This novel describes the uncompromising struggles of two very different characters
against the crippling influences of conventional morality. The autobiography of the
late medieval Johannes Faustus is interwoven with the third-person story of the
twentieth-century figure Sybil Wagner. In their different historical contexts they fight
against abuse, violence and depression in order to gain the ultimate objectives of
sexual fulfilment, professional success, and a harmonious relationship with self and
others.
Part I describes the two characters' first encounters with love and death. It shows how
their indomitable spirits cope with the hypocrisy of the adult world, with the confusing
experience of their adolescent bodies, and the puzzling moment of losing their
virginity. Part II describes their respective attempts to find out who they are and what
they want. The structural parallelism between a male and a female Faustus from
different social and historical backgrounds invites the reader to think about the barriers
of historical and gender difference.
Both narrative strands engage in a sophisticated play with the ambiguities of the
archetypal story of transgression and allow for a number of different interpretations of,
for instance, the nature and role of immaterial forces such as the devil. Both narrative
strands portray a credible or 'realistic' framework for the uncanny elements of the
Faustus narrative and thereby explore the borderlines between conventional and
subjective reality.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:ADTP/219092 |
| Date | January 2001 |
| Creators | Knellwolf, Christa, n/a |
| Publisher | University of Canberra. Creative Communication & Culture Studies |
| Source Sets | Australiasian Digital Theses Program |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Rights | ), Copyright Christa Knellwolf |
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