In Our Time23 Des 2004

Faust

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the myth of Faustus." Was this the face that launch'd a thousand ships,And burnt the topless towers of Ilium?Sweet Helen, make me immortal with a kiss!Her lips suck forth my soul: see, where it flies!"So spoke Dr Faustus with unnerving prescience shortly before being dragged off to hell in Christopher Marlowe's historical tragedy. His Faustian pact with the devil Mephistopheles had granted him 24 years of limitless knowledge and power, but at the cost of his soul. His terrible story was told as a dire warning to anyone who would seek to reach beyond the limits of their human lot.Why is Goethe's Faust reprieved, when Marlowe's Faustus gets taken by Satan and what does the story's constant retelling tell us about society's changing attitudes to knowledge, ambition and hellish damnation? But who was the real Faust? Why has his story maintained a 400 year grip on the German and British imaginations, and how has his image changed as each generation embraced the myth?With Juliette Wood, Associate Lecturer in the Department of Welsh at the University College of Wales in Cardiff and Secretary of the Folklore Society; Osman Durrani, Professor of German at the University of Kent at Canterbury; Rosemary Ashton, Quain Professor of English Language and Literature at University College London.

Denne episoden er hentet fra en åpen RSS-feed og er ikke publisert av Podme. Den kan derfor inneholde annonser.

Episoder(1101)

Seashells

Misha Glenny and guests discuss a familiar feature of our beaches: seashells, from their astonishing shapes and patterns that teach us about Earth’s oceans, to the ways that humans have treasured shel...

30 Jul 53min

Vigée Le Brun

Misha Glenny and guests discuss the French portrait painter Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun (1755 - 1842). From her teens she delighted her high society subjects in and around Paris, notably Marie Antoinette ...

23 Jul 56min

The Delian League

Misha Glenny and guests discuss the origins and evolution of an alliance which transformed the geopolitics of the classical world: the Delian League. Since the start of the 5th Century BCE, city state...

16 Jul 54min

Machado de Assis

Misha Glenny and guests discuss one of the towering figures of Brazilian and world literature, Machado de Assis (1839 - 1908). He was the descendant of slaves and built his career while slavery was s...

9 Jul 53min

The Global Story - The soft power superpower, with Roman Mars

As 4th July approaches, we think you’ll like this episode of The Global Story. All week, The Global Story podcast is exploring the surprising and often hidden ways the US has shaped the modern world. ...

3 Jul 27min

The Evolution of Trees

Misha Glenny and guests discuss the earliest evidence we have of the existence of trees and how even plants we might have on windowsills or as vegetables in gardens can and do, in the right conditions...

2 Jul 54min

The Welsh Marches

At the Hay Festival, Misha Glenny and guests discuss the impact of the Norman invasion on the people and land of Wales and across the modern border with England in what became known as The Welsh March...

25 Jun 52min

The Levellers

Misha Glenny and guests discuss the group which came to be known as the Levellers and emerged during what would become arguably one of the bloodiest and most turbulent periods of English history. Afte...

18 Jun 55min