Faust

Faust, legendary German enchanter, based on a 16th-century charlatan, who sold his soul to the devil Mephistopheles for knowledge and pleasure. Christopher Marlowe made the tale a tragedy of human presumption Dr. Faustus c.1590, while Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (Faust, 1808, 1832) made Faust a Romantic idealist whose sins are forgiven because of his continual striving after good.

See also: Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von; Marlowe, Christopher.