Mrs Faust Summary & Analysis
by Carol Ann Duffy

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"Mrs Faust" appears in Carol Ann Duffy's collection The World's Wife (1999), which features monologues from the perspective of overlooked or invented female figures in myth, history, and literature. In this poem, Duffy imagines that Faust—a character from German folklore who makes a pact with the Devil—has a wife who's as clever and greedy as he is. Mrs. Faust's monologue charts the history of their cynical marriage, from their meeting as ambitious students through their "lifestyle" as a modern power couple. Though she's excluded from Faust's infamous deal—which grants him infinite wealth, knowledge, and pleasure in exchange for his soul—she gets the best of their partnership in the end. A modern satire of a famous medieval legend, Duffy's poem illustrates how savvy women in a patriarchal world often outplay men at their own ruthless games.

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