Faust, Part 1

The medieval myth of Faust's pact with the devil preoccupied Goethe for most of his working life and in the thirty years during which he worked on Part One he reshaped the legend to dramatize his own very personal concerns as a poet. His version depicts Faust as the greatest scholar of his age, master of every branch of learning - from philosophy and law to medicine and theology - only to recognise that the true secrets of existence remain hidden from mankind. To gain this knowledge, he must sacrifice the very thing that makes him human: his own soul. Reflecting Goethe's preoccupation with the exhilaration and terrors of human creativity, Faust offers an ironic perspective on the constant striving in the Age of Enlightenment to challenge the limits of man's advancement through art and science.