ABSTRACT

In all early modern versions of the Faustus legend, Faustus is a scholar who is possessed of an insatiable thirst for knowledge. Since he was not satisfied with his culture’s received wisdom and conceptions of legitimate knowledge, he resorted to the occult sciences, selling his soul to the devil in exchange for the secrets of magic and necromancy. While the authorities of the period decried him as an archsinner, he also inspired awe and admiration. The unquestionable topicality of the material to his contemporaries is evidenced by the fact that a simple rogue’s tale was told and re-told through the sixteenth century until the Faust Book published by Johann Spies (1587), along with its English translation (1592), emerged as imaginative masterpieces of the period.