The Tragical History of the Life and Death of Doctor Faustus, commonly referred to simply as Doctor Faustus, is an Elizabethan tragedy by Christopher Marlowe, based on German stories about the title character Faust, that was first performed sometime between 1588 and Marlowe's death in 1593. Two different versions of the play were published in the Jacobean era, several years later.The powerful effect of early productions of the play is indicated by the legends that quickly accrued around them-that actual devils once appeared on the stage during a performance, "to the great amazement of both the actors and spectators", a sight that was said to have driven some spectators mad.

Dr. Faustus is a great Elizabethan tragedy by Christopher Marlow originally published in 1600. The story is based on an earlier anonymous classic German legend involving worldly ambition, black magic and surrender to the devil. It remains one of the most famous plays of the English Renaissance. Dr. John Faustus, a brilliant, well-respected German doctor grows dissatisfied with the limits of human knowledge - logic, medicine, law, and religion, and decides that he has learned all that can be learned by conventional means. What is left for him, he thinks, but magic. His friends instruct him in the black arts, and he begins his new career as a magician by summoning up Mephastophilis, a devil. Despite Mephastophilis’s warnings about the horrors of hell, Faustus tells the devil to return to his master, Lucifer, with an offer of Faustus’s soul in exchange for twenty-four years of service from Mephastophilis. On the final night before the expiration of the twenty-four years, Faustus is overcome by fear and remorse. He begs for mercy, but it is too late. At midnight, a host of devils appears and carries his soul off to hell. Marlowe’s dramatic interpretation of the Faust legend is a theatrical masterpiece. With immense poetic skill, and psychological insight that greatly influenced the works of William Shakespeare and other dramatists, Dr. Faustus combines soaring poetry, psychological depth, and grand stage spectacle. Marlowe created powerful scenes that invest the work with tragic dignity, among them the doomed man’s calling upon Christ to save him and his ultimate rejection of salvation for the embrace of Helen of Troy.

The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus, Christopher Marlowe’s classic interpretation of the Dr. Faustus legend, was first performed in London by the Admiral’s Men around 1592. It is believed to be the first dramatization of this classic tale wherein Faustus, a German scholar, trades his soul to Lucifer in return for magical powers and the command over the demon Mephistopheles. Faustus at first seeks to expand his knowledge of the universe, but soon finds that a deal with the devil brings little satisfaction. All too soon the contract expires, and Faustus is faced with the prospect of eternal damnation. Two principal versions of this play exist, one based on the 1604 quarto (the A text) and a longer, emended version published in 1616 (the B text). This edition is based on Havelock Ellis’s 1893 edition of the 1604 text (the A text is currently believed by many scholars to be the closest to Marlowe’s original). Often considered to be Marlowe’s greatest work, Doctor Faustus builds on the ancestry of the medieval morality play, but brings a more sympathetic view to the straying hero than those precursors to Elizabethan drama, and even ventures to pose questions of common Christian doctrine. This is the last play written by Marlowe before he was killed in a Deptford tavern.

THE CLASSICS - The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus by Christopher Marlowe from The Quarto of 1604 - Edited by The Rev. Alexander Dyce - The Tragical History of the Life and Death of Doctor Faustus, commonly referred to simply as Doctor Faustus, is a play by Christopher Marlowe, based on the German story Faust, in which a man sells his soul to the devil for power, experience, pleasure and knowledge. Doctor Faustus was first published in 1604, eleven years after Marlowe's death and at least 10 years after the first performance of the play. It is the most controversial Elizabethan play outside of Shakespeare, with few critics coming to any agreement as to the date or the nature of the text. The Admiral's Men performed Doctor Faustus twenty-five times in the three years between October 1594 and October 1597. On 22 November 1602, the Diary of Philip Henslowe recorded a £4 payment to Samuel Rowley and William Bird for additions to the play, which suggests a revival soon after that date. The powerful effect of the early productions is indicated by the legends that quickly accrued around them. In Histriomastix, his 1632 polemic against the drama, William Prynne records the tale that actual devils once appeared on the stage during a performance of Faustus, "to the great amazement of both the actors and spectators". Some people were allegedly driven mad, "distracted with that fearful sight". John Aubrey recorded a related legend, that Edward Alleyn, lead actor of The Admiral's Men, devoted his later years to charitable endeavours, like the founding of Dulwich College, in direct response to this incident.