The Conclusion of Goethe's Faust: Ambivalence and Ambiguity

Abstract

Perhaps the most debated issue in Goethe's Faust, a work rich in debatable issues, concerns the conclusion. Small wonder. So much of the meaning of Goethe's work, after all, turns on its outcome. And Goethe seems to have supplied a particularly equivocal and enigmatic conclusion to his magnum opus, a conclusion which continues to challenge the interpretative ingenuity of its readers with an almost endless array of problems and puzzles. Does Faust ultimately merit his redemption or not? Does he win his bet with Mephisto or not? If, as some of the standard interpreters argue, Faust's development to his final insights ascends in an upward spiral, why then does he descend to such evil-arguably the very nadir of his entire career-in the Baucis-Philemon episode just prior to attaining those insights, and how do they relate to Faust's odyssey, which begins in disillusionment in his scholar's study? What role does Sorge play in Faust's final revelation? Why her blinding of Faust? How does the land-reclamation project, which clearly excites Faust's imagination beyond all else in his final moments fit into the pattern of the work's conclusion? These questions by no means exhaust the list of ponderables confronting the reader as he observes Faust's entelechy rise into the heavens in the play's dramatic culmination; they simply attest to the multifaceted complexity of the outcome. Not surprisingly, this plethora of issues surrounding the termination of Faust's career has elicited an even greater abundance of critical opinions. Not surprisingly either, these opinions vary widely from diametrically opposed judgments of fundamental issues to minor differences over nuance and detail. On many issues the critical opinions divide quite clearly into majority and minority camps, but scarcely any issue wins a consensus. No one can deny that Faust ultimately arrives in Heaventhat is not an issue-but how he gets there (speaking figuratively, of course), and whether he deserves to get there, and what lies behind the problematic ambiguities attaching to these issues remain fascinating and largely elusive points of inquiry. In this abundance of problems one stands out both for its crucial importance as well as for enigmatic complexity: does Faust's career conclude on a demonstrably positive note or not? Or to put the question a