Enron and Doctor Faustus Critical Quotations

What is a critical quotation that demonstrates Faustus’ hubris?

‘He sees no inconsistency in aiming to be a god and requiring human assistance in the project’

-Roma Gill

What is a critical quotation that links both Enron and Faustus together?

‘He is also enchanted by the mathematical properties of incantation’

-Roma Gill

What is a critical assessment that depicts Doctor Faustus to be based of off Marlowe himself?

‘Marlowe surely noticed that Doctor Faustus came from a humble background, took his university degrees at a place remarkably similar to Cambridge, scoffed at religion yet aspired to aid the Protestants in war’

-David Riggs

What is a critical interpretation of Faustus’ character?

‘Odious moral reputation’

-David Riggs

What is a critical response to Doctor Faustus?

‘An enigma, a pitiful mixture of brilliance and vice’

-David Riggs

What is a critical quotation that ridicules the depiction of religion within Doctor Faustus?

‘All men in Christianity ought to endeavour that the mouth of so dangerous a member may be stopped’

-David Riggs

What is a critical evaluation of Doctor Faustus?

‘Marlowe’s play challenged the limits of acceptable public behaviour’

-David Riggs

What is a critical quotation that explores Marlowe’s life?

‘Cited for disturbing the peace […] and public atheism’

-David Riggs

What is a critical quotation about Marlowe that could explain the homosexual relationship between Faustus and Mephistopheles?

‘A proselytizing atheist, a counterfeiter and a consumer of boys and tobacco’

-Richard Baines

What is a critical quotation of Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus that explores how the play was written?

‘Marlowe’s masterpiece not only had the satisfying contours of a moral tale; it also gave a conservative twist to the reports of his atheism’

-David Riggs

What is a critical interpretation of Marlowe’s identification with Doctor Faustus?

‘As an intellectual, Marlowe identified with his protagonist; as a Christian, he repudiated him.’

-Davis Riggs

What year was Doctor Faustus written?

1592

What is a critical definition of Enron?

‘Enron is a story of human weakness, of hubris and greed and rampant self-delusion […] and of smart people who believed their next gamble would cover their last disaster- and who couldn’t admit they were wrong’

-Bethany McLean

What is a critical explanation of Enron?

‘The story of Enron is a complex one- necessarily simplified and streamlined by Prebble in order to create a piece of theatre’

-Rachel Clemance

What is a critical quotation that supports Prebble’s use of characters to explain key concepts within the play?

‘points to a ‘gap between the world of finance and that of the general public’ and […] attempts to both narrow this gap and offer a way into understanding the financial crisis’

-Rachel Clemance

What is a critical quotation that supports the concept of ‘perception vs reality’?

‘Through out the late 1990s, the public perception of Enron was of an innovative, award-winning company; internally and externally it exuded confidence and bravado’

-Rachel Clemance

What is a critical comment that supports the idea of plays being a criticism of the society and time that they were written?

‘playwrights work within their own particular world and time, and that their plays reflect and comment upon their societies in a range of ways’

-Rachel Clemance

What is a critical quotation that analysis Skilling’s character?

‘Skilling’s assumption that anyone who’s ‘smart enough’ will want to work in particular, high-earning, high-flying jobs in the private sector reveals a lot about his own ethics and character’

-Rachel Clemance

What is a critical citation that explores the focus of Enron?

‘Enron is structured around the rise and fall of its protagonist, Skilling, as much as it is focused on the company’s boom and bust, and both Prebble and Goold have discussed him as an almost tragic figure in the mold of a Shakespearean hero or anti-hero’

-Rachel Clemance

What is a critical interpretation that links both Enron and Doctor Faustus together?

‘He [Skilling] goes from being an ‘overweight, balding accountant’ (p.54) to a quasi-magician whose stock figures rise with his own confidence, to a crumbling paranoiac who thinks his office may have been bugged when, in fact, it is his watch’s tick he can hear’

-Rachel Clemance

When was Enron written?

2009