Do you agree with the view that Doctor Faustus has a beginning and an end but no "middle”? Or Discuss the structure or construction or design of the play, Doctor Faustus.

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Faustus is the prisoner of his own conceptions and indeed preconceptions. He trapped in his own legalism. If the devils insist that  a promise is a promise and a bond is a bond that has to be honored, Faustus himself is convinced that this is true (even though the devils themselves are far from sure that the bond has effectively put Faustus's soul in their possession). Apparently, Faustus can believe in and understand a God of justice, but not a God of mercy. If Faustus's self-knowledge makes him say (in Act II, Scene II, Line 18): "My heart's so hardened, I cannot repent", his sense of legal obligation makes him say (Act V, Scene I, Lines 50-52): "Hell calls for right and with a roaring voice/Says, "Faustus come, thine hour is almost come/And Faustus now will come to do thee right". Even at this point the Old Man thinks that Faustus can still be saved. (An Angel has come with a "vial full of precious grace"). The devils themselves would seem to fear that Faustus even at the last moment might escape them: but Faustus himself is convinced that he cannot be saved and his despair effectively prevents any action which would allow him a way out. (Thus in one sense, this play is a study in despair. But the despair does not paralyse the imagination of Faustus. He knows constantly what is happening to him).
We may therefore ask whether the changes that occur in Faustus's soul between the singing of the the bond and his final damnation are sufficient to constitute a middle. The answer to this question would be "yes". 

 

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