“Renaissance” is a French word that means “rebirth”.

“Renaissance” is a French word that means “rebirth”. This epoch which we conditionally call “Renaissance”, is characterized (apart from the economic development) by rapid development of arts, architecture, music, poetry. Renaissance initiated in Italy approximately in the XIV century; in England, where culture developed slower, this movement developed only in the XVI century. During this era ideology shifted to a new direction. Whereas the medieval people looked at the earthly life as a preparation to the eternal life, - which, in spite of the superstitions of these dark ages did not belittle their earthly pleasures, - the worldview of the Renaissance people was directed to their mundane existence. From here derived the main philosophic principle of this epoch – anthropocentrism, according to which the human is the supreme purpose of the universe creation. Therefore the Renaissance intellectuals were called humanists. The early humanists rebelled against the feudal, ecclesiastical and mystical worldview of the medieval ages, under the motto of the free development of people as individuals. This movement finds its reflexivity in the rapid development of lyrical and epic poetry (Spenser, Sydney, Shakespeare, Milton), metaphysical poetry (Donne, Herbert) and dramaturgy (Marlowe, Jonson, Shakespeare again).  Humanists for the first time declared independence of a human; every person gained the right to create himself, to choose his own path, to aspire to success and prosperity, to look for the beauty in the surrounding world (This paragraph is partially borrowed from Renaissance Aesthetics, A.F. Losev, no direct quotations, translation mine). In this essay, I will demonstrate the focus on the individual in the works of Marlowe, Shakespeare and Herbert.

1. Christopher Marlowe, Doctor Faustus

     I would not make bold to decide who was the first author to create a titanic figure, but Marlowe’s doctor Faustus certainly forestalled (served as antitype for) such gigantic figures as Raskolnikov (Dostoyevskiy) and Dorian Gray (Wild). I judge about that not merely on the fact that Doctor Faustus was written earlier, but because these ambitious characters very much remind me of Doctor Faustus. In the world of Faustus the question about the rights of us, simple small people, is in the air with an insoluble persistence, “to be or not to be”. The creative work of Marlowe, certainly, influenced that of Shakespeare, because direct references to Doctor Faustus and Mephastophilis we find in Shakespeare’s comedy The Merry Wives of Windsor, which suggests that even Shakespeare paid tribute to Marlowe’s talent.

      While it is commonplace to argue that Marlowe’s Faustus is the child of his time, when people decided that they achieved the freedom of unrestricted thought and knowledge, let’s look at this scary image of this glorified Doctor. He is a titan, who sold his soul to the devil in order to achieve the power of knowledge (or more like the power of power) and who turns to himself in the third person as “Doctor Faustus”, which sounds nearly like “Our Majesty”. His great figure bears the stamp of Renaissance gigantism. Here is how he sets off to his “individualistic” sojourn:

...Ay, these are those that Faustus most desires.

O what a world of profit and delight,

Of power, of honor, of omnipotence

All things that move between the quiet poles

Shall be at my command: emperors and kings... (I, 53-57)