Dktr Faustus
Lyrics
(parts in brackets are Brix)
[Yeah... yeah...]
Doctor Faustus
Horseshoes splackin'
Swallows hay cart, cart horse
Of the peasants blocking his path
Doctor Faustus
Power showin'
Spits out hay cart, cart horse, hay and box,
Outside the gates of the town of Anholt (2)
[Had your chances... you've had your chance
You've had your chances... you've had your chance
Yeah....]
Doctor Faustus
At the court of the Count
Made fruits exotic pleasure-licious
Appear behind curtains in Winter (3)
[Banana! Apple... Plum...] (4)
Faustus
[Exotic fruits]
At court of decadent Count [yeah]
Made animals from sunny lands appear [banana!]
In the sparse gartens
[Straw-berrieees... exotic fruits
You've Had your chances... you've had your chance
You've had your chances... you've had your chance--
Banana!!]
Doctor Faustus
Horseshoes splackin'
Swallows hay cart, cart horse,
Hay and box [cherry]
Of the peasant blocking his path [banana]
Had to leave (apples... cherries)
His drinking student friends (exotic fruits)
[Doctor Faustus... Doctor Faustus]
[Yeah... exotic fruits... strawberry]
LEMON!
[Doctor Faustus... Doctor Faustus
Had your chances... you've had your chance
Had your chances... you've had your chance
Had your chances... you've had your chance
Had your chances... you've had your chance]
There's a blood silhouette through the ceiling sky (5)
There's a blood silhouette through the ceiling sky
There's a blood silhouette through the ceiling sky
There's a blood silhouette through the ceiling sky
[Banana!]
Had your chance... you've had your chances [banana!]
[There's a blood silhouette through the ceiling sky]
Had your chance [banana!]
There's a blood silhouette through the ceiling sky
[Doctor Faustus, Doctor Faustus]
[Banana!]
There's a blood silhouette through the ceiling sky
There's a blood silhouette through the ceiling SKY!!!!
Banana!]
[Doctor Faustus
Had your chance
Banana
Had your chances
Banana
There's a blood silhouette through the ceiling sky
Banana]
Notes
1. In a radio interview with Steve Barker (On The Wire, BBC Radio Lancashire, 1986), MES said that the riff was "one of Craig's standard ones. San Quentin type...me and the wife got together over this really good story book I had...and it sort of came out from that." (thanks to Dan)
Doctor Faustus, or Faust, is a character from German folklore whose story appears in numerous permutations in German literature. It seems from the above that MES had a version in a fairy tale book, although as we will see below he also had a version of Goethe's Faust at some point before or after writing the song, but this was not, according to MES, the inspiration for the lyrics.
In the story, Faust sells his soul to the devil, in exchange for unlimited knowledge. The story has been treated both as a cautionary tale of a vain and hubristic man and also as a Promethean fable of the scientific spirit. It's most famous retellings by Goethe and Marlowe are philosophically and theologically ambiguous, in contrast to the original legend which takes a straightforwarldly negative view of Faust's contract. The expression "Faustian bargain" denotes a deal or decision in which someone cedes something esential, such as their integrity or independence, for a tangible increase of property or power.
From the NME, MES weighs in:
"I don't really like working with other voices but 'Faustus' is OK because the mix is fucked up - the backing vocals are at the level the lead vocals should be. It works because it sounds like hell straining to break through.
People go to me, 'Is that Faustus by Goethe or Faustus by Mann?', but I read it in a fairytale book. Somebody gave me a copy of this Goethe book and the drawings of Faustus are the spitting image of me. But I couldn't cope with the book, too hard. Not that I'm a simple fellow or anything but you have to give those things a lot of time."
Harry Clarke's illustrations of Goethe's Faust are indeed generally considered to bear a strong resemblance to MES, particularly the one at the top of the page here.
Thomas Mann's Doctor Faustus is a novel about a fictional 20th century composer (modeled on Arnold Schoenberg) who, his wits addled by syphilis, strikes a deal with a demon who proclaims "that you can only see me because you are mad, does not mean that I do not really exist." Aside from Goethe and Mann, the most famous literary treatment of the Faust legend is the play The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus by Christopher Marlowe.
Nairng from the FOF has found a lot of relevant material in Marlowe's Doctor Faustus:
Act 4 Scene 6 does not seem to appear in the Project Gutenberg version of the text – the intro to my copy (Longman Study Texts) explains that there are 2 versions of the play, one of which omits a lot of the comic scenes. In this one, various ‘low’ characters complain how they have been ill-used by Faustus; they get drunk and decide to seek him out. They are presumably near the court of the Duke of Vanholt, where the next scene will take place (MES has ‘Anholt’). A hay-carter known only as ‘Carter’ says:
"As I was going to Wittenburg t’other day with a load of hay, he [Faustus] met me and asked me what he should give me for as much hay as he could eat. Now, sir, I, thinking that a little would serve his turn, bade him take as much as he would for three farthings. So he presently gave me my money and fell to eating; and, as I am a cursen [Christian] man, he never left eating till he had eat up all my load of hay!"
Faustus seems to have done this purely out of mischief.
In Act 4 Scene 7, Faustus is at the court of the Duke of Vanholt, whose pregnant wife has a craving for grapes. Faustus produces some, explaining:
"Please it your grace, the year is divided into two circles over the whole world, so that, when it is winter with us, in the contrary circle it is likewise summer with them, as in India, Saba [Sheba], and farther countries in the east, where they have fruit twice a year. From whence, by means of a swift spirit that I have, I had these grapes brought as you see."
At various points in the play, Faustus is advised by a ‘bad angel’ and a ‘good angel’ – in Act 2 Scene 2 the latter tells him it’s “never too late” to repent. Faustus, therefore, has his chances.
Also in Act 2 Scene 2, Faustus quizzes Mephistophilis on the nature of the universe. He confirms the ancient belief that, if you go far enough, you’ll get to the ‘firmament’ – a solid boundary in which the stars are set. This could possibly be the ‘ceiling sky’ of Dktr Faustus…
See More Information below for a possible source for the lyrics, and note this also includes interpretation of some the lyrics.
2, Some versions of the Faust story place him in "Anholt," which is a district of Isselburg, Germany, but the original name was "Anhalt," a duchy in the German state of Saxony-Anholt.
3. In some versions of the story, Faust magically produces a dish of fruit out of season for the Duchess of Anhalt/Anholt, or, in some cases, for some other person or persons. See note 1 above.
4. Brix wasn't pleased about the lyrics MES gave her to sing:
"Mark asked me to shout 'banana, strawberry and exotic fruits' in 'Dktr Faustus'. I cringe when I hear it. I hated having to say those stupid lyrics." (The Rise, The Fall, and The Rise)
From the booklet to the 2019 Beggars Banquet reissue of Bend Sinister (thanks to Dan):
BRIX: Mark made me sing and scream 'Banana' - I wonder if it was a reference to the Velvet Underground, because there is something about that song that reminds me of the Velvets. Mark was very emphatic about me singing it. It was my idea to put the other fruits into it to try and give it some kind of context.
Sumsiadad remarks that this may be a subtle tribute to the German band, Faust:
"The recurring use of the word, 'Banana' makes me think of the Faust song, 'No Harm,' the entire lyric of which is, 'Daddy, take the banana/ Tomorrow is Sunday.'" Considering the title of this song and the fact that MES is known to be an aficionado of krautrock, it seems entirely plausible that the connection is intentional. As Dan points out, MES mentions Faust at least once, in the "Invisible Jukebox" feature, The Wire, January 2001:
FAUST
"It's A Rainy Day, Sunshine Girl" from So Far: The Wümme Years 1970-73
(Recommended) 1972
Many more to go now, Edwin? Are they all like this? Is it Can?
Close: it's Faust.
Oh right, right. Really? Is it new stuff?
No, old stuff. It's from So Far, their second album.
I prefer Faust Tapes or the first one to this.
Are there any other Krautrock groups you appreciate apart from Can and Faust?
I really liked both versions of Amon Düül a lot when I first heard them. Especially Amon Düül I, I thought they were very inventive.
5. From the booklet to the 2019 Beggars Banquet reissue of Bend Sinister (thanks to Dan):
BRIX: 'There's a blood silhouette through the ceiling sky' - the ceiling sky was my lyric - I had this weird thing about the ceiling. As a small child, I used to lay in bed and stay up all night thinking about what was past the ceiling, past the sky, past the galaxy, past the universe, where does it end, how far does it go? It used to torture me, and the ceiling sky is the opening to everything. His 'blood silhouette' was the body passing through the ceiling sky, then, what's left, the traces of the body.
A reader named Dan, who is not the usual Dan, remarks:
The "blood silhouette through the ceiling sky" may be a reference to Faust's final soliloquy in Marlowe's play, in which he is on the verge of repentence:
See, see where Christ's blood streams in the firmament!
One drop would save my soul, half a drop. Ah, my Christ!
More Information
Dan has located a version of the Faust story that may be the same as in MES's source. Note the chart below, which juxtaposes elements of the Faust story from Dan's source and MES's lyrics. Dan's information and comment below:
Folk Tales and Legends
Retold by Michaela Tvrdíková
Translated by Vera Gissing
Illustrations by Vojt?ch Kubašta
Cathay Books, 1981
ISBN 0 86178 056 6
Just to set lyric and story text side by side [note Anholt is the spelling found in the book, so that works with the way MES pronounces it]:
Lyric | Story |
Doctor Faustus Horseshoes splackin' Swallows hay cart, cart horse Of the peasants blocking his path |
'If you don't get out of my way, I'll swallow that stack of hay, cart, horses and all,' Faustus threatened. 'Help yourself,' laughed the farmer, but the smile froze on his face when the magician opened his mouth wide and swallowed the lot in one gulp. |
Doctor Faustus Power showin' Spits out hay cart, cart horse, hay and box, Outside the gates of the town of Anholt |
Not till he reached the town's gates, did Faustus turn round and spit out the stack of hay, the cart and the horses. The guards, terrified out of their minds, eyed this spectacle with amazement, but the farmer let out a cry of joy and jumped up on his box, whipped into the horses and drove off as quickly as he could... |
Doctor Faustus At the court of the Count Made fruits exotic pleasure-licious Appear behind curtains in Winter |
The count welcomed his guest warmly, and held a feast in his honour. The table was laden with many special dishes, but as it was early spring, there was no fruit on the silver trays, except nuts and apples. 'We have no other fruit here at this time of the year,' the countess said in excuse. Faustus did not comment, but picked up two empty silver trays and put them behind the window. Half an hour later they were laden with delicious, wondrous foreign fruits, oranges, apricots, grapes and strange fruits no one present had ever tasted or seen. The countess looked upon such a windfall with astonishment, while Faustus only smiled. 'My most gracious lady,' he said in the end, 'when it is cold and wet here, other parts of the world bask in sunshine and lovely fruits ripen there...' |
Made animals from sunny lands appear | At his request, Mephistopheles built him a beautiful castle on a hill. When the count and his party arrived, they marvelled at the exotic birds, swans and pheasants which lived there, and at the numerous animals from foreign lands, such as monkey, elephants and tigers, which ran freely in the yard. |
Had to leave His drinking student friends |
Then came the very last day of Faustus' life. The unhappy magician invited his student friends to his rooms... 'My dear friends, brother students!' he said. 'I have asked you here not just to dine and wine and entertain you. Today we are seeing each other for the last time... |
There's a blood silhouette through the ceiling sky | The whole chamber was tainted with blood, yet there was no corpse to be seen. Only a gaping hole in the ceiling showed that the devil had carried Doctor Faustus away. |
Comments (51)

- 1. | 23/07/2014

- 2. | 30/01/2016

- 3. | 12/03/2016

- 4. | 07/05/2016
Mark asked me to shout 'banana, strawberry and exotic fruits' in 'Dktr Faustus'. I cringe when I hear it. I hated having to say those stupid lyrics.

- 5. | 24/06/2016

- 6. | 27/06/2016
Secondly, if it is, then unless MES had the following definition in mind:
"verb getting "some" (some meaning sex)
Yo did you hear?
hear wat?
That i was splacking the buns!"
then he was inventing a verb to describe the sound which horseshoes make.
That said, the blue lyrics book contains the following:
"...Horshoes Splackin' Swallows Haycart...Horse-Shoes clackin`..."

- 7. | 29/06/2016

- 8. | 29/06/2016

- 9. | 29/06/2016

- 10. | 29/06/2016

- 11. | 29/06/2016

- 12. | 02/07/2016

- 13. | 29/12/2016
" 'Mind the carriages!' cried Mercier in his eighteenth-century Tableau de Paris. 'Here comes the black-coated physician in his chariot, the dancing master in his cabriolet, the fencing master in his diable - and the Prince behind six horses at the gallop as if he were in the open country.... The threateneing wheels of the overbearing rich drive as rapidly as ever over stones stained with the blood of their unhappy victims.' Do not fancy the danger was exaggerated: in France the stage-coach, introduced in the seventeenth century, killed more people annually than the railroad that followed it."

- 14. | 04/01/2017

- 15. | 25/01/2018

- 16. | 26/10/2018

- 17. | 27/10/2018
https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/thefall/dktr-faustus-t42086.html

- 18. | 15/11/2018
OK I found an article with that image right at the top and the link is waybacked, so that should be better.

- 19. | 15/11/2018

- 20. | 19/01/2019
In the sparse gardens
Seems like he's singing "gartens" here.

- 21. | 26/01/2019

- 22. | 06/02/2019
The "blood silhouette through the ceiling sky" may be a reference to Faust's final soliloquy in Marlowe's play, in which he is on the verge of repentence:
See, see where Christ's blood streams in the firmament!
One drop would save my soul, half a drop. Ah, my Christ!

- 23. | 08/02/2019
MES describes his source in these terms: "I read it in a fairytale book". Not much to go on. Could be a children's book, but could be an adult edition.
But good to have that information about what Marlowe's source probably was, feels like this is the way to go.
And just to observe that a "blood moon" might be a "blood silhouette" in a ceiling sky. We've focussed on the "ceiling sky" bit, and found reference to the "firmament". Which might be right. But then what is a "blood silhouette" in context? Something to do with the signing of the pact with the devil, or an astronomical feature of some kind? It feels like a kind of dramatic thing, doesn't it? "Wow, look at that up there!"
And is it "celling" or "sealing"? The Blue book has "cast me" or "pull me" blood silhouette thru the ceiling sky" but it's a typed version of unknown provenance that doesn't closely follow the recorded version lyrics.

- 24. | 08/02/2019

- 25. | 08/02/2019
https://sites.google.com/site/reformationposttpm/fall-tracks/dktr-faustus
In a radio interview with Steve Barker (On The Wire, BBC Radio Lancashire; date sometime in 1986), MES said that the riff was "one of Craig's standard ones. San Quentin type...me and the wife got together over this really good story book I had...and it sort of came out from that."
So MES twice referred to this "story book" or book of fairy tales, in which he first read the Faust story - some time before he was given the Harry Clarke-illustrated translated edition of Goethe's version.
It strikes me that we have paid less attention to this book that we should have. It feels like an illustrated book to me, maybe one aimed at children. I think what we need to do is track it down. How difficult could that be?

- 26. | 09/02/2019
Dan

- 27. | 15/03/2019
BRIX: Mark made me sing and scream 'Banana' - I wonder if it was a reference to the Velvet Underground, because there is something about that song that reminds me of the Velvets. Mark was very emphatic about me singing it. It was my idea to put the other fruits into it to try and give it some kind of context. 'There's a blood silhouette through the ceiling sky' - the ceiling sky was my lyric - I had this weird thing about the ceiling. As a small child, I used to lay in bed and stay up all night thinking about what was past the ceiling, past the sky, past the galaxy, past the universe, where does it end, how far does it go? It used to torture me, and the ceiling sky is the opening to everything. His 'blood silhouette' was the body passing through the ceiling sky, then, what's left, the traces of the body.
Seems like Brix took the bit at the end of the Faustus story about him being taken by the devil up through the ceiling, and incorporated those childhood memories.

- 28. | 21/03/2019
Dan, I am surprised at your reticence here considering what you came up with on the FOF! Your chart was too good to pass up. Please look at what I have in More Information and let me know if you have any objections to what I put there, or any further suggestions.

- 29. | 22/03/2019
although I'm not aware of him ever discussing Faust in particular
He did, see "Invisible Jukebox" feature, The Wire, January 2001:
FAUST
"It's A Rainy Day, Sunshine Girl" from So Far: The Wümme Years 1970-73
(Recommended) 1972
Many more to go now, Edwin? Are they all like this? Is it Can?
Close: it's Faust.
Oh right, right. Really? Is it new stuff?
No, old stuff. It's from So Far, their second album.
I prefer Faust Tapes or the first one to this.
Are there any other Krautrock groups you appreciate apart from Can and Faust?
I really liked both versions of Amon Düül a lot when I first heard them. Especially Amon Düül I, I thought they were very inventive.
https://thefall.org/news/010303.html
Dan

- 30. | 27/04/2019
I assumed that the title of the Faust album was italicized in the original and that the formatting got lost in transit, but that isn't always the case with these music magazines...I think it's a relatively benign intervention if I corrected them in this regard, though (ordinarily I only do that sort of thing to you good people)

- 31. | 27/04/2019

- 32. | 27/04/2019

- 34. | 26/10/2019

- 36. | 28/04/2020

- 37. | 02/05/2020

- 38. | 02/05/2020

- 39. | 04/05/2020
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artia_(publisher)
It was owned by the Czech state, and was a general cultural exports business - books and music mainly.
As noted there, the British publisher Paul Hamlyn founded Octopus books in about 1972. They had a license to publish Artia's books in the UK, and it seems Octopus could make use of cheap colour printing in the Czech republic.
See the chapter on Hamlyn in this book.
Folk Tales and Legends came out on both the Octopus and Cathay imprints (I have the latter) in the UK.

- 40. | 04/05/2020

- 41. | 14/05/2020
The book Dan found was from a Czech publisher,
... the publisher was Octopus or Cathay (part of the British Hamlyn stable), but the story was effectively licensed from the Czech state Artia business.
I have found no evidence that it was actually published in Czech in the Czech republic.

- 42. | 14/05/2020

- 43. | 14/06/2020

- 44. | 25/06/2020
The book Dan found was from a Czech publisher
... which it wasn't. It was licensed by UK publishers from a Czech publisher.

- 45. | 28/06/2020

- 46. | 06/10/2020
I would agree it's possible. As would be a pun on "banana peel".
However, it's just occurred to me that the quotation I provided in comment #29, establishing MES' appreciation for Faust, perhaps undercuts speculation along these lines.
Because in that interview, MES says he preferred Faust's first album to So Far. He didn't recognise the track that was played.
And the song No Harm appears on So Far.
Now, this isn't a fatal consideration, at all, but I would suggest that if MES had intended a tribute to Faust, he might be more likely to have picked a musical or lyrical reference from an song on an album he particularly liked and knew well.

- 47. | 17/10/2020
Sandy DenglerHis horse's feet made quiet splacking sounds in the mud.
From around the bend in the road came very noisy splacking sounds.
https://archive.org/details/johnbunyan00deng/page/132/mode/2up?q=splacking


- 48. | 16/01/2021

- 49. | 16/02/2021

- 50. | 05/03/2021
I just read Richard Cook's interview with Brix Smith in NME 25 May 1985, p.27. Right at the end, there's this:
One other thing to complete the lifelines: your favourite colour? Coral pink? Banana yellow?
"Black! I always wear black, I can't help it!"
Now, part of me would like to think MES remembered the "banana" bit and tortured Brix with it. But if so, he tortured her with it several months later and I'd often say that felt implausible. Anyway, here you are.

- 51. | 24/02/2023
A subplot of the movie is Joan being steadily edged to the periphery of Bob's world and in the end she flounces back to America. To me, the root cause of the breakup is the intellectual disparity between the two; Joan just can't keep up. Does this remind anyone of Mark and Brix's relationship? I'm thinking for example of the interview where he smirkingly tells her 'No one wants to know what you think'.
The congruence of the two relationships is one thing. The coincidence of words imo adds too much to be just coincidence. If this is correct then the song is Mark's reflections upon himself. Note that Goethe's play also portrayed a similar relationship of unequals in the Gretchen subplot.
It seems going too far, expecting biographical facts to explain a song lyric and yet there are a lot of things that match up; Faust, Dylan, MES, more than statistical likelihood would project. Perhaps becoming a Bob Dylan or an MES requires a Faustian bargain of some kind.
Please note that