Occurs at the very beginning of the play, between its Job Function Email List main character, Goetz, and his mistress, Catherine. Goetz: I will raze the city. Catherine: But why? Goetz: Because doing it is wrong. Catherine: And why do Evil? Goetz: Because the Good is already Job Function Email List done. Catherine: Who has done it? Goetz: God the father. I invent. 1 The Goetz character is a mercenary whose sole purpose, at first, is to do Evil for Evil itself. The action takes place during the religious wars Job Function Email List and the peasant revolutions that take place in Germany at the beginning of the 16th century.
Goetz has put his army at the service of the Job Function Email List archbishop, who intends to crush the peasants' rebellion with blood and fire. It is not that Goetz believes that the archbishop is right, but, I insist, that he wants to do Evil, regardless of the motivations. However, at a certain moment he is assailed by doubt and wonders if he should not make a Job Function Email List radical change in himself and dedicate himself to doing Good. Since God sends him no sign one Job Function Email List way or the other, he doesn't know how to resolve the dilemma, so he asks Catherine to play a game of dice.
If he wins, he will continue to do Evil; if he Job Function Email List loses, he will do Good. First extraordinary finding: doing Good or Evil depends on chance, or – to put it in Sartre's own jargon – on a contingency . Second extraordinary finding: Goetzcheats to lose; that is to say: it Job Function Email List transforms the random contingency into a necessary choice . Inverting Mallarmé, with a roll of the dice he decides to abolish chance. First conclusion: to choose is, ultimately, to choose Job Function Email List against oneself , it is to go against one's own nature.