An example of socio-historical contextual information being used in a less effective way

Sample essay 3: 'Tragedies portray societies which are caught between conflicting value systems.' Discuss with reference to one or more plays.

This is an extract from the essay:

'There are also conflicts between audience interpretations. For instance, the audience at the time of Dr. Faustus was continually changing their religion as the king kept swapping the country’s beliefs from Catholic to Protestant and back again and again. Because of this, it often depended on whether the audience were Catholic or not as to whether Dr. Faustus was damned. If the audience was Catholic, then they believe that Dr. Faustus would not have been damned, but if the audience was Protestant, they believed Dr. Faustus wouldn't have constant chances to repent and would most certainly be damned. Therefore there could be conflict between the audiences as they believe that two different things would have happened to Faustus.'

Q. How could this be improved?

TUTOR'S REPLY

The essay is asserting that audience reactions to Faustus’ damnation would differ depending on whether they were Catholics or Protestants - a possibly valid and interesting comment. However, the account given of religious change during the period is confused. It is not clear who exactly 'the king' is, or over what length of time these changes were occurring. The explanation of different attitudes towards repentance and damnation is also unclear. The student obviously has some awareness of the religious turmoil which existed in England at certain points in the sixteenth century, but their attempt to summarise this contextual information has led to inaccuracy. The work would be improved if the point being made was explained more clearly and in greater detail, and the historical facts double-checked.

Click here to see other examples of socio-historical contextual information being used in a less effective way


 
An example of socio-historical contextual information being used in a more effective way   An example of literary contextual information being used in a more effective way