Faust: The Cathedral
Summary
Gretchen is at church, attending the funeral of her mother and brother. Gretchen feels tremendous guilt, since both her mother and brother are now dead due to her actions with faust. Her mother drank a poison, probably due to depression and disappointment, and Valentine was murdered while fighting Faust and Mephisto. An evil spirit looms over Gretchen, taunting her, reminding her of her "role in this catastrophe" (Study Guide). The spirit reminds Gretchen of simpler days, while taunting her for her loss of innocence, her path into the darkness. The spirit also hints that these deaths are not the end of her suffering, something else is coming, "under your heart, that faint stirring" (I. 3629).
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External Resources
Works Cited
Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von. Faust, Part 1. The Norton Anthology of Western Literature. Vol. 2. 8th Ed. Trans. Martin Greenberg. Sarah Lawall, et al, eds. New York: W.W. Norton, 2006.