Devil s Contract By Ed Simon

Simon’s lively account explores the distinct historical phases of the tale of Faust and his deal with the Devil. In the early modern period, a cowed culture flirted with the danger of freedom and blasphemous knowledge, while the Faustian myth mainly enforced the proper religious and social punishment. In time, an anxious theological orthodoxy was supplanted by a broader fascination with the frontiers of knowledge itself. These days, Simon argues, in an excoriating and eloquent final chapter, we write our contracts not in blood but in silicon, signing away our identities and privacies for the short-term benefits of material ease. Simon, who is especially alive to the transgressive, enjoys the energetic heresies of the Faust myth, its madcap adventures, and, since he has read extremely widely, he relishes sharing all of that narrative wealth with his lucky readers.