Faust And The American Dream

A human being is part of a whole called by us the universe, said Albert Einstein, a famous physicist who developed the theory of relativity. In Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's most influential play Faust, there is a clear depiction of the characteristic polarity between the individual and the whole, in other words, between Microcosm and Macrocosm. The play itself, so as the main character, Faust, strongly privilege the macrocosmic perspective. Faust's vision of the Macrocosm is more complex than one can comprehend, mostly, this struggle comes from the difficulties of interpretation. However, Goethe's explanation of the concept of Macrocosm was not his invention, in the 17th century, John Milton in his epic poem Paradise Lost, was the first to …show more content…
At this point, Faust is a fifty-year-old man, who knows everything that scholarly, rational mind is capable of knowing, and yet he remains unsatisfied and trapped by the limitations of human understanding. The last hope at attaining ultimate knowledge for Faust is tuning to Magic, an irrational and powerful art. The human physical life prevents Faust from experiencing the unity with nature, the only true desire of his. He pledges to escape by opening Nostradamus’ book of magical symbols which the spirits use to communicate. In the book, Faust sees the Sign of Macrocosm: the whole universe in its harmonious unity. That vision makes Faust feel like a God, with total certainty about how all things work as one and live in each other harmoniously. However, the part of the monologue in which the hero describes his vision of the Macrocosm is very unclear for interpretation. In that part, gazing at the sign, Faust …show more content…
(447-453) From the first sight, this passage seems to be an easily understandable one. However, if looking closely at the text, it is hard to visualize such a scene on a level of high poetic dignity. The hard part to interpretation is to envision the process of how Angels are able to pass their "golden vessels" in a cycle motion, by ascending and redescending, all at the same time. Finally, with this literal understanding of that passage, there are no actual Macrocosmic elements present. Therefore, the whole of Faust's vision of the Macrocosm cannot be explained in one or two words, nor it can be interpreted literally.
As Johann Wolfgang von Goethe has taken some of the already existed ideas to create his play Faust, the vision of the Macrocosm was not his invention either. The first to introduce the explanation of that complex process in terms of cyclic course was John Milton in his poem Paradise Lost. While both Goethe and Milton used similar collocation 'golden vessels/urns', Milton used that term to describe the planets which in their cyclic course come to the sun to fetch light from. In "Book 7" of Paradise Lost Milton refers to Macrocosm