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Molière (1622-1673) - pseudonym of JEAN-BAPTISTE POQUELIN |
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French actor and playwright, the greatest of all writers of French comedy. Among Molière's best-known dramas are L'École des femmes (1662, School for Wives), Tartuffe, ou, L'imposteur (1664, Tartuffe, or the Impostor), Le Misanthrope (1666, The Misanthrope), L'Avare (1668, The Miser), and Le Bourgeois gentilhomme (1670, The Bourgeois Gentleman). His masterpieces are those plays in which, attacking hypocrisy and vice, he created characters that have become immortal types, such as the hypochondriac Argan, Tartuffe, the hypocrite, Harpagon, the miser, and Alceste, the misanthrope. Like Shakespeare, Molière was an actor-manager, but his plays were comedies and had happy endings. "Of all human follies there's none could be greater / Than trying to render our fellow-men better." (from The Misanthrope, in The Wordsworth Dictionary of Quotations, edited by Connie Robertson, 1996, p. 361 ) Molière
was born Jean-Baptiste Poquelin in Paris, the son of Jean Poquelin, a
prosperous upholsterer and furniture merchant, and Marie Cressé, whose
father was also a
merchant-upholsterer. Their matrimonial bed was made of walnut and it
had olive green wool curtains, decorated with silk and lace. Marie
Cressé gave birth in it to her first son, Jean-Babtiste, and five more
children; she died when Jean-Babtiste was ten. Their house is thought to have been on the Rue St Honore. The
Poquelins were
an old bourgeois family, perhaps originally of Scottish origin.
Molière's father was a descendant of a long
line of Beauvais tradesmen. Molière studied until 1639 with Jesuits at the Collège de Clermont, where he had a strict upbringing, but he also received a solid education in the classics of Latin and Greek literature. After studying law at the Université d'Orléans, he abandoned his social class and family's plans for his future for the theatre. With his companion Madeleine Béjart and her family, he cofounded the Illustre Théâtre. The company members were mostly young and inexperienced, but their aim was to compete with the established theatre companies. Located
in the less fashionable suburb
of St-Germain-des-près, the Illustre Théâtre survived for nearly
eighteen months. Molière was twice imprisoned for debt. Eventually,
after having disappeared for a period of time, Molière and the Béjarts
moved to the provinces, traveling around, often performing outdoors.
The theatre had
sufficient success and it obtained the patronage of Philippe d'Orléans.
Molière worked constantly, directing and writing plays heavily
influence by the Italian commedia dell'arte. In addition, he
nearly always acted in the lead role himself. According to an actress,
Mlle Poissa, Angélique Du Croisy, who was fifteen when Molière died, he
was "neither too fat nor too thin; he was more tall than short, he had
a noble bearing and a handsome leg; he walked slowly, gravely, with a
very serious air. His nose was large, as was his mouth; he had thick
lips, a dark complexion, heavy black brows, the various movements of
which made his expression very comical . . . Nature . . . had
refused him those external gifts so necessary to the stage, especially
for tragic roles." (Molière: A Theatrical Life by Virginia Scott, 2002, p. 58) After almost fifteen years experience of
acting, managing, and writing, Molière returned to Paris. Little is
know of his life in the provinces. His translation of Lucretius has
been lost. In 1658 Molière performed before the King Louis XIV Corneille's Nicomède and his own farce, Le Docteur amoureux,
and
organized a regular theatre, the Théâtre du Petit Bourbon, under the
patronage of the brother of the
king. After a difficult start, Molière secured his popularity
among the upper ranks of the aristocracy – the "people" did not have
money to go to the theatre. By
1661, Molière and his troupe had the privilege of performing in
the prestigious Palais Royal, the best theatre in Paris.
Later in life Molière concentrated on writing musical comedies, in
which the drama is interrupted by songs and dance or a combination of
both. Musical scores were composed by Lully, Charpentier, and Beauchamps, who was a relative and dancing master to Louis XIV. At the age of forty, in 1662, Molière married the twenty-year old Armande Béjart. Rumours were spread that he had married his own daughter. The issue of her parentage has never been settled. Little is known of their domestic life, but Armande soon came into conflict with a number of Molière's friends. Some anecdotes recorded in an anonymous pamphlet entitled La Fameuse Comédienne (1687) suggest that she had one of more affairs. In L'Impromptu de Versailles (1663) Molière's famous line to Armande on stage is, "Shut up, wife, you're an idiot." Armande played mostly female leads and love interests. In general Molière portrayed women as strong and intelligent, who express their own opinions. It is the male characters, whom he ridiculed at every turn. During his early years in Paris, Molière's close friends included La Fontaine, Claude Chapelle, and Racine. He first achieved fame with the prose comedy Les Précieuses ridicules, performed November 18, 1659 at the Théâtre du Petit-Bourbon. The author himself played successfully the Marquis de Mascarille, actually a disguised servant; he nearly adopted "Mascarille" as a new stage name. Encouraged by its success, Molière soon had his own theatre, which was competing with Racine's stage plays at the Hôtel de Bourgogne. The Shool for Wives (1662)
is generally regarded
as the
first of Molière's masterpieces, but it was criticized by the actors at
the Hôtel de Bourgogne. This
comedy poked fun at the limited education
that was given to daughters of rich families. "It's an odd job, making decent people laugh,"
says Dorante in The Critique of the School
for Wives (1663), Moliére's response to the criticism of his work: he was the constant target of religious authorities. "Man, I can assure you, is a nasty creature," wrote Molière in Tartuffe, ou L'imposteur (1664, Tartuffe, or the Impostor), which aroused the wrath of the Jansenist theologian Pierre Nicole. The play was banned but Molière escaped further punishment thanks to the royal protection – Louis XIV allowed it to be staged. The title characer Tartuffe has been taken to the home of credulous Orgon. He believes with his mother Pernelle that Tartuffe's pious example will be good for the other members of the family. Orgon determines that his daughter Mariane, who loves a young man named Valère, shall marry Tartuffe. Orgon's wife Elmire begs Tartuffe to refuse Mariane's hand, and he attempts to seduce her. Orgon rejects the truth about his guest and signs over his entire property to him. Elmire devises a way to expose the hypocrite Tartuffe to Orgon, whose eyes are opened a little too late. Tartuffe turns the family out of the house, and tries to have his former host arrested. But by the order of the King, the arresting officer apprehends Tartuffe instead, and the impostor is hauled off to prison. When an outraged theatre-goer stood up during a performance of Sganarelle; ou, le Cocu imaginaire (1660) and declared that he was being libelled, it made the audience laugh twice s hard. ('Molière (Jean-Baptiste Poquelin)' in The Book of Lost Books: An Incomplete History of All the Great Books You'll Never Read by Stuart Kelly, 2006) While his troupe was in Paris, Moliére played the traditional comic servant himself. There are other Sganarelle figures in later plays, the final is in Le Médecin malgré lui (1667). Although Moliére mocked the sly peasant, the vain bourgeois, and the hypocrisy of the clergy, he was careful not to attack the Crown directly. Art was an instrument of the government, but Louis XIV himself had not much time to think the artistic significance of his favorite, who enjoyed his protection. When the King once heard that Molière was the greatest writer of the century, he replied: "But I never knew that." Louis XIV was the godfather of Molière's first son Louis, who died in November 1664. In
the last years of his life, Molière suffered from pulmonary
tuberculosis – he
had a bad bout in 1666 and then in 1667 – but he remained stubborn in
his efforts to have his plays staged. The medical profession of the
period was a
recurrent subject matter in Molière's work. Basically he believed that
nature is the most effective
healer. Moreover, in his plays, doctors know nothing at all: they
"can talk fine Latin, can give a Greek name to every disease, can
define and distinguish them; but as to curing these diseases, that's
out of the question." (The Imaginary Invalid, 1673, translated by Charles Heron Wall, The Dramatic Works of Molière, 1876-1877) After the disastrous reception of the first three acts of Tartuffe, Molière wrote its fourth and fifth act. Dom Juan; ou, Le Festin de
pierre, finished in 1665 and based on plays of the same title
by the actor-writer Dorimont and Claude Villiers, was banned. Molière's melancholic side surfaced in Tartuffe, Le Misanthrope and L'Avare. These plays were apprecited by poets such as Goethe and Musset. In February 17, 1673, Molière had a violent fit of coughing during the performance of Le Malade
imaginaire (The Imaginary Invalid). However, he got through his part. Moliére
played the role of Argan, who, referring to the playwright himself,
says: "if I were a physician, I would be revenged of his impertinence,
and when he falls ill, I would let him die without relief. In vain
would he beg and pray. I would not prescribe for him the least little
bleeding, the least little injection, and I would tell him, "Die, die,
like a dog; it will teach you to laugh at us doctors."" (translated by Charles Heron Wall, The Dramatic Works of Molière, 1876-1877) At the same night, Molière died in his apartment on Rue de Richelieu ten o'clock There was no priest present. A Christian burial was denied at first, but it was granted by the King after the plea of Armante to the Archbishop. The burial took place quietly at night in a cemetery for unbaptised infants (Saints Innocents Cemetery). The publication of a plagiarized version of his play The Affected Ladies in 1659 promted Molière to begin publishing his own plays. As a result his works have survived fairly well, but curiously, not one letter from Molière has survived. The Comédie Française was established in 1680, but the era of the literary giants, Corneille, Racine, and Moliére, was gone. Armande married the actor Isaac-François Guérin; she retired in 1694. Along the centuries, a mass of legend has
accumulated around Molière's personality, work, and supposed lack of education and culture.
Jean-Léonor Le Gallois de Grimarest authored famously the first
biography, La Vie de M. de Molière (1705), full of errors, starting from the date of his birth. The
French poet and writer Pierre Louÿs claimed in his article 'Molière est
un chef-d'oeuvre de Corneille' (Temps, October 16, 1919), that most of his great comedies had been ghostwritten by the poet Pierre Corneille. In 1922, on the 300th anniversary of Molière's birth, the Catholic Church honoured him with a Requiem Mass at Saint-Roch. For further reading: The Life of Molière by H. Trollope (1905); Molière: His Life and His Work by B. Matthews (1910); La jeunesse de Molière by G. Michaut (1922); Molière by J. Palmer (1930); Molière: Sa vie dans ses oeuvres by P. Brisson (1942); New Light on Molière by J. Cairncross (1957); Molière: A New Criticism by W.G. Moore (1962); Men and Masks by L. Grossman (1963); Molière: A Collection of Critical Essays, ed. by J. Guicharnaud (1964); History of French Dramatic Literature in the Seventeeth Century by Henry C. Lancaster (1966); Molère by A. Tilley (1968); Molière: Traditions in Criticism, 1900-1970 by E. Romero (1974); From Gesture to Idea by Nathan Gross (1983); The Happy End of Comedy by Zvi Jagendorf (1984); The Life of Monsieur De Molière by Mikhail Bulgakov and Mirra Ginsburg (1986); Molière by Hallam Waller (1990); Molière's Theatrical Bounty by Albert Bermel (1990); Molière: The Theory and Practice of Comedy by Andrew Calder (1993); Rereading Molière by James Patrick Carmody and Jim Carmody (1993); Approaches to Teaching Moliere's Tartuffe and Other Plays, ed. by James F. Gaines and Michael S. Koppisch (1995); Intruders in the Play World: The Dynamics of Gender in Molière's Comedies by Roxanne Decker (1996); La Carriere de Molière by C.E.J. Caldicott (1998); The Public Mirror: Molière and the Social Commerce of Depiction by Larry F. Norman (1999); Molière: A Theatrical Life by Virginia Scott (2000); Molière, the French Revolution, and the Theatrical Afterlife by Mechele Leon (2009); Molière on Stage: What's So Funny? by Robert W. Goldsby (2012); Molière's Strategies: Timely Reflections on His Art of Comedy by Walter E. Rex (2013); Controversy in French Drama: Molière's Tartuffe and the Struggle for Influence by Julia Prest (2014); Molière's Metatextual Maneuvers by M.J. Muratore (2016); Translating Molière for the English-speaking Stage: The Role of Verse and Rhyme by Cédric Ploix (2020); Molière in Context, edited by Jan Clarke (2022); Women and Irony in Molière's Comedies of Marriage by John D. Lyons (2023) - See also: Isaiah Berlin - Suom.: Moliérilta on suomennettu lukuisia muita näytelmiä, mm. Scapinin vehkeilyt, 1901 (suom. Jalmari Finne), Lannistettu aviomies, Oppineita naisia, Väkinäinen naiminen sekä valikoimat Komedioja 1-2. Selected works:
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