During the English Renaissance there was a unique combination of traditions and ideologies, and Christopher Marlowe's play The Tragical History Dr. Faustus contains many examples of the synthesis of these ideas. It is important to remember the mindset of the original audience when evaluating Dr. Faustus and its source.

The source of Dr. Faustus is a German work which was translated into and published in English as The Historie Of The Damnable Life, And Deserved Death Of Doctor John Faustus, often called the Faustbook, shortly before the date when historians believe Marlowe wrote his play. Faustbook was meant to be a biography of the real Dr. Faustus, and didn't show him in a sympathetic light. Popular as it was, Faustbook was inaccessible to the largely illiterate common people.

These illiterate masses were a vital demographic for the theater of the time, making up most of the audience. Marlowe chose to take the powerful tale of the downfall of a learned man and makes it more accessible to his popular audience. In order to do so, he chose to add the additional conflict of Faustus' second thoughts to the story and in doing so added a great deal of depth to his character as well as creating a far more sympathetic character for the audience.

Faustus' story is brought down to the level of the common people as Marlowe creates a new kind of Morality play for a new age. Marlowe shows that the ideal Renaissance man is as vulnerable to temptation as the everyman of days gone by. One of the ways that Marlowe makes Faustus more sympathetic is through the addition of the characters of Valdes and Cornelius, a pair of conjurers who greatly aid Faustus on his road to damnation. By creating these two characters, Marlowe has already made the protagonist more sympathetic by moving much the temptation outward, removing much of the responsibility from Faustus.

Faustus considers repenting, but is always stopped by some outward force. In the beginning of the play, Valdes and Cornelius urge Faustus along his sinful path, and after they are no longer neccessary, Mephistophiles goes to great lengths to prevent the redemption of Faustus. Here, Faustus is not entirely evil, so he doubts and wavers at various times during the play, requiring additional temptation and persuation, such as Mephistophiles' pageant of the seven deadly sins, who the audience could easily recognize from many medieval morality plays.

Faustus' conflict is made more accessible to the audience through the use of the Good and Bad Angels, who were also common characters from medieval morality plays. The devil himself was also made more accessible in Marlowe's version. In Faustbook, Faustus had to perform very difficult and elaborate conjuring to simply summon Mephistophiles, who then seems to be very uninterested in Faustus' offers. In Marlowe's version, however, the devil reveals that he may be conjured by anyone who turns their back on God and blasphemes by worship of the devil. This is further evidenced by the comic interludes in which the clown, Robin, is able to cause Mephistophiles to appear despite using comically mangled magical spells.

Comic relief, as well as all of the addition of morality play symbols and internal conflict serve to make the character of Dr. Faustus more readily accessible to his contemporary audience. This was absolutely essential to creating a protagonist with whom audiences would identify with, and a play which they would recommend to their friends. I think that Marlowe did a great job of blending the source material with that of common morality plays, and Dr. Faustus serves as a window into the common mind during that time of clashing ideologies, as well as a damned fine read.