Book description
Goethe's Faust reworks the late-medieval myth of Dr Faust, a brilliant
scholar so disillusioned he resolves to make a contract or wager with
the devil, Mephistopheles. The devil will do all he asks on Earth and
seek to grant him a moment in life so glorious that he will wish it to
last for ever. But if Faust does bid the moment stay, he falls to
Mephisto and must serve him after death. In this first part of Goethe's
great work the embittered thinker and Mephistopheles enter into their
agreement, and soon Faust is living a life beyond his study and - in
rejuvenated form - winning the love of the charming and beautiful
Gretchen. But in this compelling tragedy of arrogance, unfulfilled
desire and self-delusion, Faust, served by the devil, heads inexorably
towards destruction.
David Constantine is a poet, novelist, biographer, playwright and
translator. He has taught German at the Universities of Durham, Oxford
and Rutgers, New Jersey and is currently Visiting Professor in the
School of English at the University of Liverpool. He lives in Oxford
and (with his wife the translator Helen Constantine) is joint editor
of Modern Poetry in Translation. His book of poetry Something for the
Ghosts was short listed for the 2002 Whitbread Prize and his
translation of Hans Magnus Enzensberger s Lighter than Air, won the
Corneliu Popescu Prize for European Poetry Translation in 2003.
David Constantine is a poet, novelist, biographer, playwright and
translator. He has taught German at the Universities of Durham, Oxford
and Rutgers, New Jersey and is currently Visiting Professor in the
School of English at the University of Liverpool. He lives in Oxford
and (with his wife the translator Helen Constantine) is joint editor
of Modern Poetry in Translation. His book of poetry Something for the
Ghosts was short listed for the 2002 Whitbread Prize and his
translation of Hans Magnus Enzensberger's Lighter than Air, won the
Corneliu Popescu Prize for European Poetry Translation in 2003.
A S Byatt, novelist, short story writer, and critic, is the author
of many books including Possession, winner of the 1990 Booker Prize;
Babel Tower; The Biographer's Tale; and The Whistling Woman. She was
appointed DBE in 1999.
