new sins at others' expense. To meet Gretchen, Faust is compelled to perjure himself and to tell Martha a lie. MEPHISTOPHELES Would I could happier tidings show! Your husband's dead, and greeteth you. Madam, in truth, it grieves me sore, Ay, madam, what two witnesses declare Is held as valid everywhere; A gallant friend I have, not far from here, Who will for you before the judge appear. I'll bring him straight. MARTHA I pray you do! MEPHISTOPHELES [to Gretchen] And this young lady, we shall find her too?
Gretchen mother is like a patron saint or a guardian angel for her virgin daughter Gretchen. But Faust gives a sleeping drug for her mother, lest they get caught in the act of sex on spot. Gretchen does not know this drug ultimately kills her mother. GRETCHEN.. Ah, if I slept alone! To-night The bolt I fain would leave undrawn for thee; But then my mother's sleep is light, Were we surprised by her, ah me! FAUST Dear angel! there's no cause for dread. Here is a little phial,--if she take Mixed in her drink three drops, 'twill steep Her nature in a deep and soothing sleep.
When Gretchen talks with one of her friends Bessy, she likens her story to herself. Bessy wonders why Gretchen feels sorry for the condemned girl because she is rightly served. Gretchen can forsee her own future. For penance, Gretchen decorates the shrine of the Mater dolorosa (sorrowful mother) with flowers and asks for mercy. BESSY She's rightly served, in sooth, The first she everywhere must shine, He always treating her to pastry and to wine. Of her good looks she was so vain, So shameless too, that to retain His presents, she did not disdain; Sweet words and kisses came anon-- And then the virgin flower was gone. GRETCHEN.. Poor thing! BESSY Forsooth dost pity her? Or on the bench or in the dusky walk, At night, with her lover she must chat, Thinking the hours too brief for their Sweet talk; Her proud head she will have to bow, And in white sheet do penance now! GRETCHEN.. Ah, rich in sorrow, thou, Stoop thy maternal brow, And mark with pitying eye my misery! Gaze upwards on thy Son's death agony. Help! from disgrace and death deliver me! And mark with pitying eye my misery! The pangs that rack me to the bone? How my poor heart, without relief, Trembles and throbs, its yearning grief Thou knowest, thou alone!
FAUST'S MURDER OF GRETCHEN'S BROTHER
Gretchen is enceinte. At Gretchen's door, her brother Valentine defies and challenges Mephistopheles and gets killed in a scuffle. On expiring, Valentine gives Gretchen a warning as a parting gift. Gretchen has a good family. Her mother teaches her honesty and her brother inoculates her with honor and chastity -in vain. VALENTINE My Gretchen, still young are you, Art not discreet enough, I trow, thou the path of shame dost tread. Abstain, Nor dare God's holy name profane! What's done, alas, is done and past! Matters will take their course at last; Thou'lt common be to all the town. When infamy is newly born, In secret she is brought to light, And the mysterious veil of night. And shun thy hated form to meet, As when a corpse infects the street. Thy heart will sink in blank despair, A golden chain no more thou'lt wear! And e'en though God thy crime forgive, On earth, a thing accursed, thou'lt live! Full measure I might hope to win Of pardon then for every sin. 'Twas thy dishonour that pierced my heart, Through the death-sleep I now depart.
WALPURGIS-NIGHT In order to divert Faust's mind from Valentine's death, the devil brings Faust to witches' festivals and ballroom. Yet, Faust sees an apparition that resembles Gretchen. Faust is alarmed because she looks like an emaciated prisoner. When Mephistopheles refuses to aid Faust's wanting to rescue Gretchen, he says the devil's former shape of a dog is very becoming and fitting. Apart from Faust's contract, nobody would dare to curse the devil in the face. But Faust's vehement protest against the devil's callousness, unfeelings and apathy may be too late because it is Faust, not the devil who seduces Gretchen and forsakes her irresponsibly. FAUST Hound! Execrable monster !--Back with him into his dog's shape, in which it was his wont to scamper before me. Change him again into his favourite shape, that he may crouch on his belly before me in the dust, whilst I spurn him with my foot.
Gretchen's confused mind becomes increasingly distracted, disoriented and split between her carnal love for Faust and her sisterly love for Valentine. There is no way for her to justify the birth of her illegitimate bastard. She is convicted of killing it and gets imprisoned in a dungeon. In her delirium, she raves incoherent nonsenses. She is traumatized by haunting memories. She sounds like Hamlet's Ophelia before she drowns herself. Her sense of proportion is damaged. (Singing within.) GRETCHEN'S LOUD, MAD SONG IN HER SOLITARY PRISON CELL AT NIGHT I sent my mother to her grave, I drown'd my child beneath the wave. My mother took me and slew! My father, the scoundrel, Hath eaten me too! My sweet little sister Hath all my bones laid, Where soft breezes whisper All in the cool shade! Then became I a wood-bird, and sang on the spray, Fly away! little bird, fly away! fly away! GRETCHEN.. (hiding her face in the bed of straw) Let me my babe but suckle once again! I fondled it; They took it from me but to give me pain, And now, they say that I my child have slain. Woe! woe! they come! oh bitter 'tis to die! FAUST (softly) Hush! hush! be still! I come to set thee free!
For Gretchen, the borderline between reality and imagination is blurred. She smells death. She is a living corpse. Her soul is gone but her body remains. In death, her soul stays, her body is gone. She constantly invokes the most haunting image of her infant struggling in the pond when it is getting drowned. Because of her, her mother, brother and baby are killed. GRETCHEN The graves I will describe to thee, And thou to them must see The best place give to my mother, Close at her side my brother, Me at some distance lay-- But not too far away! Quick! Quick I Save thy poor child! The brook along, Over the bridge To the wood beyond, To the left, where the plank is, In the pond. Seize it at once! It fain would rise, It struggles still! Save it. Oh save! My brain, alas, is cold with dread !-- There sits my mother upon a stone, And to and fro she shakes her head; She winks not, she nods not, her head it droops sore; She slept so long, she waked no more;
She hears him but she sees him not. When she sees him, his hand, she imagines there is blood, her brother's blood on Faust's murderous hand. FAUST (aloud) Gretchen! Gretchen! My love! My love! GRETCHEN.. (listening) That was my lov'd one's voice! Where is he? I heard him calling me. To his neck will I fly, On his bosom will lie! On yon threshold he stood; Amidst all the howling of hell's fiery flood, The scoff and the scorn of its devilish crew, The tones of his voice, sweet and loving, I knew. GRETCHEN.. Give me thy hand! It is no dream! 'Tis true! Thine own dear hand !--But how is this? 'Tis wet? Quick, wipe it off! Meseems that yet There's blood thereon. Ah God! what hast thou done? Put up thy sword, I beg of thee!
Her soul flies away from her body when her love goes away. Her disoriented mind is reinstated by Faust's sweet and healing presence. Her soul is saved by angels. MEPHISTOPHELES She now is judged! VOICES (from above) Is saved!
She loved him at her soul's expense. Faust's constancy and fidelity reassure her. Because of Faust, Gretchen disobeys her mother's warning that she shall not take any cursed gift, unknowingly kills her mother by giving her Faust's sleeping drug and loses her brother Valentine who tries to restore her reputation. In exchange for Faust's love, new miseries, homicide, pregnancy and infanticide are heaped upon old tribulations (poverty, etc.) until she is driven to madness. It's some ironical coincidence that both Faust and Gretchen do not take care of their "soul." Through consummate love, Gretchen gives her soul to Faust who sold his soul to the devil. When Faust grows to love Gretchen more than the mere gratification of bodily senses, he needs to reclaim his undivided soul from the devil so that he can give to Gretchen. His heart belongs to Gretchen. It would appear like affectation to romanticize Gretchen's madness.
FAUST's peroration. In misery! despairing! long wandering pitifully on the face of the earth and now imprisoned, immured in the dungeon as a malefactor and reserved for horrid tortures! That it should come to this! To this !--Perfidious, worthless spirit, and this thou hast concealed from me ! Imprisoned! In hopeless misery! Delivered over to the power and the judgment of unpitying humanity without help!
This reminds a reader of Shakespeare's Macbeth. Macbeth is similarly hailed and blessed (?) -questionablly- by treacherous witches. He is raised in rank and prestige but in the end, he realizes the sophistry and equivocation of the witches' prophetic omens.
FAUST, by Goethe -Part 2
In part two, Faust's ambition is in worldly fame, power, wealth and influence. Faust falls in love with Helen of Troy (necrophile?). Like Virgil in Dante's Inferno, Mephistopheles guides Faust in the Hell in search for Helen. MEPHISTOPHELES. Descend, then! I might also tell you: Soar! It's all the same. Escape from the Existent To phantoms' unbound realms far distant! Delight in what long since exists no more! Like filmy clouds the phantoms glide along. Brandish the key, hold off the shadowy throng.
With some unintended mistakes, Faust helps an Emperor modernize many facets of economy and improve so many people's lives. His social, civil contribution is so great that he is redeemed by the Lord.
Part 2 Act II CLONE HUMANS Doctor Wagner, Faust's former research assistant becomes a great scholar by now. He actually clones humans via stem cell researches? His creation is Homunculus. This scientific advancement reveals Goethe's vast imagination and prophetic foresight. LABORATORY WAGNER. A man is in the making! The mystery's within our reach. It turns to voice, it turns to speech. Homunculus [in the phial, to WAGNER]. Well, Daddy! how are you? It was no jest. Come, press me tenderly upon your breast, To MEPHISTOPHELES. How Sir Cousin, are you too? And at the proper moment? Thank you!
WAGNER'S HOMUNCULUS AND PYGMALION'S GALATEA
Homunculus is a human clone created by Doctor Wagner. He looks like an undeveloped premature infant. Like a glow-worm or a beacon, Homunculus emits light in a glass, illuminating his surroundings radiantly. It is fitting for Homunculus to love Galatea because I think Galatea is Pygmalion's lover and creation. Pygmalion chisels her and breathes a soul in an inanimate object. Homunculus. In this dear water brightens All that my lamplet lightens, All wondrous fair to see. At once a flood of light I'll scatter, Discreetly, though, for fear the glass might shatter. Thales. Homunculus is it, by Proteus swayed... The symptoms are those of a masterful yearning, Prophetic of agonized throbbing and burning. At Galatea's feet, he'll shatter himself on the glittering throne. See it flame, now it flashes, pours forth- it is done! Thales. Homunculus has come to earth But half-way formed, a quite peculiar birth. He has no lack of qualities ideal But lacks too much the tangible and real. Till now the glass alone has given him weight; He'd like forthwith to be incorporate. Proteus. You are a virgin's son, yea, verily: You are before you ought to be!
MONETARY POLICY
Faust and Mephistopheles become an Emperor's royal economists. They initiate gold-mining explorations, introduce paper money, improve agriculture and expand land through land reclamation projects (at the expense of Philemon and Baucis. This part is similar to 1 Kings 21, where "King Ahab envied the vineyard of his subject Naboth. His wicked wife (Mephistopheles for Faust) arranged for Naboth to be killed so that Ahab could seize it."). If the emperor fathoms the proved amount of gold reserves in mines, every paper currency can be backed by such vast gold. Faust gets the emperor's permission to print countless paper money and quickly solves the country's insoluble deficit. EMPEROR. I'm sated of this endless "If" and "How." There is no money. Well, then, get it now! So let the time in merriment be spent! Be quick! How long are we to wait? MEPHISTOPHELES. Such urgent longing, Sire, pray moderate! Money's lacking here. Where in this world does not some lack appear? In veins of mountains, walls far underground, Gold coined and uncoined can be found; MEPHISTOPHELES. Nor gold nor pearls are half as handy as Such paper. Then a man knows what he has. Goblet and chain are auctioned off and sold; Paper redeemed without delay in gold Ready at hand the Emperor's realm will hold Henceforth enough of paper, jewels, gold. EMPEROR. Our realm owes you this great prosperity; As is the service, the reward should be. Our empire's soil be trusted to your care, The worthiest guardians of the treasures there.
I really wonder if Faust and Mephistopheles can raise his ideal woman from the dead, why doesn't Faust choose to resurrect Gretchen instead of Helen from the deceased? But it is the emperor who wants to meet Helen in the first place (although she later marries Faust and has a son by him.) FAUST. The Emperor orders- straightway must it be- Both Helen and Paris will he see, Of man and woman in their true ideal Demands to see the forms distinct and real.
Mephistopheles makes Faust thirty years younger. There is another atavistic element. Faust admires Helen of Troy in books. As if they were riding a time machine, they go back to ancient times. Faust disguises himself as a medieval knight and pledges to serve Helen. They have a son, Euphorion.
Helen's beauty overwhelms, enthralls, excites and captivates Faust. He swoons away and his knees give away when her invoked image disappears. [HELEN appears.] FAUST. Have I still eyes? Is Beauty's spring, outpouring, Revealed most richly to my inmost soul? My dread path brought me to this loftiest goal! Void was the world and barred to my exploring! What is it now since this my priesthood's hour? Vanish from me my every vital power The lovely form that once my fancy captured, That in the magic glass enraptured. MEPHISTOPHELES. So that is she! She'd not disturb my rest; Pretty indeed, but still I'm not impressed. Faust! poor wretch! seduced, unwise, Scarce to be rescued from Love's chain! Whom Helen doth paralyze, His reason he'll not soon regain.
Part II ACT III According to Homer's Illiad, Paris falls in love with a married queen Helen and the Trojan War breaks out. But Helen's husband King Menelaus wins and restores Helen from Paris. Helen. "And now I am sent before Menelaus to his city; But I can not guess what intent he harbours. Do I come here as wife? Do I come as victim for the prince's bitter pain And for the adverse fate the Greeks endured so long? Be it as it may!" When Helen worries about her safety, Mephistopheles who disguises himself as Phorkyas suggests that a chivalrous knight (Faust) wants to protect her. Faust's son Euphorion is born. Euphorion seems to be a mixture of a poet Lord Byron and Ecarus (the first aviator). Helen and Euphorion live with Faust only for a short time. Like Ecarus, Euphorion is killed in his flight and Helen would rather follow her son to the underworld.
Joy is morbidly jealous of her mother's new boyfriend. Joy finds herself stlaking her mother Mrs. Gwyn and Lever. Lever tries to persuade Joy's grandfather Colonel Hope into buying a gold mine stock shares. Joy thinks Level is a swindler. Miss Beech is Joy's governess. One thing that is worth reading is Dick. Dick hopes to be Joy's boyfriend. Dick is Joy's funny comforter.
John Galsworthy's "Justice (Play)"
Court scenes are depicted in Tolstoy's "Resurrection" and Shakespeare's "The Merchant of Venice." In "Resurrection," a juryman knew a prisoner. In "The Merchant of Venice," a woman judge hides her love for a prisoner (her husband). In Galsworthy's "Justice," Frome, a lawyer defends a prisoner Falder quite well. The advocate argues that criminals are not wicked people but weak people. The judge clarifies "One wrong is no excuse for another", insinuating criminals wicked as well as weak. However important extenuating circumstances, the judge can't let him go scot-free with impunity because "I have to consider the necessity of deterring others from following your example." But the book's preponderance is tilted to too much ill-advised romance.
The Fugitive, by John Galsworthy
Clare Dedmond is high-born, thoroughbred, well-mannered and beautiful. Her husband George is wealthy. But she is cajoled by Malise. George calls Malise's house a pigsty. She leaves Malise too. She plunges herself into voluntary poverty and wanders like a hooker or a teenage girl who just reaches puberty.
A Family Man by John Galsworthy
A DOMESTIC DISAGREEMENT
John Builder is a multi-millionaire lawyer and a district magistrate. An incumbent mayor recommends him for the next mayor. Builder always believes "All my married life I've put a curb on myself for the sake of respectability. I've been a man of principle. I'm a family man." But Builder's eldest daughter Athene is his problem. "It's not dignified for the Mayor of this town to have an unmarried daughter as young as Athene living by herself away from home. Do you know what sort of people Athene associates with now?" Miss Athene Builder willingly and gladly suffers voluntary poverty and fictitious misery for the sake of freedom and independence. Hitherto, Mr. Builder disowns and disinherits his daughters. In fact, Miss Athene is married secretly. She is Mrs. Herringhame, Guy's wife. When Mr. Builder visits his daughter's house (or rather pigsty or foothold), he finds a man's razor in her bedroom, indicating Athene's cohabitation. BUILDER (Father). I've never grudged you girls any comfort, or pleasure. ATHENE (His eldest daughter). Except wills of our own. ... BUILDER. Is it a question of money? You can always have more. You know that. Athene's sister Maud rebels similarly. MAUD. I have a film face. Don't oppose it, father! I've always wanted to earn my own living. BUILDER. I've spent goodness knows what on your education--both of you. Galsworthy tries to highlight discrepancies between Mr. Builder's political necessity to uphold his public reputation as a family man and his real self.
For him, his wife is a mainstay mentally. He leans on her emotionally. But Mr. Builder is caught by his wife on the spot when he returns his handmaid Camille's kiss. His wife stands petrified, stock-still and unseen and leaves him. At his daughters' house, he makes scenes and exposes his violent, inflammable personality in his attempts to reclaim his wife. He is "charged with assaulting his daughter Maud Builder by striking her with a stick in the presence of Constable Moon and also with resisting Constable Moon in the execution of his duty, and injuring his eye." When the police tries to arrest Mr. Builder, he says "You stupid lout! I'm a judge! Get out! If the law is going to enter private houses and abrogate domestic authority...." Disreputably, he is branded as a woman-beater on newspapers' headlines. "Serve him right!" people react to the news. MAYOR. The Judge has got a name to keep up-must stand well in the people's eyes. And you did resist the police. You'd have been the first to maintain justice. BUILDER. You came to beg me to resign. BUILDER. No Councillorship, no Magistracy, no future. why? Because I tried to exercise a little wholesome family authority. RALPH (his brother, lawyer partner). Keep your sense of humour.
"The Strife" by Galsworthy Anthony is a chairman from his company's inception. In workers' views, Anthony's iron rules amount to tyranny. The firebrand of workers' strike is Roberts. Roberts' wife and Anthony's daughter Enid (Mrs. Underwood) are on good terms. Anthony's son Edgar takes pity on Mrs. Roberts. As the strike is in progress, workers' families suffer. Mrs. Roberts starves to death. The Boards of directors force Anthony to resign.
The Mob (Play), by John Galsworthy
"It seems the fashion nowadays for men to take their enemy's side."
Stephen More is a member of Parliament. His father-in-law, Sir John Julian works at the War Office. Stephen tries to stop the war in vain, when his three brothers-in-law including Hubert Julian are fighting on the frontier. His daughter Olive asks him. Outspeaking against the war, Stephen More cannot withstand the mob's backlash, hooting. A reader can indeed visualize Stephen More making speeches before audiences.
OLIVE: I heard Daddy making a speech to the wind. It broke a wine-glass. His speeches must be good ones, mustn't they! It felt funny; you couldn't see any wind. KATHERINE (her mother). Talking to the wind is an expression, Olive. OLIVE. What does it mean? KATHERINE. Speaking to people who won't listen.
Like a kite in windy sky, Mr.More soars ironically higher and more vehemently as his opposition's torrential gale becomes stronger. His anti-war speeches sound self-defeating and traitorous in the time of war. His family forsakes him. The mob is angry because More makes speeches in favor of the enemies that kill the nation's soldiers.
The Eldest Son (play), by John Galsworthy
Bill Cheshire, Sir William's eldest son is secretly engaged to marry his mother's handmaid Freda Studdenham. (This is the same early theme in Tolstoy's "Resurrection.") His parents want him to marry a high-born, well-bred, wealthy Lady Mabel Lanfarne. Bill and Freda's relationship is as serious as that of Dunning and Rose Taylor. Dunning and Rose do not belong to Bill's high society. Bill's mother Lady Cheshire tries to persuade Dunning into marry a girl of his equal, Rose. But her ladyship does not think his son's engagement to her servant Freda is suitable. As a result, Sir William disowns and disinherits Bill. His title and wealth will go to his second son, Harold Cheshire.
The Silver Box (Play), by John Galsworthy
Mr. Barthwick's silver box of cigarettes is missing. Mr. Johnes took the silver box and Mrs. Barthwick's purse when he was tipsy. He was drunken and on his way home, he saw another drunken man, Jack Barthwick having difficulty in finding his house. Mr. Jones helped Jack to open the door At home, in return for his help, Jack said to Mr. Jones "Take anything you want in this room." Mr. Jones does not steal but take the silver box. But in daylight the next day Jack remembers nothing. Mr. Johnes is unemployable. His wife is employed as one of many servants at the Barthwicks. Mrs. Jones is a person of interest. Mr. Snow, a police officer in plain clothes arrests the Jones. Although the Jones live like homeless gypsies, Mrs. Jones is honest and warm-hearted.
SIRE AND SCION
Mr.Barthwick's son, Jack is as bad, forgetful and intoxicated as Mr. Johnes. He bounces many checks, snatches a purse from a stranger. But his wealthy father always comes to rescue him. His house is an inviolate sanctuary where Jack Barthwick claims he remembers nothing. Jack lives scot-free with impunity. JACK. I'll send you a check. UNKNOWN Give me cash now. I've got to pay rent. If you don't I'll summons you. It's stealing! JACK. I have n't a penny in my pocket. [He glances stealthily at BARTHWICK, his father.] BARTHWICK I shall settle this claim. [He produces money.] Here is cash; the extra will cover the value of the purse and your cab fares.
LAW'S DOUBLE STANDARDS?
Building upon the pressumption that the silver box was given as a gift by Jack to Mr. Johnes, the purse matter still remains to be solved. Both Mr. Jones and Jack Barthwick take others' purses when they are inebriated. But Mr. Jones is charged of theft of a silver cigarette-box and assault on the police(when the police tries to arrest him) and is imprisoned, while Jack continues to study at Oxford. According to Mrs. Barthwick, when the poor gets caught justly or wrongly, the law shall inflict harsher punishment and longer sentences on them in order to protect the well-to-do. But when the rich commits similar iniquities, restitution is quickly done before the matter is brought to the court by the police. The poor is somehow driven to steal in their desperation to feed their children. The rich happens to steal due to negligence and bad habits such as drinking. Maybe that's why the government should increase welfare programs, foodstamp to provide people in need with basic sustenance and necessities. Jack's family is prosperous and his incorrigible fault is overlooked. But Mr. Johnes can't take care of himself, his family. Thus, when he falls into sin (drinking and taking others' belongings unwittingly and unknowing), he is not upbraided by his father but is charged and sentenced by a magistrate. Without second chance, he is publicly branded and avoided as a criminal.
The theme is uttered by Achilles' son, Neoptolemons. "I far prefer failure, if it is honest, to victory earned by treachery. Know, to be just is better far than to be wise. " "Son of Achilles, you must be like your father, and not in strength alone." Neoptolemons is not only honest but also compassionate. He is a good nurse and protector. This book reminds me of Defoe's Robinson Crusoe or Job in the Bible (a just man who suffers unmerited punishments from God). Apart from a dramatic plot, however, this book can be categorized with Charles Dickens's Oliver Twist (honesty), "Caleb Williams" (magnanimity, clemency), Oscar Wilde's "The Picture of Dorian Grey" (warning against vanity and beauty), etc. It's because the above-mentioned authors seem to convey a clear moral message in their books. Philoktetes is blessed because he inherits Herakles' invincible bow. But Philoktetes is bitten by a sacred snake as he roams around God's shrine. The viper is a guardian, doorkeeper that attacks any intruder. Philoktetes is permanently wounded and becomes a lame cripple. He laments, wails day and night so much that Agamemnon, Menelaos, and Odysseus maroon and wrong him in a deserted island of Lemnos. Besides, Philoktetes' rank, rotten amputated legs fill the air with blood-poisoning smells. A shipwrecked castaway lives like Robinson Crusoe, Rousseau's noble savage, or Emerson's self-reliant, self-sufficient man. But Odysseus cannot win in the Trojan war without Philoktetes' bow. To steal this weapon, he asks Archilles' son Neoptolemos to swindle him with lies. But Neoptolemos is split between incompatible, irreconcilable purposes. He wants to help Odysseus to win the war by obtaining Philoktetes, but it would be to skin Philoktetes alive. Neoptolemos takes pity on him and tries to help him by taking him to his homeward voyage. Achilles' son is as sad ad Philoktetes because his father Greek hero Achilles is slain by God Apollo. Neoptolemos commiserates and feels his pain (share his sorrow). " I feel for you--I do really. I pity you. Without a friend, left alone, deprived of all the mutual joys that flow from sweet society- distempered too!It seems to me that your woes are enough without taking on the woes of others. Your share of grief almost matches mine. You have endured such miseries, and still you live on and stay alive. I grieve for you. Your pain is mine. How can you withstand and bear such misfortunes? Thou art oppressed with ills on every side. Will thou lean upon me? I mourn thy hapless fate. Whence is it?"
Neoptolemos wants to cure him first then persuades him into helping their battles against Troy. But Philoktetes does not want to help those who abandoned him. However crippled, invalid he is, he still possesses the magical bow, Herakles's bow, the son of Zeus's. ULYSSES His arrows winged with death inevitable.
NEOPTOLEMUS Then it were not safe even to approach him. ULYSSES No; unless by fraud. Troy cannot fall without his arrows. Oddseus and Neoptolemos need his bow to bring Greek victory, while he needs the bow to kill birds for livelihood, sustenance.
Achilles' son reminds me of a quote from Tolstoy's "Resurrection." "His inner life was of a nature directly opposite to that of Simonson's. Simonson was one of those people (of an essentially masculine type) whose actions follow the dictates of their reason, and are determined by it. His capacity for assimilating the thoughts of others, and of expressing them correctly, had given him a position of supremacy among pupils. Novodvoroff belonged, on the contrary, to the class of people of a feminine type, whose reason is directed partly towards the attainment of aims set by their feelings, partly to the justification of acts suggested by their feelings." Novodvoroff is like Neoptolemos, whereas Oddysseus resembles Simonson who does not act in deference to others' feelings or others' sufferings. (Sophocles' impersonal description of Odysseus puzzles me because Homer's Odysseus (King of Ithaca) is very romantic, lonely person and suffers a lot in his journey. Would his own suffering make him callous to Philoktetes' misery?) Neoptolemos is an honest man, a good nurse. "You remain by me and endure my woes. The Atreids, the noble generals, would not do this. They would have no tolerance for my distress. You took this burden easily, a burden heavy with howls and foul smells of abscess and pus. Nor from my wounds the noisome stench deter thy generous heart. Raise me up in your arms, my boy." He is also a skillful negotiator. When Odysseus appears in view, Philoktetes tries to shoot him with his divine bow to avenge his misery. But Neoptolemos holds his hands, arresting his revenge. (As NEOPTOLEMUS restores the bow and arrows to the rightful owner, PHILOCTETES, ULYSSES suddenly enters.) ULYSSES I forbid it. PHILOCTETES (He aims an arrow directly at ULYSSES.) Not if I aim This shaft aright. To rob me of my bow, the only means of life! I die destitute of food; No longer shall my swift arrow reach the flying prey, Or on the mountains pierce the wandering herd: O, Odysseus, I wish it were you, I wish it were you that these pains now gripped! NEOPTOLEMUS (laying hold of him) Don't shoot! I beg thee Stop thy rash hand! PHILOCTETES Let go my arm. ULYSSES I could answer him, Were this a time for words; but now, no more than this- I act as best befits our purpose. Ulysses yields to none; I was not born to be o'ercome,. What could thy presence do? Let Lemnos deserted island keep thee. Neoptolemos soothes inconsolable Philoktetes. He conjures up Hercules' ghost (Philoktetes' patron saint) and asks for his mercy and benediction.
"ELECTRA" by Sophocles
Electra, Chrysothemis and their brother Orestes hope to avenge on their hapless sire Agamemnon's dire murder. Agamemnon is slain by Aegisthus, now Electra's mother (Clytemnestra)'s husband. Electra ululates vehemently (in proportion to her filial piety), while Orestes conspires stealthy ruses according to oracles. He asks old Paedagogus to bruit about false tidings (even to his own family including Electra and mother) that Orestes is "hurled from his rapid chariot and died amid the tramp of racing steed that dragged him." In days bereft of her father, inconsolable Electra pines away and languishes, waiting for her mysteriously vanished brother. On the other hand, Chrysothemis is happy because her mother is still happy. Rather, Chrysothemis asks Electra to desist from her perpetual lament because Aegisthus will put her in a windowless dungeon. Chrysothemis says "bend before the strong." Their mother dreams the following (foreboding). "Tis said that she beheld our sire, restored to the sunlight; then he took the sceptre,- Once his own, but now borne by Aegisthus,- and planted it at the hearth; and thence a fruitful bough sprang upward, wherewith the whole land of Mycenae was overshadowed." Behaving like Hamlet (or treating her mother as an accomplice of Agamemnon's murder), Electra tries to prevent her sister from offering libations to the grave on their mother's behalf. Instead, "give the departed a lock cut from your tresses, and my hair. Then pray that he may come in kindness from the world below, to aid us against our foes; and that Orestes may live to set his foot upon his foes in victorious might, that henceforth we may crown his tomb with wealthier hands." Furthermore, Electra warns her sister. Do you dream of "nuptial song or wedded love? Nay, and do not hope that such joys will ever be thine; Aegisthus is not so ill-advised as ever to permit that children should spring from thee or me for his own sure destruction." With Aegisthus' help, Clytemnestra kills her husband because Agamemnon sacrificed her daughter (instead of his brother Menelaus') to the gods (Argives). Agamemnon was compelled to sacrifice his child because he hunted and slaughtered a sacred animal that belongs to a goddess. Clytemnestra is afraid of her children, Electra and Orestes, but her fear admits of her maternal instinct. "CLYTEMNESTRA There is a strange power in motherhood; a mother may be wronged, but she never learns to hate her child. They, who sprang from my own life, yet, forsake me who had suckled and reared them." Upon hearing her brother's (false) death, Electra is alone haunted by the Nemesis of vindication. "Orestes! I am alone, bereft of thee, as of my father. The will to stay alive left me. What have I to live for?" Only faceless, anonymous Chorus takes pity on her (later the same imaginative Chorus asks Electra to have more mercy, foresight and prudence). "CHORUS For all men it is appointed to die." Then, her light-hearted and carefree sister Chrysothemis brings a confusing news regarding Orestes. "CHRYSOTHEMIS When I came to our father's ancient tomb, I saw that streams of milk had lately flowed from the top of the mound, and that his sepulchre was encircled with garlands of all flowers.On the mound's edge I saw a lock of Orestes' hair, freshly severed." Electra's sister does not share her feeling. Orestes neither intends to heap fresh causes of mourning on Electra, nor wants to add another misery to her old one. Orestes who has lived so long in exile and who is now known to be dead meets her in disguise when he brings his own relics and avenges on his father's murder. ORESTES What shall I say? What words can serve me at this pass? I can restrain my lips no longer! ELECTRA I have no right to lament for my dead brother? ORESTES This is not thy part. ELECTRA What? Art thou he? ORESTES Look at this signet, once our father's. Sophocles' Electra puzzles a reader because they are in the vicious cycle of homicide. Agamemnon unwittingly kills a goddess' animal in a grove, thereby is forced to kill one of his daughter. This leads his wife Clytemnestra to kill him. Now, her son Orestes tries to kill his mother. How can Eletra's and Orestes' love for their father justifies their killing their mother? Orestes is driven by Apollo's spiteful oracle, whereas Electra hates her stepfather who indulges in sharing spoils with her mother. (At least in Shakespeare's Hamlet, Hamlet's father ghost explicitly orders Hamlet not to harm his mother.) CLYTEMNESTRA My son, my son, have pity on thy mother! ELECTRA Thou hadst none for him, nor for the father that begat him. CLYTEMNESTRA Oh, I am smitten! ELECTRA Smite, if thou canst, once more! Virginia Woolf writes "But it is not so easy to decide what it is that gives these cries of Electra in her anguish their power to cut and wound and excite. ... something suffering in her, outraged and stimulated to its utmost stretch of capacity ...Electra witnesses her mother's vileness and denounce it in loud, almost vulgar, clamour to the world at large. Orestes kills within the house, and Electra bids him utterly destroy--"Strike again." Orestes and Electra are like Shakespeare's Othello who kills his beloved wife for the sake of his honor only. They see one thing clearly to the exclusion of other equally important things. Can't Electera love her mother as much as her father? Greek Sophocles are like Russia's Dostoevsky (in his "The Karamazov Brother" where an illegitimate bastard- a son nonetheless- kills his father.) Virginia Woolf writes "Electra, as if she swept her veil over her face and forbade us to think of her any more." This is graphic and vivid. In the veil of dissimulation, Electra is happily waiting for her brother's attacking Aegisthus. She obscures her face with her veil, lest Aegisthus get puzzled by her radiant, elated face. She keeps an appearance of mourning for her brother's (feigned) death.
. "Oscar Wilde from Purgatory" (1924) by Hester Smith
"Saul said to the witch of Endor. 'Conjure up the dead, Invoke the phantom of Samuel.' 'I see a preternatural being rising from the earth.' Samuel said to Saul, 'Why do you disturb me by conjuring me up?' 1 Samuel 29:8, 13,15 in the Bible (This is quoted by Huxley.)
Is it true?
THE "EXTERIORISED EFFECTS OF UNCONSCIOUS COMPLEXES."
The author uses a word "cryptesthesia" a lot. "Cryptesthesia" means something cryptic? According to the author, it means second-sighted clairvoyance by an exterior energy. First, I thought think book is like Virgil's guide of Dante in Purgatory. Shakespeare and Dante are Oscar Wilde's favorite writers, so I thought it is congenial. But John Bangs' "The Enchanted Typewriter" and this book give a reader a special flavor of impersonating. Vernon Lee's "Hauntings," Dumas' "Urbain Grainer," Shakespeare's "As you Like it (Rosalind), or "The Merchant of Venice," Virginia Woolf's "Orlando" have the theme of impersonating, assuming somebody else's identity. I was startled (if you care to hear about my feelings) and taken back when somebody blasphemously says that Jesus also believes Isaiah's prophesy in the Old Testament is about himself? I read Frank Harris' biography of Oscar Wilde. As for biographies, I like Benjamin Franklin's autobiography, Gaskell's "Life of Charlotte Bronte" without prejudice. Sometimes a person is so distinct, unique, self-exhibiting, and self-disclosing that it's easy to distinguish that person from crowds. This book claims that Oscar Wilde is still alive and speaks through the author like a conduit or medium. By faking or impersonating somebody else, you have to overcome general suspicions. But when I read a sentence like "I once said in "Dorian Gray," that art had a soul but man had not," this really seems to be uttered by Oscar Wilde. Isn't it the concept of Pygmalion and Galateau? Goddess Venus appreciates Pygmalion's' skill and blesses him by making Galateau be real. Darwin thinks humans' ancestors are evolved monkey species who are experts to imitate. It relieves so much burden, and efforts to imitate a great person than to become a great person from scratch. That is, self-discovery (or fancied self-realization) in others can be easier than self-creation. That's why many have a role-model. (I stretch too far, but it strikes me that the author's THE AUTOMATIC WRITING is inspired by Oscar Wilde like Mohammed, an illiterate man, could write Koran by being infused with the Holy Spirit? What about Jesus' promise of giving his disciples a gift of polyglot languages on Pentecost? Maybe dopamine-filled divine inspirations and enamored adoration have something to do with the department of language skills in a brain.) The book's author may learn Oscar Wilde's habits, attitudes, tones of voice by reading his diaries, letters or conversations, then impersonate them by acting out one's imaginations, creative memory and telepathy. One impersonates what one is not, what one wishes to be. But on the other hand, being oneself has its own merits. One can have an undivided, united one inner voice. If a person, like the author, imitates, internalizes somebody else's voice so deeply, one is likely to become a hybrid, an adulterated alloy, a split personality. Imitating also impairs self-love. Why should the author waste her time in learning every trifle, detail about Oscar Wilde like a stalker? You involuntarily find yourself becoming like Echo who loves Narciss in vain. (Oscar Wilde was not born like Byron (his mother is royal), or like Bacon (his father is Queen Elizabeth's seal keeper and becomes the Chief Justice of England). But his father was a surgeon and his mother was a bluestocking. As rich kids, he and his brother Willie know nothing but academic competitions. He loves Greek, believes himself to be Greek born in a wrong world. He graduates from Oxford. His famous Oxford graduates are John Ruskin, Pater, Anatole France, and Matthew Arnold. These are confirmed in this book. I suspect the author just knows so much about Oscar Wilde and switching "his" or "he" to "my" and "I" in her narratives. For example, automatic writers would say "my alma mater Oxford" when it truly should mean "Oscar Wilde's alma mater Oxford.") Jesus has many healing powers and one of them is to exorcise a discarnate spooky phantom out of a person. Maybe a ghost can feed on a living host. The author claims that it is Oscar Wilde who moves her hands in order to write his thoughts. She even imitates Oscar Wilde's penmanship. I have seen his own handwriting, and I assure you it's scrawling or arguably cacography. (Chris Fletcher's hardcover book "1000 Years of English Literature; English Manuscripts" costs $40. I want to buy this book.) It looks like a three year old baby writes or a drunken man doodles. (I like Virginia Woolf's, Coleridges', Mary Shelley's and John Donnes' elegant and cursive handwritings.) A formidable fan audaciously dares to impersonate Oscar Wilde. "The automatic writing came from Wilde at such a headlong pace that it is impossible to imagine that the mediums could possibly have improvised them consciously. The only possible accusation might be that they were composed and memorised." Moreover, by assuming an extra personality, one can tap into second-wind. "Even when you are tired you are a perfect aeolian lyre that can record me as I think. They ask me to write a poem or an essay, and, at a speed which far exceeds that of the fastest writing, a poem or essay is written." For somebody who cannot get enough of Oscar Wilde and wants more and more about him, this book is spicy. Oscar Wilde is relatively less prolific and thus easy to imitate. What if the author impersonates Macaulay or Pepys or Thomas Carlyle?
John Galsworthy's "Justice (Play)"
Court scenes are depicted in Tolstoy's "Resurrection" and Shakespeare's "The Merchant of Venice." In "Resurrection," a juryman knew a prisoner. In "The Merchant of Venice," a woman judge hides her love for a prisoner (her husband). In Galsworthy's "Justice," Frome, a lawyer defends a prisoner Falder quite well. The advocate argues that criminals are not wicked people but weak people. The judge clarifies "One wrong is no excuse for another", insinuating criminals wicked as well as weak. However important extenuating circumstances, the judge can't let him go scot-free with impunity because "I have to consider the necessity of deterring others from following your example." But the book's preponderance is tilted to too much ill-advised romance.
FAUST, by Goethe Part 1 What i
FAUST, by Goethe
Part 1
What is Doctor Henry Faust's contract with the devil? The Devil will be Faust's servant until Faust says "Abide, you are so fair," (I'm satisfied.) In other words, the devil will serve Faust, whereas Faust will serve the devil in afterlife. And the moment of Faust's death is decided when his happiness is so perfect that he wants to seize the moment into eternity. Faust thinks he will win this bet because he knows that he is naturally an insatiable person who will never find the moment of perfect satisfaction. The cornucopia of his knowledge is great enough but he always wants more and more. Is Faust's eternal craving and hunger what God calls "striving"? Mephistopheles is a fallen Archangel. He is inferior to God. Dante's Inferno indicates that God creates a hell not to punish humans but to punish fallen angels. If God's most meritorious, praiseworthy creature Faust cannot be satisfied by God, how can the devil? Humans are obliged to strive for something beyond themselves eternally and futily.
Goethe's Faust consists of several stories, 1) A learned, hoary doctor who did nothing but study in his life sells his soul to the devil in exchange for his rejuvenation, worldly glory and love. Hitherto, his profound study leads him to dissatisfaction and skepticism. But his learning is above his nature. He bargains with the devil. 2) With the devil incarnate's aid, Faust falls in love with a young girl Gretchen (Margaret). Gretchen suffers too much and becomes crazy in a prison as a result of Faust's seduction. She is doomed. I call the first part of Faust "Gretchen's Tragedy as a result of her liaison with Faust."
The First Part of Faust ends here. In the end, Faust's lover ultimately saves him from the devil and leads him back to God. He lives wantonly and sinfully until her self-forgetting, self-donating love overcomes the devil's influence and power over Faust. Also, indifferent God finally intervenes on Faust's behalf when he is on the verge of becoming the devil's eternal slave.
Long time ago, I read Faust with Hesse's Demian, Goldmund and Narciss, Andre Gide's "The Narrow Gate," Hawthorn's "The Scarlet Letter," when I was a middle school student. Then, to my young mind, Gretchen's love only appeals to me. Now, Gretchen's suffering resonates with me. I used to admire Gretchen, but now I feel sorry for Gretchen.
HEAVEN
In God's holy presence, angels talk about the universe. Raphael mentions about the Sun, Gabriel about the Earth. Michael attributes celestial harmonies to God's splendor wonder.
Thine aspect to the powers supernal
Gives strength, though fathom thee none may;
And all thy works, sublime, eternal,
Are fair as on the primal day.
But Mephistopheles is envious and feels self-mortification in the presence of God. While God's staunchest angels praise God's creation, new born babies, newly built architecture, etc. the devil is the spirit of denial, degeneration, nothingness, barrenness and negation.
FAUST Who are you? [May I ask whom I have the pleasure of speaking to?]
MEPHISTOPHELES Part of that power which still
Produceth good, whilst ever scheming ill.
The spirit I, which will forever deny!
Whate'er to light is brought
Deserves again to be reduced to naught;
Then better 'twere that naught should be.
Mephistopheles believes he can lure, tempt God's most faithful creature Faust away from the Lord. This part of the Devil's wager with God is similar to Job in the Bible.
In Goethe's Faust,
GOD Does nothing on the earth to thee seem right? Is blame
In coming here, as ever, thy sole aim?
MEPHISTOPHELES Faust? What wilt thou wager? Him thou yet shall lose,
If leave to me thou wilt but give, Gently to lead him as I choose!
In the Bible (Job 1:6~1:11),
GOD said to Satan "Have you noticed Job? There is no one like him, blamless, and upright, God-fearing and sinless.
SATAN: If God ceases to bless him, he will surely blaspheme you to your face.
Job's only sin is his self-complacent conviction, his too-much self-confidence about his innocence. He wails and protests loudly that God is wrong to punish him, although he should just endure all quietly and uncomplainingly. Faust's sin is his discontentment and disillusionment. He doubts himself, his life, his God, his studies, etc. Both Job and Faust don't have virtues like humility. In his own mind, Faust thinks he is beyond and above all humans, but his reality does not correspond to his ego. He feels as if his study room were like a prison.
God may acquiesce to the devil's toying with Faust and Job at their expense because self-will is important to human beings. Humans appreciatively understand God's blessing only after they firsthand experience the devil's anathema. God's tolerance comes partly from his words. Humans ever errs, as long as they strive.
FAUST'S DEPRESSION, DISCONTENT
Bookish and academic Faust is glued to his chair all day, reading and studying in his windowless and prison-like room. In self-doubt, he is disillusioned and wonders what his studies amount to and how he can make use of his learnings. His rhapsodical monologue (soliloquy) reveals that his loneliness is somehow maddening, despite the perpetual presence of his inanimate friends such as books. He keeps brooding, moping away. Wagner's use of a time-honored phrase "Art is long. Life is short." does not encourage Faust.
FAUST
I have neither goods nor treasure,
No worldly honour, rank, or pleasure;
Woe's me! still prison'd in the gloom
Of this abhorr'd and musty room!
Hemmed in by book-heaps, piled around,
Worm-eaten, hid 'neath dust and mould,
Where phantasy creates her own self-torturing brood,
Around whose narrow jaws rolleth hell's fiery flood;
Faust continues to rant so vehemently that his unbridled (somewhat diseased) imagination conjures up and summons the Earth Spirit. Faust dubs the Earth Spirit his equal. But the Earth Spirit is no ill-wisher and has nothing to do with Faust. The Spirit snubs him point-blank and disappears. This is critical because Faust is fond of nature, the Earth Spirit. Even after this, Faust often takes refuge in nature and laments his temptation by the devil. Nature certainly induces Faust to appreciate God's creation and creatures.
FAUST Shall I yield, thing of flame, to thee?
Faust, and your equal, I am he!
O'ersweep the world; how near I feel to thee!
SPIRIT Thou'rt like the spirit, thou dost comprehend, Not me!
FAUST I, God's own image!
And not rank with thee!
Spirit! I dare not lift me to thy sphere.
What though my power compell'd thee to appear,
My art was powerless to detain thee here.
I am not like the gods! Feel it I must;
I'm like the earth-worm, writhing in the dust,
Faust's self-absorption and depression gnaw away at his soul. Faust is an old, senile man. His declining life is numbered. Death is near. In sleepless nights, his thoughts verge on suicide.
With glad resolve to take the fatal leap,
Though danger threaten thee, to sink in endless sleep!
Thus draws the [poison] goblet from my lips away?
Announce the solemn dawn of Easter-day?
ON THE EASTER MORNING
When he is about to drink a sort of analgesic and fatal drug, he is stopped by churches' Easter pealing bells. He is infused with the Holy Spirit. Angels encourage him to strengthen his faith in Christ's salvation.
CHORUS OF ANGELS
You whom mortality,Earth's sad reality,Held as in prison.
Blessed the loving one, Who from earth's trial throes,
Healing and strengthening woes,
Soars as from prison.
Christ is arisen, redeem'd from decay.
The bonds which imprison Your souls, rend away!
Praising the Lord with zeal, By deeds that love reveal,
Like brethren true and leal, Sharing the daily meal,
To all that sorrow feel Whisp'ring of heaven's weal,
Still is the master near,
Still is he here!
When Faust thinks of himself, he is miserable. Yet, in outside worlds, people love Faust. On the Easter festival, he is an honored guest. People pay homage to him and bless him. Maybe when the Black Death plague or a similar kind of deadly disease is ubiquitous, Faust apparently helps so many dying people. But when a peasant praises him, Faust somehow ironically asks him to thank God instead.
OLD PEASANT
Doctor, 'tis really kind of you, to come this way,
A highly learned man like you, To join us today.
the fever's deadly blast,
The fatal sickness stay'd at last.
you sought each house,Where reign'd the mortal pestilence.
Corpse after corpse was carried forth, But still unscath'd you issued thence.
FAUST
To Him above in homage bend,
Who prompts the helper and Who help doth send.
But the devil's malice overpowers angels' exhortation and people's appreciation. In Goethe's Faust, Mephistropheles in disguise follows Faust and his sidekick Wagner. Although Faust may be said to be inflicted with morbidly acute imagination and sensibility, he seems to have second-sight or clairvoyance. Wagner only sees outward appearances, husk.
WAGNER
Naught but a poodle black of hue I see;
'Tis some illusion doth your sight deceive.
FAUST
Methinks a magic coil our feet around,
He for a future snare doth lightly spread.
Faust tries to translate the New Testament. In his room, Faust's astray dog can't be still till it is metamorphosed into a devil.
A dog growls, doubts, lays him on his belly, too,
And wags his tail--as dogs are wont to do.
Thou standest still, for thee he'll wait;
Thou speak'st to him, the poodle fawns upon thee straight;
Peace , poodle, peace! Scamper not thus; obey me!
Behind the stove now quietly lay thee,
Poodle, snarl not! with the tone that arises.
Hallow'd and peaceful, my soul within,
Accords not thy growl, thy bestial din.
We find it not strange, that man despises
To open the New Testament an impulse strong
Impels me, to explore its sacred lore,
And render into my loved German tongue.
Real is it, or a phantom show?
In length and breadth how doth my poodle grow!
What spectre have I harbour'd thus!
Huge as a hippopotamus.
Are you, comrade fell,
Fugitive from hell?
The following part is similar to the temptation of Jesus. While Jesus categorically dispells the devil by saying that he can't live by bread alone, that he shall never test God, Faust is insatiable, discontented and self-deluded. The devil pledges to be Faust's servant and to administer to his needs until Faust is so ecstatic and satisfied that he wants to seize the moment and to feel eternity in an instant. For Faust, rejuvenation and returning youth means a second chance. Does Faust have defective subnormal foresight? Faust seems very eager to finalize his covenant with the devil.
In Goethe's Faust,
MEPHISTOPHELES But make
The compact! I at once will undertake
To charm thee with mine arts. I'll give thee more
Than mortal eye has ever beheld before.
A scrap is for our compact good.
You under-sign merely with a drop of blood.
FAUST: When to the moment I shall say,
"Linger awhile! so fair thou art!"
Then mayst thou fetter me straightway,
Then to the abyss will I depart!
In the Bible, (Mark 1:12, Matthew 4:8 and Luke 4:1)
DEVIL: Behold all the kingdoms of the world in their magnificence. All these I shall give to you, if you worship me. (Matthew 4:8)
Suddenly, a student visits Faust in the hope of becoming a great scholar. But Faust's environment seems too oppressive and suffocating. The student asks Faust's advice. Mephistopheles disguises himself as Faust and impersonates Faust. But after giving very sophisticated advices, the devil further enthralls him with double-meaning equivocations. He signs his autograph on the student's guestbook.
STUDENT Here, I longed true knowledge to attain. yet These walls, this melancholy room,
O'erpower me with a sense of gloom;
The space is narrow, nothing green,
No friendly tree is to be seen:
MEPHISTOPHELES (aside)
I'm weary of the dry pedantic tone,
And must again the genuine devil play.
In Part 2, this student becomes a pretentious scholar.
STUDENT
I find you still as then when I began;
But I am here again, another man!
Confess: what men have ever known is stuff not worth knowing. What teacher has the grace
To tell the truth directly to our face?
MEPHISTOPHELES.
The other time I valued you, an embryo, the chrysalis quite high;
Is of the future, gaily-coloured butterfly.
There is, indeed, a time to learn;
You're ready now to teach, as I discern.
I sought a hidden treasure, one of gold;
'Twas hideous coals when all my search was done.
Bachelor of Arts. Confess it then! Your skull, now bald and old,
Is worth no more than yonder hollow one.
Mephistopheles [good-humouredly].
I see the learned man in what you say!
You're ruder, friend, perhaps than you mean quite.
This student, graduate with a degree of Bachelor Art sounds like old egomaniac (self-complacent) Faust. Ironically, there is much truth in his well-said words.
BACHELOR OF ARTS. This is youth's noblest message and most fit!
The world was not till I created it.
It is presumption that men old and hoar
Seek to be something when they are no more.
Man's life lives in his blood and where, forsooth,
Does blood so stir as in the veins of youth?
Ah, that is living blood, with vigour rife,
Creating newer life from its own life.
There all is stirring, there is something done,
The weak fall out, the capable press on.
While half the world we've brought beneath our sway,
What have you done? Thought, nodded, dreamed away,
Considered plan on plan- and nothing won.
It's certain! Age is but an ague cold,
Chill with its fancies of distress and dread.
Once a man's thirty, he's already old,
He is indeed as good as dead.
Mephistopheles belittles and renounces traditional Christian teachings and dogmas.
I know it well, so rings the book throughout;
Much time I've lost in puzzling o'er its pages,
For downright paradox, no doubt,
A mystery remains alike to fools and sages.
Ancient the art and modern too, my friend.
'Tis still the fashion as it used to be,
Error instead of truth abroad to send
By means of three and one, and one and three.
the Holy Trinity is ever taught and babbled in the schools.
Who'd take the trouble to dispute with fools?
With Sibyls'' aids, Mephistopheles rejuvenates and reinvigorates Faust.
MEPHISTOPHELES Again at eighty to grow hale and young. In truth,
Nature giveth a method to renew thy youth:
FAUST'S BAITING BRIBE
After Faust gulps down (guzzle) a sort of magically concocted love potion, he imediately falls in love with Magaret (Gretchen). As if he were sexually-frustrated hitherto, he captures the first prey in view. To see if Gretchen is materialistically covetuous and acquisitive, Mephistopheles leaves jewelries unattended in her bedroom. He wants to shower Gretchen with jewelries, trinkets.
FAUST Fair lady, may I thus make free
To offer you my arm and company?
FAUST [to Mephistopheles] Conduct me to her place of rest!
Bring me a kerchief from her snowy breast,
MEPHISTOPHELES Here is a casket, with a store
Of jewels, which I got elsewhere.
GRETCHEN How comes this lovely casket here?
Jewels! which any noble dame might wear,
This necklace--how would it look on me!
These splendid gems, whose may they be?
FAUST'S VOYEUR
Does love-sick and lovelorn Faust invite a reader to peep through a keyhole with him while Gretchen is getting naked? But Faust thinks he means well. He wants to beautify Gretchen, the object of his love.
GRETCHEN(While undressing herself she begins to sing.)
There was a king in Thule, True even to the grave;
To whom his dying mistress A golden beaker gave.
(She puts jewels on and steps before the glass.)
In Gretchen's eyes, Faust is ennobled, enriched and empowered to the highest degree that she readily reciprocates and shares his tender feeling.
GRETCHEN Just wait awhile! (She gathers a star-flower and plucks off the leaves one after another. She plucks off the leaves and murmurs to herself.) He loves me--loves me not-- (Plucking off the last leaf with fond joy.) He loves me! (embracing Faust, and returning his kiss)
Gretchen's humor, mirth and light-heartedness at least take oppressive weight and depression off Faust's mind.
(He kisses her hand.)
GRETCHEN..
Nay! trouble not yourself! A hand so coarse,
So rude as mine, how can you kiss!
What constant work at home must I not do perforce!
My mother too exacting is.
FAUST'S MURDER OF GRETCHEN'S MOTHER
But Gretchen's mother brings these unattended treasure to her church. By Faust's request, the devil brings more treasures as love tockens for the second time. Gretchen stashes away jewelry caskets at her friend Martha's house, lest her mother find and bring them to the church again.
The gems for Gretchen brought,
A glimpse of them the mother caught,
"My child," she cries, "ill-gotten good
Ensnares the soul, consumes the blood;
With them we'll deck our Lady's shrine,
She'll cheer our souls with bread divine!"
At this poor Gretchen 'gan to pout;
'Tis a gift-horse, at least, she thought,
Straight for a priest the mother sent,
With what he saw was well content.
The Church alone, be it confessed,
can ill-got wealth digest."
FAUST'S PERJURY
Mephistopheles plays a role of a pandering pimp or sex monger or match maker. He accosts Martha and brings her unhappy tidings of her husband. Martha asks for any relics or bequests from her departed husband. She gets angry when her husband spends almost all money in asking for three hundred posthumous masses for his disembodied soul's rest in the churches. When Martha asks for more evidence of her husband's demise, Mephistopheles gladly says he will bring another witness, Faust. Gretchen often visits Martha and will see Faust. But when the devil gives Faust one mote of happiness, he asks Faust to commit new sins at others' expense. To meet Gretchen, Faust is compelled to perjure himself and to tell Martha a lie.
MEPHISTOPHELES
Would I could happier tidings show!
Your husband's dead, and greeteth you.
Madam, in truth, it grieves me sore,
Ay, madam, what two witnesses declare
Is held as valid everywhere;
A gallant friend I have, not far from here,
Who will for you before the judge appear.
I'll bring him straight.
MARTHA
I pray you do!
MEPHISTOPHELES
[to Gretchen] And this young lady, we shall find her too?
Gretchen mother is like a patron saint or a guardian angel for her virgin daughter Gretchen. But Faust gives a sleeping drug for her mother, lest they get caught in the act of sex on spot. Gretchen does not know this drug ultimately kills her mother.
GRETCHEN.. Ah, if I slept alone! To-night
The bolt I fain would leave undrawn for thee;
But then my mother's sleep is light,
Were we surprised by her, ah me!
FAUST Dear angel! there's no cause for dread.
Here is a little phial,--if she take
Mixed in her drink three drops, 'twill steep
Her nature in a deep and soothing sleep.
When Gretchen talks with one of her friends Bessy, she likens her story to herself. Bessy wonders why Gretchen feels sorry for the condemned girl because she is rightly served. Gretchen can forsee her own future. For penance, Gretchen decorates the shrine of the Mater dolorosa (sorrowful mother) with flowers and asks for mercy.
BESSY
She's rightly served, in sooth, The first she everywhere must shine,
He always treating her to pastry and to wine.
Of her good looks she was so vain,
So shameless too, that to retain His presents, she did not disdain;
Sweet words and kisses came anon--
And then the virgin flower was gone.
GRETCHEN.. Poor thing!
BESSY Forsooth dost pity her? Or on the bench or in the dusky walk,
At night, with her lover she must chat, Thinking the hours too brief for their Sweet talk;
Her proud head she will have to bow,
And in white sheet do penance now!
GRETCHEN.. Ah, rich in sorrow, thou,
Stoop thy maternal brow,
And mark with pitying eye my misery! Gaze upwards on thy Son's death agony.
Help! from disgrace and death deliver me! And mark with pitying eye my misery!
The pangs that rack me to the bone?
How my poor heart, without relief,
Trembles and throbs, its yearning grief
Thou knowest, thou alone!
FAUST'S MURDER OF GRETCHEN'S BROTHER
Gretchen is enceinte. At Gretchen's door, her brother Valentine defies and challenges Mephistopheles and gets killed in a scuffle. On expiring, Valentine gives Gretchen a warning as a parting gift. Gretchen has a good family. Her mother teaches her honesty and her brother inoculates her with honor and chastity -in vain.
VALENTINE My Gretchen, still young are you,
Art not discreet enough, I trow,
thou the path of shame dost tread. Abstain,
Nor dare God's holy name profane!
What's done, alas, is done and past!
Matters will take their course at last;
Thou'lt common be to all the town.
When infamy is newly born,
In secret she is brought to light,
And the mysterious veil of night.
And shun thy hated form to meet,
As when a corpse infects the street.
Thy heart will sink in blank despair,
A golden chain no more thou'lt wear!
And e'en though God thy crime forgive,
On earth, a thing accursed, thou'lt live!
Full measure I might hope to win
Of pardon then for every sin.
'Twas thy dishonour that pierced my heart,
Through the death-sleep I now depart.
WALPURGIS-NIGHT
In order to divert Faust's mind from Valentine's death, the devil brings Faust to witches' festivals and ballroom. Yet, Faust sees an apparition that resembles Gretchen. Faust is alarmed because she looks like an emaciated prisoner. When Mephistopheles refuses to aid Faust's wanting to rescue Gretchen, he says the devil's former shape of a dog is very becoming and fitting. Apart from Faust's contract, nobody would dare to curse the devil in the face. But Faust's vehement protest against the devil's callousness, unfeelings and apathy may be too late because it is Faust, not the devil who seduces Gretchen and forsakes her irresponsibly.
FAUST Hound! Execrable monster !--Back with him into his dog's shape, in which it was his wont to scamper before me. Change him again into his favourite shape, that he may crouch on his belly before me in the dust, whilst I spurn him with my foot.
Gretchen's confused mind becomes increasingly distracted, disoriented and split between her carnal love for Faust and her sisterly love for Valentine. There is no way for her to justify the birth of her illegitimate bastard. She is convicted of killing it and gets imprisoned in a dungeon. In her delirium, she raves incoherent nonsenses. She is traumatized by haunting memories. She sounds like Hamlet's Ophelia before she drowns herself. Her sense of proportion is damaged.
(Singing within.)
GRETCHEN'S LOUD, MAD SONG IN HER SOLITARY PRISON CELL AT NIGHT
I sent my mother to her grave,
I drown'd my child beneath the wave.
My mother took me and slew!
My father, the scoundrel, Hath eaten me too!
My sweet little sister Hath all my bones laid,
Where soft breezes whisper All in the cool shade!
Then became I a wood-bird, and sang on the spray,
Fly away! little bird, fly away! fly away!
GRETCHEN.. (hiding her face in the bed of straw)
Let me my babe but suckle once again!
I fondled it; They took it from me but to give me pain,
And now, they say that I my child have slain.
Woe! woe! they come! oh bitter 'tis to die!
FAUST (softly) Hush! hush! be still! I come to set thee free!
For Gretchen, the borderline between reality and imagination is blurred. She smells death. She is a living corpse. Her soul is gone but her body remains. In death, her soul stays, her body is gone. She constantly invokes the most haunting image of her infant struggling in the pond when it is getting drowned. Because of her, her mother, brother and baby are killed.
GRETCHEN The graves I will describe to thee,
And thou to them must see
The best place give to my mother,
Close at her side my brother,
Me at some distance lay--
But not too far away!
Quick! Quick I Save thy poor child! The brook along, Over the bridge To the wood beyond, To the left, where the plank is, In the pond. Seize it at once! It fain would rise, It struggles still! Save it. Oh save!
My brain, alas, is cold with dread !--
There sits my mother upon a stone, And to and fro she shakes her head;
She winks not, she nods not, her head it droops sore;
She slept so long, she waked no more;
She hears him but she sees him not. When she sees him, his hand, she imagines there is blood, her brother's blood on Faust's murderous hand.
FAUST (aloud) Gretchen! Gretchen! My love! My love!
GRETCHEN.. (listening) That was my lov'd one's voice!
Where is he? I heard him calling me.
To his neck will I fly,
On his bosom will lie!
On yon threshold he stood;
Amidst all the howling of hell's fiery flood,
The scoff and the scorn of its devilish crew,
The tones of his voice, sweet and loving, I knew.
GRETCHEN..
Give me thy hand! It is no dream! 'Tis true!
Thine own dear hand !--But how is this? 'Tis wet?
Quick, wipe it off! Meseems that yet
There's blood thereon.
Ah God! what hast thou done?
Put up thy sword, I beg of thee!
Her soul flies away from her body when her love goes away. Her disoriented mind is reinstated by Faust's sweet and healing presence. Her soul is saved by angels.
MEPHISTOPHELES She now is judged!
VOICES (from above) Is saved!
She loved him at her soul's expense. Faust's constancy and fidelity reassure her. Because of Faust, Gretchen disobeys her mother's warning that she shall not take any cursed gift, unknowingly kills her mother by giving her Faust's sleeping drug and loses her brother Valentine who tries to restore her reputation. In exchange for Faust's love, new miseries, homicide, pregnancy and infanticide are heaped upon old tribulations (poverty, etc.) until she is driven to madness. It's some ironical coincidence that both Faust and Gretchen do not take care of their "soul." Through consummate love, Gretchen gives her soul to Faust who sold his soul to the devil. When Faust grows to love Gretchen more than the mere gratification of bodily senses, he needs to reclaim his undivided soul from the devil so that he can give to Gretchen. His heart belongs to Gretchen. It would appear like affectation to romanticize Gretchen's madness.
FAUST's peroration.
In misery! despairing! long wandering pitifully on the face of the earth and now imprisoned, immured in the dungeon as a malefactor and reserved for horrid tortures! That it should come to this! To this !--Perfidious, worthless spirit, and this thou hast concealed from me ! Imprisoned! In hopeless misery! Delivered over to the power and the judgment of unpitying humanity without help!
This reminds a reader of Shakespeare's Macbeth. Macbeth is similarly hailed and blessed (?) -questionablly- by treacherous witches. He is raised in rank and prestige but in the end, he realizes the sophistry and equivocation of the witches' prophetic omens.
FAUST, by Goethe -Part 2
In part two, Faust's ambition is in worldly fame, power, wealth and influence. Faust falls in love with Helen of Troy (necrophile?). Like Virgil in Dante's Inferno, Mephistopheles guides Faust in the Hell in search for Helen.
MEPHISTOPHELES. Descend, then! I might also tell you: Soar!
It's all the same. Escape from the Existent
To phantoms' unbound realms far distant!
Delight in what long since exists no more!
Like filmy clouds the phantoms glide along.
Brandish the key, hold off the shadowy throng.
With some unintended mistakes, Faust helps an Emperor modernize many facets of economy and improve so many people's lives. His social, civil contribution is so great that he is redeemed by the Lord.
Part 2 Act II CLONE HUMANS
Doctor Wagner, Faust's former research assistant becomes a great scholar by now. He actually clones humans via stem cell researches? His creation is Homunculus. This scientific advancement reveals Goethe's vast imagination and prophetic foresight.
LABORATORY
WAGNER. A man is in the making!
The mystery's within our reach.
It turns to voice, it turns to speech.
Homunculus [in the phial, to WAGNER].
Well, Daddy! how are you? It was no jest.
Come, press me tenderly upon your breast,
To MEPHISTOPHELES. How Sir Cousin, are you too?
And at the proper moment? Thank you!
WAGNER'S HOMUNCULUS AND PYGMALION'S GALATEA
Homunculus is a human clone created by Doctor Wagner. He looks like an undeveloped premature infant. Like a glow-worm or a beacon, Homunculus emits light in a glass, illuminating his surroundings radiantly. It is fitting for Homunculus to love Galatea because I think Galatea is Pygmalion's lover and creation. Pygmalion chisels her and breathes a soul in an inanimate object.
Homunculus.
In this dear water brightens
All that my lamplet lightens,
All wondrous fair to see. At once a flood of light I'll scatter,
Discreetly, though, for fear the glass might shatter.
Thales. Homunculus is it, by Proteus swayed... The symptoms are those of a masterful yearning,
Prophetic of agonized throbbing and burning.
At Galatea's feet, he'll shatter himself on the glittering throne.
See it flame, now it flashes, pours forth- it is done!
Thales. Homunculus has come to earth
But half-way formed, a quite peculiar birth.
He has no lack of qualities ideal
But lacks too much the tangible and real.
Till now the glass alone has given him weight;
He'd like forthwith to be incorporate.
Proteus. You are a virgin's son, yea, verily:
You are before you ought to be!
MONETARY POLICY
Faust and Mephistopheles become an Emperor's royal economists. They initiate gold-mining explorations, introduce paper money, improve agriculture and expand land through land reclamation projects (at the expense of Philemon and Baucis. This part is similar to 1 Kings 21, where "King Ahab envied the vineyard of his subject Naboth. His wicked wife (Mephistopheles for Faust) arranged for Naboth to be killed so that Ahab could seize it."). If the emperor fathoms the proved amount of gold reserves in mines, every paper currency can be backed by such vast gold. Faust gets the emperor's permission to print countless paper money and quickly solves the country's insoluble deficit.
EMPEROR. I'm sated of this endless "If" and "How."
There is no money. Well, then, get it now!
So let the time in merriment be spent! Be quick! How long are we to wait?
MEPHISTOPHELES. Such urgent longing, Sire, pray moderate!
Money's lacking here.
Where in this world does not some lack appear?
In veins of mountains, walls far underground,
Gold coined and uncoined can be found;
MEPHISTOPHELES. Nor gold nor pearls are half as handy as
Such paper. Then a man knows what he has.
Goblet and chain are auctioned off and sold;
Paper redeemed without delay in gold
Ready at hand the Emperor's realm will hold
Henceforth enough of paper, jewels, gold.
EMPEROR. Our realm owes you this great prosperity;
As is the service, the reward should be.
Our empire's soil be trusted to your care,
The worthiest guardians of the treasures there.
I really wonder if Faust and Mephistopheles can raise his ideal woman from the dead, why doesn't Faust choose to resurrect Gretchen instead of Helen from the deceased? But it is the emperor who wants to meet Helen in the first place (although she later marries Faust and has a son by him.)
FAUST. The Emperor orders- straightway must it be-
Both Helen and Paris will he see,
Of man and woman in their true ideal
Demands to see the forms distinct and real.
Mephistopheles makes Faust thirty years younger. There is another atavistic element. Faust admires Helen of Troy in books. As if they were riding a time machine, they go back to ancient times. Faust disguises himself as a medieval knight and pledges to serve Helen. They have a son, Euphorion.
Helen's beauty overwhelms, enthralls, excites and captivates Faust. He swoons away and his knees give away when her invoked image disappears.
[HELEN appears.]
FAUST. Have I still eyes? Is Beauty's spring, outpouring,
Revealed most richly to my inmost soul?
My dread path brought me to this loftiest goal!
Void was the world and barred to my exploring!
What is it now since this my priesthood's hour?
Vanish from me my every vital power
The lovely form that once my fancy captured,
That in the magic glass enraptured.
MEPHISTOPHELES. So that is she! She'd not disturb my rest;
Pretty indeed, but still I'm not impressed.
Faust! poor wretch! seduced, unwise,
Scarce to be rescued from Love's chain!
Whom Helen doth paralyze,
His reason he'll not soon regain.
Part II ACT III
According to Homer's Illiad, Paris falls in love with a married queen Helen and the Trojan War breaks out. But Helen's husband King Menelaus wins and restores Helen from Paris.
Helen. "And now I am sent before Menelaus to his city; But I can not guess what intent he harbours. Do I come here as wife? Do I come as victim for the prince's bitter pain And for the adverse fate the Greeks endured so long? Be it as it may!"
When Helen worries about her safety, Mephistopheles who disguises himself as Phorkyas suggests that a chivalrous knight (Faust) wants to protect her. Faust's son Euphorion is born. Euphorion seems to be a mixture of a poet Lord Byron and Ecarus (the first aviator). Helen and Euphorion live with Faust only for a short time. Like Ecarus, Euphorion is killed in his flight and Helen would rather follow her son to the underworld.
______________________________________________________________________________________________
Joy, by Galsworthy
Joy is morbidly jealous of her mother's new boyfriend. Joy finds herself stlaking her mother Mrs. Gwyn and Lever. Lever tries to persuade Joy's grandfather Colonel Hope into buying a gold mine stock shares. Joy thinks Level is a swindler. Miss Beech is Joy's governess. One thing that is worth reading is Dick. Dick hopes to be Joy's boyfriend. Dick is Joy's funny comforter.
John Galsworthy's "Justice (Play)"
Court scenes are depicted in Tolstoy's "Resurrection" and Shakespeare's "The Merchant of Venice." In "Resurrection," a juryman knew a prisoner. In "The Merchant of Venice," a woman judge hides her love for a prisoner (her husband). In Galsworthy's "Justice," Frome, a lawyer defends a prisoner Falder quite well. The advocate argues that criminals are not wicked people but weak people. The judge clarifies "One wrong is no excuse for another", insinuating criminals wicked as well as weak. However important extenuating circumstances, the judge can't let him go scot-free with impunity because "I have to consider the necessity of deterring others from following your example." But the book's preponderance is tilted to too much ill-advised romance.
The Fugitive, by John Galsworthy
Clare Dedmond is high-born, thoroughbred, well-mannered and beautiful. Her husband George is wealthy. But she is cajoled by Malise. George calls Malise's house a pigsty. She leaves Malise too. She plunges herself into voluntary poverty and wanders like a hooker or a teenage girl who just reaches puberty.
A Family Man by John Galsworthy
A DOMESTIC DISAGREEMENT
John Builder is a multi-millionaire lawyer and a district magistrate. An incumbent mayor recommends him for the next mayor. Builder always believes "All my married life I've put a curb on myself for the sake of respectability. I've been a man of principle. I'm a family man." But Builder's eldest daughter Athene is his problem. "It's not dignified for the Mayor of this town to have an unmarried daughter as young as Athene living by herself away from home. Do you know what sort of people Athene associates with now?" Miss Athene Builder willingly and gladly suffers voluntary poverty and fictitious misery for the sake of freedom and independence. Hitherto, Mr. Builder disowns and disinherits his daughters. In fact, Miss Athene is married secretly. She is Mrs. Herringhame, Guy's wife. When Mr. Builder visits his daughter's house (or rather pigsty or foothold), he finds a man's razor in her bedroom, indicating Athene's cohabitation.
BUILDER (Father). I've never grudged you girls any comfort, or pleasure.
ATHENE (His eldest daughter). Except wills of our own.
... BUILDER. Is it a question of money? You can always have more. You know that.
Athene's sister Maud rebels similarly.
MAUD. I have a film face. Don't oppose it, father! I've always wanted to earn my own living.
BUILDER. I've spent goodness knows what on your education--both of you.
Galsworthy tries to highlight discrepancies between Mr. Builder's political necessity to uphold his public reputation as a family man and his real self.
For him, his wife is a mainstay mentally. He leans on her emotionally. But Mr. Builder is caught by his wife on the spot when he returns his handmaid Camille's kiss. His wife stands petrified, stock-still and unseen and leaves him. At his daughters' house, he makes scenes and exposes his violent, inflammable personality in his attempts to reclaim his wife. He is "charged with assaulting his daughter Maud Builder by striking her with a stick in the presence of Constable Moon and also with resisting Constable Moon in the execution of his duty, and injuring his eye." When the police tries to arrest Mr. Builder, he says "You stupid lout! I'm a judge! Get out! If the law is going to enter private houses and abrogate domestic authority...." Disreputably, he is branded as a woman-beater on newspapers' headlines. "Serve him right!" people react to the news.
MAYOR. The Judge has got a name to keep up-must stand well in the people's eyes. And you did resist the
police. You'd have been the first to maintain justice.
BUILDER. You came to beg me to resign.
BUILDER. No Councillorship, no Magistracy, no future. why? Because I tried to exercise a little wholesome family authority.
RALPH (his brother, lawyer partner). Keep your sense of humour.
"The Strife" by Galsworthy
Anthony is a chairman from his company's inception. In workers' views, Anthony's iron rules amount to tyranny. The firebrand of workers' strike is Roberts. Roberts' wife and Anthony's daughter Enid (Mrs. Underwood) are on good terms. Anthony's son Edgar takes pity on Mrs. Roberts. As the strike is in progress, workers' families suffer. Mrs. Roberts starves to death. The Boards of directors force Anthony to resign.
The Mob (Play), by John Galsworthy
"It seems the fashion nowadays for men to take their enemy's side."
Stephen More is a member of Parliament. His father-in-law, Sir John Julian works at the War Office. Stephen tries to stop the war in vain, when his three brothers-in-law including Hubert Julian are fighting on the frontier. His daughter Olive asks him. Outspeaking against the war, Stephen More cannot withstand the mob's backlash, hooting. A reader can indeed visualize Stephen More making speeches before audiences.
OLIVE: I heard Daddy making a speech to the wind. It broke a
wine-glass. His speeches must be good ones, mustn't they! It felt funny; you couldn't see any wind.
KATHERINE (her mother). Talking to the wind is an expression, Olive.
OLIVE. What does it mean?
KATHERINE. Speaking to people who won't listen.
Like a kite in windy sky, Mr.More soars ironically higher and more vehemently as his opposition's torrential gale becomes stronger. His anti-war speeches sound self-defeating and traitorous in the time of war. His family forsakes him. The mob is angry because More makes speeches in favor of the enemies that kill the nation's soldiers.
The Eldest Son (play), by John Galsworthy
Bill Cheshire, Sir William's eldest son is secretly engaged to marry his mother's handmaid Freda Studdenham. (This is the same early theme in Tolstoy's "Resurrection.") His parents want him to marry a high-born, well-bred, wealthy Lady Mabel Lanfarne. Bill and Freda's relationship is as serious as that of Dunning and Rose Taylor. Dunning and Rose do not belong to Bill's high society. Bill's mother Lady Cheshire tries to persuade Dunning into marry a girl of his equal, Rose. But her ladyship does not think his son's engagement to her servant Freda is suitable. As a result, Sir William disowns and disinherits Bill. His title and wealth will go to his second son, Harold Cheshire.
The Silver Box (Play), by John Galsworthy
Mr. Barthwick's silver box of cigarettes is missing. Mr. Johnes took the silver box and Mrs. Barthwick's purse when he was tipsy. He was drunken and on his way home, he saw another drunken man, Jack Barthwick having difficulty in finding his house. Mr. Jones helped Jack to open the door At home, in return for his help, Jack said to Mr. Jones "Take anything you want in this room." Mr. Jones does not steal but take the silver box. But in daylight the next day Jack remembers nothing. Mr. Johnes is unemployable. His wife is employed as one of many servants at the Barthwicks. Mrs. Jones is a person of interest. Mr. Snow, a police officer in plain clothes arrests the Jones. Although the Jones live like homeless gypsies, Mrs. Jones is honest and warm-hearted.
SIRE AND SCION
Mr.Barthwick's son, Jack is as bad, forgetful and intoxicated as Mr. Johnes. He bounces many checks, snatches a purse from a stranger. But his wealthy father always comes to rescue him. His house is an inviolate sanctuary where Jack Barthwick claims he remembers nothing. Jack lives scot-free with impunity.
JACK. I'll send you a check.
UNKNOWN Give me cash now. I've got to pay rent. If you don't I'll summons you. It's stealing!
JACK. I have n't a penny in my pocket. [He glances stealthily at BARTHWICK, his father.]
BARTHWICK I shall settle this claim. [He produces money.] Here is cash; the extra will cover the value of the purse and your cab fares.
LAW'S DOUBLE STANDARDS?
Building upon the pressumption that the silver box was given as a gift by Jack to Mr. Johnes, the purse matter still remains to be solved. Both Mr. Jones and Jack Barthwick take others' purses when they are inebriated. But Mr. Jones is charged of theft of a silver cigarette-box and assault on the police(when the police tries to arrest him) and is imprisoned, while Jack continues to study at Oxford. According to Mrs. Barthwick, when the poor gets caught justly or wrongly, the law shall inflict harsher punishment and longer sentences on them in order to protect the well-to-do. But when the rich commits similar iniquities, restitution is quickly done before the matter is brought to the court by the police. The poor is somehow driven to steal in their desperation to feed their children. The rich happens to steal due to negligence and bad habits such as drinking. Maybe that's why the government should increase welfare programs, foodstamp to provide people in need with basic sustenance and necessities. Jack's family is prosperous and his incorrigible fault is overlooked. But Mr. Johnes can't take care of himself, his family. Thus, when he falls into sin (drinking and taking others' belongings unwittingly and unknowing), he is not upbraided by his father but is charged and sentenced by a magistrate. Without second chance, he is publicly branded and avoided as a criminal.
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Sophocles's Philoktetes (496 B.C.- 406 B.C.)
HUMANITY
The theme is uttered by Achilles' son, Neoptolemons. "I far prefer failure, if it is honest, to victory earned by treachery. Know, to be just is better far than to be wise. " "Son of Achilles, you must be like your father, and not in strength alone." Neoptolemons is not only honest but also compassionate. He is a good nurse and protector.
This book reminds me of Defoe's Robinson Crusoe or Job in the Bible (a just man who suffers unmerited punishments from God). Apart from a dramatic plot, however, this book can be categorized with Charles Dickens's Oliver Twist (honesty), "Caleb Williams" (magnanimity, clemency), Oscar Wilde's "The Picture of Dorian Grey" (warning against vanity and beauty), etc. It's because the above-mentioned authors seem to convey a clear moral message in their books. Philoktetes is blessed because he inherits Herakles' invincible bow. But Philoktetes is bitten by a sacred snake as he roams around God's shrine. The viper is a guardian, doorkeeper that attacks any intruder. Philoktetes is permanently wounded and becomes a lame cripple. He laments, wails day and night so much that Agamemnon, Menelaos, and Odysseus maroon and wrong him in a deserted island of Lemnos. Besides, Philoktetes' rank, rotten amputated legs fill the air with blood-poisoning smells. A shipwrecked castaway lives like Robinson Crusoe, Rousseau's noble savage, or Emerson's self-reliant, self-sufficient man. But Odysseus cannot win in the Trojan war without Philoktetes' bow. To steal this weapon, he asks Archilles' son Neoptolemos to swindle him with lies. But Neoptolemos is split between incompatible, irreconcilable purposes. He wants to help Odysseus to win the war by obtaining Philoktetes, but it would be to skin Philoktetes alive. Neoptolemos takes pity on him and tries to help him by taking him to his homeward voyage. Achilles' son is as sad ad Philoktetes because his father Greek hero Achilles is slain by God Apollo.
Neoptolemos commiserates and feels his pain (share his sorrow). " I feel for you--I do really. I pity you. Without a friend, left alone, deprived of all the mutual joys that flow from sweet society- distempered too!It seems to me that your woes are enough without taking on the woes of others. Your share of grief almost matches mine. You have endured such miseries, and still you live on and stay alive. I grieve for you. Your pain is mine. How can you withstand and bear such misfortunes? Thou art oppressed with ills on every side. Will thou lean upon me? I mourn thy hapless fate. Whence is it?"
Neoptolemos wants to cure him first then persuades him into helping their battles against Troy. But Philoktetes does not want to help those who abandoned him. However crippled, invalid he is, he still possesses the magical bow, Herakles's bow, the son of Zeus's. ULYSSES His arrows winged with death inevitable.
NEOPTOLEMUS Then it were not safe even to approach him.
ULYSSES No; unless by fraud. Troy cannot fall without his arrows.
Oddseus and Neoptolemos need his bow to bring Greek victory, while he needs the bow to kill birds for livelihood, sustenance.
Achilles' son reminds me of a quote from Tolstoy's "Resurrection."
"His inner life was of a nature directly opposite to that of Simonson's. Simonson was one of those people (of an essentially masculine type) whose actions follow the dictates of their reason, and are determined by it. His capacity for assimilating the thoughts of others, and of expressing them correctly, had given him a position of supremacy among pupils. Novodvoroff belonged, on the contrary, to the class of people of a feminine type, whose reason is directed partly towards the attainment of aims set by their feelings, partly to the justification of acts suggested by their feelings."
Novodvoroff is like Neoptolemos, whereas Oddysseus resembles Simonson who does not act in deference to others' feelings or others' sufferings. (Sophocles' impersonal description of Odysseus puzzles me because Homer's Odysseus (King of Ithaca) is very romantic, lonely person and suffers a lot in his journey. Would his own suffering make him callous to Philoktetes' misery?)
Neoptolemos is an honest man, a good nurse. "You remain by me and endure my woes. The Atreids, the noble generals, would not do this. They would have no tolerance for my distress. You took this burden easily, a burden heavy with howls and foul smells of abscess and pus. Nor from my wounds the noisome stench deter thy generous heart. Raise me up in your arms, my boy." He is also a skillful negotiator. When Odysseus appears in view, Philoktetes tries to shoot him with his divine bow to avenge his misery. But Neoptolemos holds his hands, arresting his revenge. (As NEOPTOLEMUS restores the bow and arrows to the rightful owner, PHILOCTETES, ULYSSES suddenly enters.) ULYSSES I forbid it.
PHILOCTETES (He aims an arrow directly at ULYSSES.) Not if I aim This shaft aright. To rob me of my bow, the only means of life! I die destitute of food; No longer shall my swift arrow reach the flying prey, Or on the mountains pierce the wandering herd: O, Odysseus, I wish it were you, I wish it were you that these pains now gripped!
NEOPTOLEMUS (laying hold of him) Don't shoot! I beg thee Stop thy rash hand!
PHILOCTETES Let go my arm.
ULYSSES
I could answer him, Were this a time for words; but now, no more than this- I act as best befits our purpose. Ulysses yields to none; I was not born to be o'ercome,. What could thy presence do? Let Lemnos deserted island keep thee.
Neoptolemos soothes inconsolable Philoktetes. He conjures up Hercules' ghost (Philoktetes' patron saint) and asks for his mercy and benediction.
"ELECTRA" by Sophocles
Electra, Chrysothemis and their brother Orestes hope to avenge on their hapless sire Agamemnon's dire murder. Agamemnon is slain by Aegisthus, now Electra's mother (Clytemnestra)'s husband. Electra ululates vehemently (in proportion to her filial piety), while Orestes conspires stealthy ruses according to oracles. He asks old Paedagogus to bruit about false tidings (even to his own family including Electra and mother) that Orestes is "hurled from his rapid chariot and died amid the tramp of racing steed that dragged him." In days bereft of her father, inconsolable Electra pines away and languishes, waiting for her mysteriously vanished brother. On the other hand, Chrysothemis is happy because her mother is still happy. Rather, Chrysothemis asks Electra to desist from her perpetual lament because Aegisthus will put her in a windowless dungeon. Chrysothemis says "bend before the strong." Their mother dreams the following (foreboding). "Tis said that she beheld our sire, restored to the sunlight; then he took the sceptre,- Once his own, but now borne by Aegisthus,- and planted it at the hearth; and thence a fruitful bough sprang upward, wherewith the whole land of Mycenae was overshadowed." Behaving like Hamlet (or treating her mother as an accomplice of Agamemnon's murder), Electra tries to prevent her sister from offering libations to the grave on their mother's behalf. Instead, "give the departed a lock cut from your tresses, and my hair. Then pray that he may come in kindness from the world below, to aid us against our foes; and that Orestes may live to set his foot upon his foes in victorious might, that henceforth we may crown his tomb with wealthier hands." Furthermore, Electra warns her sister. Do you dream of "nuptial song or wedded love? Nay, and do not hope that such joys will ever be thine; Aegisthus is not so ill-advised as ever to permit that children should spring from thee or me for his own sure destruction."
With Aegisthus' help, Clytemnestra kills her husband because Agamemnon sacrificed her daughter (instead of his brother Menelaus') to the gods (Argives). Agamemnon was compelled to sacrifice his child because he hunted and slaughtered a sacred animal that belongs to a goddess. Clytemnestra is afraid of her children, Electra and Orestes, but her fear admits of her maternal instinct. "CLYTEMNESTRA There is a strange power in motherhood; a mother may be wronged, but she never learns to hate her child. They, who sprang from my own life, yet, forsake me who had suckled and reared them." Upon hearing her brother's (false) death, Electra is alone haunted by the Nemesis of vindication. "Orestes! I am alone,
bereft of thee, as of my father. The will to stay alive left me. What have I to live for?" Only faceless, anonymous Chorus takes pity on her (later the same imaginative Chorus asks Electra to have more mercy, foresight and prudence). "CHORUS For all men it is appointed to die." Then, her light-hearted and carefree sister Chrysothemis brings a confusing news regarding Orestes. "CHRYSOTHEMIS When I came to our father's ancient tomb, I saw that streams of milk had lately flowed from the top of the mound, and that his sepulchre was encircled with garlands of all flowers.On the mound's edge I saw a lock of Orestes' hair, freshly severed." Electra's sister does not share her feeling. Orestes neither intends to heap fresh causes of mourning on Electra, nor wants to add another misery to her old one. Orestes who has lived so long in exile and who is now known to be dead meets her in disguise when he brings his own relics and avenges on his father's murder.
ORESTES What shall I say? What words can serve me at this pass? I can restrain my lips no longer!
ELECTRA I have no right to lament for my dead brother?
ORESTES This is not thy part.
ELECTRA What? Art thou he?
ORESTES Look at this signet, once our father's.
Sophocles' Electra puzzles a reader because they are in the vicious cycle of homicide. Agamemnon unwittingly kills a goddess' animal in a grove, thereby is forced to kill one of his daughter. This leads his wife Clytemnestra to kill him. Now, her son Orestes tries to kill his mother. How can Eletra's and Orestes' love for their father justifies their killing their mother? Orestes is driven by Apollo's spiteful oracle, whereas Electra hates her stepfather who indulges in sharing spoils with her mother. (At least in Shakespeare's Hamlet, Hamlet's father ghost explicitly orders Hamlet not to harm his mother.) CLYTEMNESTRA My son, my son, have pity on thy mother!
ELECTRA Thou hadst none for him, nor for the father that begat him.
CLYTEMNESTRA Oh, I am smitten!
ELECTRA Smite, if thou canst, once more!
Virginia Woolf writes "But it is not so easy to decide what it is that gives these cries of Electra in her anguish their power to cut and wound and excite. ... something suffering in her, outraged and stimulated to its utmost stretch of capacity ...Electra witnesses her mother's vileness and denounce it in loud, almost vulgar, clamour to the world at large. Orestes kills within the house, and Electra bids him utterly destroy--"Strike again." Orestes and Electra are like Shakespeare's Othello who kills his beloved wife for the sake of his honor only. They see one thing clearly to the exclusion of other equally important things. Can't Electera love her mother as much as her father? Greek Sophocles are like Russia's Dostoevsky (in his "The Karamazov Brother" where an illegitimate bastard- a son nonetheless- kills his father.)
Virginia Woolf writes "Electra, as if she swept her veil over her face and forbade us to think of her any more." This is graphic and vivid. In the veil of dissimulation, Electra is happily waiting for her brother's attacking Aegisthus. She obscures her face with her veil, lest Aegisthus get puzzled by her radiant, elated face. She keeps an appearance of mourning for her brother's (feigned) death.
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"Oscar Wilde from Purgatory" (1924) by Hester Smith
"Saul said to the witch of Endor. 'Conjure up the dead, Invoke the phantom of Samuel.' 'I see a preternatural being rising from the earth.' Samuel said to Saul, 'Why do you disturb me by conjuring me up?' 1 Samuel 29:8, 13,15 in the Bible (This is quoted by Huxley.)
Is it true?
THE "EXTERIORISED EFFECTS OF UNCONSCIOUS COMPLEXES."
The author uses a word "cryptesthesia" a lot. "Cryptesthesia" means something cryptic? According to the author, it means second-sighted clairvoyance by an exterior energy. First, I thought think book is like Virgil's guide of Dante in Purgatory. Shakespeare and Dante are Oscar Wilde's favorite writers, so I thought it is congenial. But John Bangs' "The Enchanted Typewriter" and this book give a reader a special flavor of impersonating. Vernon Lee's "Hauntings," Dumas' "Urbain Grainer," Shakespeare's "As you Like it (Rosalind), or "The Merchant of Venice," Virginia Woolf's "Orlando" have the theme of impersonating, assuming somebody else's identity. I was startled (if you care to hear about my feelings) and taken back when somebody blasphemously says that Jesus also believes Isaiah's prophesy in the Old Testament is about himself? I read Frank Harris' biography of Oscar Wilde. As for biographies, I like Benjamin Franklin's autobiography, Gaskell's "Life of Charlotte Bronte" without prejudice. Sometimes a person is so distinct, unique, self-exhibiting, and self-disclosing that it's easy to distinguish that person from crowds. This book claims that Oscar Wilde is still alive and speaks through the author like a conduit or medium. By faking or impersonating somebody else, you have to overcome general suspicions. But when I read a sentence like "I once said in "Dorian Gray," that art had a soul but man had not," this really seems to be uttered by Oscar Wilde. Isn't it the concept of Pygmalion and Galateau? Goddess Venus appreciates Pygmalion's' skill and blesses him by making Galateau be real. Darwin thinks humans' ancestors are evolved monkey species who are experts to imitate. It relieves so much burden, and efforts to imitate a great person than to become a great person from scratch. That is, self-discovery (or fancied self-realization) in others can be easier than self-creation. That's why many have a role-model. (I stretch too far, but it strikes me that the author's THE AUTOMATIC WRITING is inspired by Oscar Wilde like Mohammed, an illiterate man, could write Koran by being infused with the Holy Spirit? What about Jesus' promise of giving his disciples a gift of polyglot languages on Pentecost? Maybe dopamine-filled divine inspirations and enamored adoration have something to do with the department of language skills in a brain.) The book's author may learn Oscar Wilde's habits, attitudes, tones of voice by reading his diaries, letters or conversations, then impersonate them by acting out one's imaginations, creative memory and telepathy. One impersonates what one is not, what one wishes to be. But on the other hand, being oneself has its own merits. One can have an undivided, united one inner voice. If a person, like the author, imitates, internalizes somebody else's voice so deeply, one is likely to become a hybrid, an adulterated alloy, a split personality. Imitating also impairs self-love. Why should the author waste her time in learning every trifle, detail about Oscar Wilde like a stalker? You involuntarily find yourself becoming like Echo who loves Narciss in vain. (Oscar Wilde was not born like Byron (his mother is royal), or like Bacon (his father is Queen Elizabeth's seal keeper and becomes the Chief Justice of England). But his father was a surgeon and his mother was a bluestocking. As rich kids, he and his brother Willie know nothing but academic competitions. He loves Greek, believes himself to be Greek born in a wrong world. He graduates from Oxford. His famous Oxford graduates are John Ruskin, Pater, Anatole France, and Matthew Arnold. These are confirmed in this book. I suspect the author just knows so much about Oscar Wilde and switching "his" or "he" to "my" and "I" in her narratives. For example, automatic writers would say "my alma mater Oxford" when it truly should mean "Oscar Wilde's alma mater Oxford.") Jesus has many healing powers and one of them is to exorcise a discarnate spooky phantom out of a person. Maybe a ghost can feed on a living host. The author claims that it is Oscar Wilde who moves her hands in order to write his thoughts. She even imitates Oscar Wilde's penmanship. I have seen his own handwriting, and I assure you it's scrawling or arguably cacography. (Chris Fletcher's hardcover book "1000 Years of English Literature; English Manuscripts" costs $40. I want to buy this book.) It looks like a three year old baby writes or a drunken man doodles. (I like Virginia Woolf's, Coleridges', Mary Shelley's and John Donnes' elegant and cursive handwritings.) A formidable fan audaciously dares to impersonate Oscar Wilde. "The automatic writing came from Wilde at such a headlong pace that it is impossible to imagine that the mediums could possibly have improvised them consciously. The only possible accusation might be that they were composed and memorised." Moreover, by assuming an extra personality, one can tap into second-wind. "Even when you are tired you are a perfect aeolian lyre that can record me as I think. They ask me to write a poem or an essay, and, at a speed which far exceeds that of the fastest writing, a poem or essay is written." For somebody who cannot get enough of Oscar Wilde and wants more and more about him, this book is spicy. Oscar Wilde is relatively less prolific and thus easy to imitate. What if the author impersonates Macaulay or Pepys or Thomas Carlyle?
John Galsworthy's "Justice (Play)"
Court scenes are depicted in Tolstoy's "Resurrection" and Shakespeare's "The Merchant of Venice." In "Resurrection," a juryman knew a prisoner. In "The Merchant of Venice," a woman judge hides her love for a prisoner (her husband). In Galsworthy's "Justice," Frome, a lawyer defends a prisoner Falder quite well. The advocate argues that criminals are not wicked people but weak people. The judge clarifies "One wrong is no excuse for another", insinuating criminals wicked as well as weak. However important extenuating circumstances, the judge can't let him go scot-free with impunity because "I have to consider the necessity of deterring others from following your example." But the book's preponderance is tilted to too much ill-advised romance.
The Fugitive, by John Galsworthy
Clare Dedmond is high-born, thoroughbred, well-