For as long as we have been modern, the legend of the devil’s pact has been the preferred metaphor for the desire to surpass the limits of human knowledge and power at any cost. Starting with the sixteenth-century Faust Book, which recounts the story of a scholar, alchemist and necromancer who sold his soul to the devil, and extending to the present, this course offers students a chance to explore our enduring fascination with the forbidden. The main focus is on two masterpieces of world literature, Goethe’s Faust, written toward the end of the Enlightenment, and Bulgakov’sMaster and Margarita, written during the height of Soviet Stalinism, in combination with samples from cinema and music, ranging from opera to rock and roll. Taught by teaching-award-winning professors Simon Richter and Ilya Vinitsky, this is the kind of course that will stay with you for the rest of your life.