The Tower of Babel

1. The Tower of Babel • Long, long ago, all the world spoke the same language and used the same words. • Tired of hard work, people decided to build a city and a high tower with its top in the heavens. • God feared that the people would challenge his authority.

2. The Tower of Babel • He said to his followers, “Let us go down there and confuse their speech, so that they will not understand what they say to one another.” • God made people speak different languages. People had to give up the plan of building the tower because they could not understand each other. They were dispersed all over the world.

3. Renaissance: The Definition • The rise of the bourgeoisie showed its influence in cultural life. The result is an intellectual movement known as the Renaissance, or the rebirth of literature. Renaissance sprang in Italy and spread to France, Germany, the Low Countries, and lastly to England. Two features are striking of this movement. One is the thirst for classical literature, the other is the rise of Humanism.

4. Humanism • Humanism was the keynote of the Renaissance. People ceased to look upon themselves as living only for God and a future world. They began to admire human beauty and human achievement. Man is no longer the slave of the external world. He can mould the world according to his desires, and attain happiness by removing all external checks.

5. Drama: Its Origin and Development • The miracle plays were simple plays based upon the Bible or the lives of saints. They were played in churches at first. Then with the increasing numbers of actors and plays, the players went to the market places. • Morality plays focused on the conflict between good and evil through allegorical characters. They were too abstract. So Vice, a lively figure approximated the modern clown, was introduced.

6. Drama: its origin & development (2) • Interlude is a short performance during the intervals to enliven the audience after a solemn scene. • Classical-style comedy and tragedy was in the making in England. • Three unities (unity of time, place and action by Aristotle)

7. Christopher Marlowe (1564-1593) • Marlowe is the greatest playwright before Shakespeare and the most gifted of the University Wits. • In 1580 he left his home city for Cambridge where he got his B.A. and M.A. degrees. • In 1587. when he was only 23, Marlowe took the London theatre by storm with his play Tamburlaine. • Marlowe ended his short and wretched life at the age of 29

8. Marlowe’s Plays • Tamburline the Great • Desire for power • The Jew of Malta • Desire for wealth • Doctor Faustus • Desire for knowledge

9. Tamburline the Great • Tamburline was a shepherd when he was young. He became a Khan and then king of Persia. • Tamburline began to conquer the world. He had battles with the Turks. He caught the Turkish king Bajazeth and insulted him. He made the king his footstool and forced the queen to feed Bajazeth with scraps.

10. Tamburline the Great (2) • Tamburline won the affection of Zenocrate, the daughter of the Sultan Egypt. • Tamburline could not escape from death. On his death bed, he called for a map wherein he traced his past conquest and contemplated his unfinished enterprises.

11. Brief analysis • Tamburline is a humanist. He has an insatiable desire for power. He achieves his ambition with his conquest. He shows his passion over Zenocrate. • The play is not well plotted. The characterization is not good, either. It is noted for Marlowe’s mighty lines.

12. Doctor Faustus • Doctor Faustus is taken from German legend. • Faustus is a great scholar. He is not satisfied with book knowledge. He wants to learn magic and tour around the world. • He turns to the Devil’s servant Mephistophilis. Mephis tells him to sell his soul to the Devil for 24 years. Faustus agrees. Then he gets magical power and makes a tour in the universe on a dragon’s back.

13. Doctor Faustus (2) • He plays tricks on VIPs such as the Pope & Alexander the Great. • Faustus marries the greatest beauty, Helena of Greece. • Faustus is taken way by the Devil. He dies at last. • Doctor Faustus is a humanist. In order to acquire knowledge, he never grudges to sell his soul to the Devil.

14. Marlowe's Literary Achievement • Marlowe is the greatest of the pioneers of English drama. It is Marlowe who first made blank verse (unrhymed iambic pentameter) the principal instrument of English drama. • Marlowe's dramatic achievement lies chiefly in his epical, and at times lyrical, verse. • His work paved the way for the plays of the greatest English dramatist---Shakespeare