Moliere: The Theory and Practice of ComedyBloomsbury Publishing, 1 déc. 2000 - 258 pages The history of ideas provides an important means of understanding and reinterpreting the literature of the past; and in this study Dr. Calder demonstrates the illumination that this informed approach brings to the comedies of MoliFre. In the course of this study, the author outlines a fresh theory of classical comedy which applies to the works of other French writers of the 17th century; and the historical reinterpretations of MoliFre's two most difficult plays -- Le Tartuffe and Dom Juan -- break entirely new ground.Although this is a work which specialists will admire, it is also intended to serve as an introduction to MoliFre and French classical comedy at large and will be of considerable value to younger students and readers of MoliFre in general. |
Table des matières
| 1 | |
| 18 | |
| 26 | |
Comedy and the Ridiculous | 41 |
Reason and the Ridiculous | 55 |
Body and Soul A Physiology of Laughter | 63 |
Honn234tet233 | 73 |
Judgement | 83 |
Medicine | 123 |
Preciosity | 138 |
Le Tartuffe | 153 |
Dom Juan and the hidden God | 180 |
Moli232res Philosophy | 203 |
Chronology | 210 |
Notes | 215 |
Bibliography | 228 |
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Expressions et termes fréquents
action Agnès Alceste amusing argued arguments Aristotelian Aristotle Arnolphe Arnolphe's audience authority behaviour body Bourgeois casuistry Célimène character Charron Christian Cléante Clitandre comedy comic poet contemporary Cotin cuckolded dénouement doctors Dom Juan Dorimon's Éliante Elmire Essais farce father Femmes savantes figures folly and vice fools Garasse happiness honest honnête homme honnêteté Horace human humour hypocrite Jesuits Juan judgement King L'École des femmes L'École des maris L'Impromptu laugh laughter Le Malade imaginaire Le Mariage forcé Le Misanthrope Le Tartuffe learning Les Femmes savantes Lettre libertine lovers Malade imaginaire marriage marry medicine Misanthrope Molière Molière's plays Monsieur Montaigne Montaigne's moral nature Orgon Paris Pascal passions pedants performances Philinte philosophy Plautus pleasure plot polemical portrait Précieuses precious Préface reason Renaissance rich ridiculous Rochefoucauld satire says scepticism scholastic self-love sense seventeenth-century Sganarelle share social soul stage Tartuffe Tartuffe's Terence tion Trissotin vanity wife women writing wrote
Fréquemment cités
Page 13 - So in every human body, The choler, melancholy, phlegm, and blood, By reason that they flow continually In some one part, and are not continent, Receive the name of humours. Now thus far It may, by metaphor, apply itself Unto the general disposition : As when some one peculiar quality Doth so possess a man, that it doth draw All his effects, his spirits, and his powers, In their confluctions, all to run one way, This may be truly said to be a humour.
Page 45 - Tis charg'd upon me that I make debauch'd persons (such as they say my Astrologer and Gamester are) my Protagonists, or the chief persons of the Drama; and that I make them happy in the conclusion of my Play; against the Law of Comedy, which is to reward virtue and punish vice.
Page 134 - Mihi a docto doctore Demandatur causam et rationem quare Opium facit dormire A quoi respondeo Quia est in eo Virtus dormitiva Cujus est nature Sensus assoupire. Chorus. Bene, bene, bene, bene respondere. Dignus, dignus est entrare In nostro docto corpore.
Page 78 - ... to harmony with Nature and the faithful observance of her laws. If we follow Nature as our guide, we shall never go astray, but we shall be pursuing that which is in its nature clear-sighted and penetrating (Wisdom), that which is adapted to promote and strengthen society (Justice), and that which is strong and courageous (Fortitude).
Page 12 - Of good writing the source and fount is wisdom. Your matter the Socratic pages can set forth, and when matter is in hand words will not be loath to follow. He who has learned what he owes his country and his friends, what love is due a parent, a brother, and a guest, what is imposed on senator and judge, what is the function of a general sent to war, he surely knows how to give each character his fitting part. I would advise one who has learned the imitative art to look to life and manners for a...
Page 10 - ... the role of advocates in their declamations. As a rule they impersonate sons, parents, rich men, old men, gentle or harsh of temper, misers, superstitious persons, cowards and mockers, so that hardly even comic actors have to assume more numerous roles in their performances on the stage than these in their declamations.
Page 60 - And if this is true of the general theory of ethics, still less is exact precision possible in dealing with particular cases of conduct; for these come under no science or professional tradition, but the agents themselves have to consider what is suited to the circumstances on each occasion, just as is the case with the art of medicine or of navigation.
Page 56 - Poetry, they are requisite in some degree for the forming a true judgment of it. No man can judge of a Beautiful imagination in another, without some degree of it in himself. And as for the judging rightly of any thing without Judgment, that is a contradiction in terms. And if Philosophy and a knowledge of the World are necessary to a Comick Poet, for his forming his Characters; if an acquaintance with the best Authors among the...
Page 59 - Such is its essential nature, 94 that it is inseparable from moral goodness ; for what is proper is morally right, and what is morally right is proper. The nature of the difference between morality and propriety can be more easily felt than expressed. For whatever propriety may be, it is manifested only when there is pre-existing moral rectitude.
Page 9 - ... of his past observation. But secondly, Humour distinguishes the Characters better, and gives an occasion for a greater variety of Action. For tho the Love of one man must be allow'd to be very different from the Love of another man, yet Love is but a single Passion, and Humour comprehends them all. For to every Passion there is a Humour which answers to it, which Humour is nothing but a less degree of that Passion. As for example, Anger is a Passion, Peevishness and Moroseness are Humours, Joy...