خلاصة:
Reading and perceiving a text differ according to different times
and places. This leads to various re-shaping and re-presenting the
text in a way which corresponds with the new time and place. An
event or a story may be read and perceived in different manners
that suit the spirit and concepts of the time and the place in which
these readings and perceptions arise.
This article deals with the notion of the connection between the
concepts of Good and Evil and how they have been read and
perceived. This is done in the light of reading the legend of the
famous German scholar, Dr. Faust, which got a great attention
throughout ages.
Through reading the binary opposition "Good/Evil" in Doctor
Faustus and Faust , we can distinguish between two different
readings of the two works – a structuralist (modernist) reading and
a deconstructive (post-modernist) reading. Whereas structuralism,
as a modernist school, gives the text one single meaning and
interpretation, deconstruction, as a post-modernist school, sees that
the text bears several meanings and interpretations. So, the
structuralist reads the binary opposition "Good/Evil" in one way
giving Good a privilege over Evil, but, at the same time, the
deconstructionst gives this binary opposition a different reading in
which the two concepts (Good or Evil) have no privilege over each
other. And this idea leaves the door open for many further different
readings.