The Picture Of Dorian Gray And Dr Faustus example essay topic

Starting with greed and temptation, then with a sense of immortality and cold heartedness, and ending with destruction of one's morals and soul, without repentance, one will be forever punished. In the novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray, by Oscar Wilde, the main character trades his soul for that which he most desires, eternal youth and beauty. He ends up dying after living a tormented life because he had done so much damage to his soul. Similarly, in Dr. Fasutus, a play by Christopher Marlowe, a doctor sells his soul to the devil in order to obtain powers. He dies regretting the life that he choose to live.

A common theme in the two pieces of writing is that giving into greed and temptation will ultimately cause one's downfall. In The Picture of Dorian Gray, by Oscar Wilde, the main character faces a great temptation. He is first tempted when he realizes the power of his beauty. His friends, the artist Basil Hallward and Lord Henry Wotton, fill his head with the thought that he could use his good looks and youth to achieve anything.

As the critic, Peter Raby of Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism Volume 41, puts it, "The artist Basil Hallward, obsessed and inspired by the youthful beauty of Dorian Gray, is about to complete his masterpiece, a full-length portrait. As Dorian poses, Lord Henry Wotton, the detached amoral observer, tempts him with words that stir him like music: 'Ah! Realize your youth while you have it. Live the wonderful life that is in you!" ' (392). The obsessed artist builds Dorian's ego by making him feel beautiful, and Lord Henry convinces him that youth and beauty is all that is worth having. Dorian realizes what gifts his beauty and youth are, and he never wants to live without them.

He says to Basil, "Lord Henry Wotton is perfectly right. Youth is the only thing worth having. When I find that I am growing old, I shall kill myself" (26). Once Dorian establishes that he wants to stay young, he gives in to this greed and temptation to stay youthful and he makes his fatal wish. He says that he will give his soul if his portrait will bare his signs of aging and sin.

He would give up his soul; all that is good in him, just to obtain his desires. Similarly, in the play Doctor Faustus, by Christopher Marlowe, the main character gives into his own greed and temptation of greatness. Faustus, an already very scholarly and learned man, has heard about the fame and power that magic has provided others. He thinks about how great it would be to have powers and what he would do with them. He contemplates all the marvels that these magical powers will produce. He imagines piling up wealth from the four corners of the world, reshaping the map of Europe, and obtaining complete knowledge about the universe.

He is arrogant and self-aggrandizing, and his ambitions are very high. As the critic, Dr. A. Close of Sixteenth-Century Literary Criticisms Volume 17, says, "He delights in the power that is given to the Devil and this becomes his desire. Now he sees that the magician is a mighty god, in other words, the ruler over darkness is what he wants to become". This temptation and greed to have all this power makes him give his soul to the devil in order to obtain what he most desires. Like Dorian Gray, Dr. Faustus has others helping to tempt him.

Dr. Faustus has both the bad angel and Mephastophilis convincing him to turn away from God and to the devil so he can never live in want again. Mephastophilis presents Faustus with a book that will teach him evil ways. The good "angel", Faustus' good conscience, tries to warn Faustus against the book, while the bad conscience works with Mephastophilis to try and convince Faustus to read the book. As Dr. Angela Domi un of The Cambridge History of Literary Criticism, Vol., puts it", The good conscience pleads with him, and tells him that it will bring damnation upon him if he continues to read the book.

But then the evil conscience puts his two cents in and works on Faustus' pride. He tells him to go on and read it, because it contains everything that he is wanting, and that he is in control of his own life, just as God is in control of everything that is in heaven" (397). Dr. Faustus lets both Mephastophilis and his conscience convince him to give into the temptation. The second step that each character approached was a lack of care for others. In The Picture of Dorian Gray, Dorian only cares about himself, and has no regard for other's feelings.

He was once a caring young man, he now is harsh and cold. An example of this is when he thinks he is in love with the young actress, Sibyl Vain. One day, after they engage to be married, she does not perform her best on stage. Dorian then feels that she is no longer good for him, and tells her, "I loved you because you were marvelous. You have thrown it all away. You are shallow and stupid.

I will never see you again. I will never think of you" (77). He breaks the heart of the woman he supposedly loved over something as insignificant as one bad performance. He is not satisfied, so he heartlessly crushes her, and she kills herself because of his lack of care for her. As another critic in Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism Volume 41, Epifanio San Juan, Jr., puts it, Dorian "yields nonetheless to an inner fatality, a passionate indifference which makes him incapable of feeling compassion for others" (358). This lack of compassion is the first sign of the corruption of Dorian's soul.

In Dr. Faustus, when Dr. Faustus obtains his desires, he also no longer cares about any one else. He spends much of his time playing cruel practical jokes on people. One person in particular that he plays a joke on is the Pope. When preparing to go to torment the Pope, Faustus says, "Now, Faustus might delight his mind, / and by their folly make some merriment, / Sweet Mephastophilis, so charm me here / That I may walk invisible to all / And do what " er I please unseen of any" ( , ii; 7-13). He becomes invisible and makes the Pope believe that there is a spirit after him and his belongings. He grows out of touch with his friends, he uses his power only to benefit himself, even though he does favors for people, he does it only to gain fame.

His sense of humanity died when he bargained with the devil. Lack of caring for others soon progresses into a feeling of immortality and immorality, because along with not caring about anything other than oneself, one will start to believe that he or she is the most important being alive. Nothing can affect or challenge him or her and will do anything he or she desires. In The Picture of Dorian Gray, this is clearly seen when Dorian begins to mock his portrait. He enjoys the fact that no matter how much he sins, it will never affect him physically, it is his picture that will be affected. Dorian would "stand, with a mirror, in front of the portrait. looking now at the evil and aging face on the canvas, and now at the fair young face that laughed back at him from the polished glass" (112).

He laughed at the corroding image of him on the canvas, because his real external image was still so beautiful and youthful. He laughed because his youth was immortal. Dorian is not ashamed or afraid of the corruption of his soul. "He [grows] more and more enamored of his own beauty, more and more interested in the corruption of his own soul" (112). He likes to commit more and more sins because he can, because it will not affect him externally, and it interests him to see what it is doing to his soul. Doctor Faustus also gains a sense of immortality and immorality.

He believes that he can conquer the world and dry the oceans. He feels that he is the supreme being on earth. Unlike any other mortal, Dr. Faustus is able to control the world and people around him. He can make things go his way, and so he starts to feel that he is above God.

He does many immoral things, all making him feel more powerful, each blasphemous thing building his desire to be able to do more with his powers. He feels that he can do anything and get away with it. He has the devil on his side and he has the power to protect himself if he should ever be questioned. In the end, both characters eventually realize what they are doing to their souls, and can no longer pretend that they will not suffer under some greater power for what they have let themselves become. In The Picture of Dorian Gray, Dorian begins to hate looking at his hideous portrait and wants to reverse the corruption of his soul by doing good deeds. This good just ends up a selfish act to help himself and then corrupts his soul even more.

When his friend Basil finds out about the secret of the portrait, he starts to pray and tells Dorian that he must repent. Dorian cannot take the criticism and hearing the truth, so he kills Basil. San Juan, Jr., concludes that, "The murder is an attempt on part to stifle the voice of goodness forever" (368). This is Dorian's way of hiding from both the truth that his soul is ugly, and shutting up the voice that tells him he needs to repent and change his ways. Dorian never repents, but continues to pretend that he is not committing sins.

He turns to drugs to escape from the reality of what he has done. Ted R. Spires, of British Writers Volume V. compares Dorian's tragedy to those of Macbeth and Othello, all " gradually poisoned until their destructiveness forces them to face the fact that they have been deluded" (502). It is not until it is too late that Dorian realizes the error of his ways and that he put to much value in the wrong things. Dr. Faustus, like Dorian Gray, also tries to hide from the voice of good and truth in order to continue in his devilish ways. The first voice that tells him to stay away from the devil and return to God is the good angel. The good angel tries to make Dr. Faustus see that the bad angel is trying to corrupt him, but unfortunately for Faustus, he stifles the voice of the good angel by listening to the bad angel.

Throughout the play, Faustus continually has to hear both angels, but always listens to the bad angel until it is too late to save his soul. The other voice of good that Faustus encounters is the old man in scene 12. The old man says to Faustus, O stay, good Faustus, stay thy desperate steps. I see an angel hovers o'er thy head, And with a vial full of precious grace / Offers to pour the same into thy soul. / Then call for mercy and avoid despair" (Scene 12, 60-64).

This old man also fails at trying to get Faustus to repent. There is also a"voice" that keeps Faustus from repenting, and that is Mephastophilis. It is he who, throughout the play, steps in whenever Faustus considers repentance to cajole or threaten him into staying loyal to hell. Faustus, in fear of repenting, tells himself that he cannot, and that he does not believe he will suffer if he does not repent. When talking to Mephastophilis, a demon, Faustus blithely and absurdly insists that he does not believe in hell. He does this to try to hide from the reality that scares him.

Faustus fails to repent because of his pride and continuing ambition, and he tells himself that God will not hear his plea, so he should remain loyal to the devil. In both of Oscar Wilde and Christopher Marlowe's works, the men either do not repent, or do not repent in time. Both have been so deluded that they lead themselves to believe that they cannot change for one reason or another. Both die a tragic death. Dorian, now hating his soul, stabs it [the portrait], which then leaves him dead on the floor with the dagger in his heart, lying there just as ugly and withered as the figure in the portrait was. Faustus, who in his last few minutes of life finally decides to repent, dies, and is swallowed up by hell to live an eternity in damnation.

Because both characters gave into evil temptations, they die tragically. Both Their lives were cut short and destroyed by the prevailing corruption of their souls. It is clear in both The Picture of Dorian Gray, by Oscar Wilde, and Doctor Faustus, by Christopher Marlowe, that giving into greed and temptation without repentance will lead to destruction of one's soul and eternal damnation. Once a person succumbs to the greed and temptation, he or she become so consumed with the newfound strength, and no longer care about others or feel like anything can harm or stop him of her. This then leads to immorality, which, if not reversed, will doom that person to have a corrupt or lost soul, and finally, to pay for it with his or her life.