Villains in Literature and Elizabethan Poetry

            Different authors use various figures of speech to present their characters in plays or poems. For actors, figures of speech usually help to determine the most prominent traits of characters. The first part one of this paper analyzes the character of Doctor Faustus who is the protagonist of Marlowe's play who was overwhelmed with the desire to possess power and the presentation of the character as a pure villain in the play. This will be compared with the character and the figure of Richard III in the eponymous play by William Shakespeare, while identifying the significance of his figure in relation to being the villain in the play and his quest for power at any cost. Finally, this section will also compare the two characters with that of Satan, the major character in the poem "Paradise Lost" by John Milton.
             Doctor Faustus - Marlowe's Play.
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             Doctor Faustus in Marlowe's play is presented as a gifted German scholar at Wittenburg, who has reached the limits of human knowledge by successfully learning everything he can, and now he thinks from the point of view of conventional academic disciplines. Ironically, he is still not satisfied with his profound knowledge and, as a result, he turns to magic, to a dangerous practice of necromancy. This practice of necromancy is scary and the character is presented as the villain of the play who engages in occult forces and uses dreadful supernatural practices. As the play unfolds, a Good Angle and an Evil Angel come to Faustus after his thoughts about necromancy. The two angels represent his choice between Christian good conscience and the path to eternal damnation (Marlowe 8).
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             To the readers' surprise, Dr Faustus prefers the damnation, life full of misery and unhappiness, to free righteous Christian life. With the help of Mephistopheles who is his agent representing Lucifer, they negotiate the terms of their agreement and agree that Faustus will sell his soul to Lucifer the devil in exchange for 24 years of power, and Mephistopheles will remain his servant and he will satisfy his every whim.