Molière’s ‟Les Fâcheux,” ‟The Bores” (2)

17 Tuesday Dec 2019

Posted by michelinewalker in Comédie-Ballet, Molière

Tags

All's well that ends well, Chivalry, deus ex machina, jealousy, La Bruyère, Les Fâcheux, Molière, reason, The Bores, Theophrastus

edmond-geffroy-1804-1895-moliere-et-ses-personnages_-suite-de-17-aquarelles-originales-hellip

Lisandre par Edmond Geffroy

Vois-tu ce petit trait de feinte que voilà ?
Ce fleuret ? ces coupés courant après la belle?
Lisandre (I. iii)
[Do you observe that little touch of a faint? This fleuret?
The coupés running after the fair one.]
Lisandre (I. 5)

Molière’s Les Fâcheux, a three-act and verse comédie-ballet, was first performed at Vaux-le-Vicomte, Nicolas Fouquet‘s château, on 17 August 1661. It heralded King Louis XIV’s divertissements, which usually took place in a château outside Paris, such as the château at Saint-German-en-Laye. After Vaux-le-Vicomte’s performance of Les Fâcheux, Louis XIV congratulated Molière, but suggested that a hunter, le Marquis de Soyecourt, be added to the bores. The role had been added by 25 August 1661, when Les Fâcheux was performed at Fontainebleau. On 4 November 1661, Les Fâcheux was performed in Paris at the Théâtre du Palais-Royal.

In comédies-ballets, one also names the composer, Lully, and the choreographer, Beauchamp. Here, Molière was the lyricist. As a comédie-ballet, Les Fâcheux contains a Prologue that precedes Act One and features a naiad in a shell. Moreover, interludes, entrées de ballet, separate Acts One and Two (two), Acts Two and Three (four), and two entrées de ballet follow Act Three.

Jealousy

Les Fâcheux continues the theme of jealousy, introduced in Dom Garcie de Navarre ou le Prince jaloux. In Les Fâcheux, it is a debate mostly which takes place in Act Two, Scene Four, a scene I chose to discuss separately. It should be noted, however, that Dom Garcie de Navarre ou le Prince jaloux was a comédie héroïque, but that Les Fâcheux, is a form of divertissement, not a comédie héroïque. Form imposes a different treatment of a similar subject, such as jealousy, but jealousy is jealousy. In Act Two, Scene Four Éraste, our young lover, will be asked to hear both sides of a debate on whether jealousy is a sign of love. This was a question d’amour. These were plentiful and were often discussed, rather lightheartedly, in the salons of seventeenth-century France. Questions d’amour are associated with préciosité. In this scene, the fâcheuses are Climène and Orante.

Horace (Google)

Sources

Horace
Theophrastus

I named Horace’s Satires as the play’s main source, adding that Les Fâcheux was also rooted in French and contemporary sources: Mathurin Régnier, Paul Scarron, and others. But The Bores also borrows from Theophrastus, as does Jean de La Bruyère‘s Caractères.[1] French classicisme has Greek and Roman ancestry. On the cover of the third edition of Jean de La Bruyère’s Caractères, we can read that some of La Bruyère’s caractères are a translation of Theophrastus’ Greek characters, and others “de ce siècle,” living caractères. The seventeenth-century had its moralistes. In fact, Le Misanthrope contains a portrait scene. Someone drops a name and Célimène has a portrait ready.

Moreover, as I reread Les Fâcheux, a word leaped off the page: raison, as in René Descartes. Éraste says to La Montagne:

215 J’ai de l’amour encor pour la belle inhumaine,/ Et ma raison voudrait, que j’eusse de la haine!
Éraste to La Montagne (I. iv)
[Ah, I feel myself greatly disturbed ! I still love the cruel fair one, and my reason bids me hate her.]
Éraste to La Montagne (I. 7)

Does reason militate against love? Descartes championed reason, but he wrote Les Passions de l’âme, and was opposed by several figures in seventeenth-century France. We need only name Blaise Pascal (31 March 1596 – 11 February 1650). Le cœur a ses raisons que la raison ne connaît point. (See merriam-webster.com.)

Let us run back to Vaux-le-Vicomte. Les Fâcheux was created, rehearsed and performed in fifteen days.

Molière wrote that

« Jamais entreprise au théâtre ne fut si précipitée que celle-ci, et c’est une chose, je crois, toute nouvelle qu’une comédie ait été conçue, faite, apprise et représentée en quinze jours. »
Molière, Avertissement
[Never was any Dramatic performance so hurried as this; and it is a thing, I believe, quite new, to have a comedy planned, finished, got up, and played in a fortnight.][Preface]

DIAGHILEW-(SERGE-DE)-BRAQUE-(GEORGES).-LES-FACHEUX.-PARIS-_-QUATRE-CHEMINS-1924.&HELLIP-

Braque, Diaghilev

Our DRAMATIS PERSONÆ is:

ERASTE, in love with ORPHISE,
ORPHISE, in love with ERASTE
DAMIS, guardian to Orphise,
LA MONTAGNE, servant to Eraste,
L’EPINE, servant to Damis.
ALCIDOR,
DORANTE,
LISANDRE/LYSANDRE,
CARITIDES,
ALCANDRE,
ORMIN,
ALCIPPE,
FILINTE,
ORANTE,
CLIMÈNE.
LA RIVIERE and Two COMRADES.

The Scene is at PARIS.

ACT ONE

In Act One, La Montagne is helping Éraste dress properly. For instance, he cleans Éraste’s hat, drops it, and must clean again. These are comedic routines called lazzi.

Valets and other servants help young couples overcome obstacles to their marriage. They are zanni. For instance, Éraste tells La Montagne that of all the bores, the worst is Damis, Orchise’s uncle and guardian:

Mais de tous mes fâcheux, le plus fâcheux encore,/ C’est Damis, le tuteur de celle que j’adore;/ Qui rompt ce qu’à mes vœux elle donne d’espoir,/ Et fait qu’en sa présence elle n’ose me voir./ 115 Je crains d’avoir déjà passé l’heure promise,/ Et c’est dans cette allée, où devait être Orphise.
Éraste à La Montagne (I. i)
[But of all my bores the greatest is Damis, guardian of her whom I adore, who dashes every hope she raises, and has brought it to pass that she dares not see me in his presence. I fear I have already passed the hour agreed on; it is in this walk that Orphise promised to be.]
Éraste to La Montagne (I. 1)

Moreover, Éraste turns to La Montagne to ask him whether Orphise loves him. La Montagne calls Orphise’s love “un amour confirmé.”

125 Mais, tout de bon, crois-tu que je sois d’elle aimé?
Éraste à La Montagne (I. i)
[But, in good earnest, do you believe that I am loved by her?]
Éraste to La Montagne (I. 1)
Quoi? vous doutez encor d’un amour confirmé…
La Montagne à Éraste (I. i)
[What ! do you still doubt a love that has been tried?]
La Montagne to Éraste (I. 1)

La Montagne is doing what valets do, but Éraste wishes to leave as quickly as possible, which makes La Montagne a bore. Being a bore is, to a large extent, a matter of timing and, therefore, relative. At the end of Scene One Éraste says:

150 Au diantre tout valet qui vous est sur les bras;/ Qui fatigue son maître, et ne fait que déplaire/ À force de vouloir trancher du nécessaire.
Éraste à La Montagne (I. i)
[The deuce take every servant who dogs your heels, who wearies his master, and does nothing but annoy him by wanting to set himself up as indispensable!]
Éraste a La Montagne (I. 1)

However, as soon as Éraste leaves, so does La Montagne who sees, as Éraste does, that Alcidor is holding Orphise’s hand. Orphise waves to Éraste and tends turns her head in another direction. Éraste is miffed. Orphise has ignored him. Does she or does she not love Éraste?

153 Mais vois-je pas Orphise? Oui c’est elle, qui vient./ Où va-t-elle si vite, et quel homme la tient?
(Il la salue comme elle passe, et elle en passant détourne la tête)
Éraste à La Montagne (I. ii)
[But do I not see Orphise? Yes, it is she who comes. Whither goeth she so fast, and what man is that who holds her hand?]
Éraste to La Montagne (I. 2, p. 59)

He bows to her as she passes, and she turns her head another way.

155 Quoi me voir en ces lieux devant elle paraître,/ Et passer en feignant de ne me pas connaître/ Que croire? Qu’en dis-tu? Parle donc, si tu veux.
Éraste à La Montagne (I. ii)
[What! She sees me here before her, and she passes by, pretending not to know me! What can I think? What do you say? Speak if you will.]
Éraste to La Montagne who will not speak for fear of being a bore. (1. 3, p. 59)

Éraste suffers :

Et c’est l’ [fâcheux] être en effet que de ne me rien dire/ 160 Dans les extrémités d’un si cruel martyre./ Fais donc quelque réponse à mon cœur abattu:/ Que dois-je présumer? Parle, qu’en penses-tu? Dis-moi ton sentiment.
Éraste à La Montagne (I. ii)
[And so indeed you do, if you say nothing to me whilst I suffer such a cruel martyrdom. Give me some answer; I am quite dejected. What am I to think? Say, what do you think of it? Tell me your opinion.]
Éraste à La Montagne (I. 3)

165 Peste l’impertinent! Va-t’en suivre leurs pas;/ Vois ce qu’ils deviendront, et ne les quitte pas.
Éraste à La Montagne (I. ii)
[Hang the impertinent fellow! Go and follow them; see what becomes of them, and do not quit them.]
Éraste to La Montagne (I. 3)

The above quotations suggest inquiétude in Éraste who loves Orphise, and matters get worse, but remember that this is a divertissement.

213 Monsieur, Orphise est seule, et vient de ce côté.
La Montagne à Éraste (I. iv)
[Sir, Orphise is alone, and is coming this way.]
La Montagne to Éraste (I. 7)

Ah d’un trouble bien grand je me sens agité!/ 215 J’ai de l’amour encor pour la belle inhumaine,/ Et ma raison voudrait, que j’eusse de la haine!
Éraste à La Montagne (I. iv)
[Ah, I feel myself greatly disturbed ! I still love the cruel fair one, and my reason bids me hate her.]
Éraste to La Montagne (I. 7)

Why would “reason” demand that Éraste hate Orphise whom he loves? When, finally, Éraste catches up to Orphise, she tells him that she was pursued by a bore and laughs. Yes, a man held her hand, but she was trying to rid herself of a bore and find Éraste.

Certes il en faut rire, et confesser ici,/ Que vous êtes bien fou, de vous troubler ainsi./ L’homme, dont vous parlez, loin qu’il puisse me plaire,/ 240 Est un homme fâcheux dont j’ai su me défaire;/ Un de ces importuns, et sots officieux, /Qui ne sauraient souffrir qu’on soit seule en des lieux;/ Et viennent aussitôt, avec un doux langage,/Vous donner une main, contre qui l’on enrage./ 245 J’ai feint de m’en aller, pour cacher mon dessein;/ Et, jusqu’à mon carrosse, il m’a prêté la main./ Je m’en suis promptement défaite de la sorte,/ Et j’ai pour vous trouver, rentré par l’autre porte.
Orphise à Éraste (I. v)
[I really must laugh, and declare that you are very silly to trouble yourself thus. The man of whom you speak, far from being able to please me, is a bore of whom I have succeeded in ridding myself; one of those troublesome and officious fools who will not suffer a lady to be anywhere alone, but come up at once, with soft speech, offering you a hand against which one rebels. I pretended to be going away, in order to hide my intention, and he gave me his hand as far as my coach. I soon got rid of him in that way, and returned by another gate to come to you.]
Orphise to Éraste (I. 8)

When he learns the truth, Éraste believes Orchise and asks her not to be angry. Had he offended her, she would not laugh and, if he were jealous, a simple explanation would not have appeased him.

Ah ne vous fâchez pas, trop sévère beauté./ 255 Je veux croire en aveugle, étant sous votre empire,/ Tout ce que vous aurez la bonté de me dire./ Trompez, si vous voulez, un malheureux amant; /J’aurai pour vous respect, jusques au monument.[tomb]/ Maltraitez mon amour, refusez-moi le vôtre;/ 260 Exposez à mes yeux le triomphe d’un autre,/ Oui je souffrirai tout de vos divins appas,/ J’en mourrai, mais enfin je ne m’en plaindrai pas.
Éraste à Orphise (I. v)
[Ah! too severe beauty, do not be angry. Being under your sway, I will implicitly believe whatever you are kind enough to tell me. Deceive your hapless lover if you will; I shall respect you to the last gasp. Abuse my love, refuse me yours, show me another lover triumphant; yes, I will endure everything for your divine charms. I shall die, but even then I will not complain.]
Éraste à Orphise (I. 8)

In Act One, Scene Three, Lisandre, pictured at the top of this post, is a bore who sings and dances. Alhough Éraste appreciates Lisandre, the meeting is brief. In Scene Six, Alcandre asks Éraste to help him. He has been threatened. Éraste refuses to help because he does not want to oppose the king who frowns upon duels, but violence is suggested and we have learned that Éraste was a soldier before he was courtier:

275 Je ne veux point ici faire le capitan;/ Mais on m’a vu soldat, avant que courtisan/ J’ai servi quatorze ans, et je crois être en passe,/ De pouvoir d’un tel pas me tirer avec grâce,/ Et de ne craindre point, qu’à quelque lâcheté/ Le refus de mon bras me puisse être imputé.
Éraste à Alcandre (I. vi)
[I have no desire to boast, but I was a soldier before I was a courtier. I served fourteen years, and I think I may fairly refrain from such a step with propriety, not fearing that the refusal of my sword can be imputed to cowardice. A duel puts one in an awkward light, and our King is not the mere shadow of a monarch.]
Éraste to Alcandre (I. 10)

Moreover, in Scene One, Éraste mentions Damis, Orchise’s uncle and guardian whom he fears. Of all the bores separating Éraste and Orchise, Damis is the worst.

So, from the very beginning of the play, we know that the blocking-character of The Bores is Damis, Orchise’s uncle and guardian.Violence has been suggested and jealousy, but neither Orchise nor Éraste are prone to jealousy. She laughs when he asks her about the man who held her hand. A short explanation suffice and he apologizes for having suggesting that the man who held Orchise may be a rival. In Act Two, Scene Four, she watches Éraste adjudicating a debate. Is jealousy a sign of love?

THE BORES

In Act One, the bores are Lisandre (Scene Three) and Alcandre (Scene Six). Although Éraste appreciates Lisandre, he hasn’t much time for him. As for Alcandre he is asking for help that would jeopardize Éraste’s relationship with the King.

La Montagne is also a bore, but only inasmuch as Éraste is in a hurry. Damis, Orphise’s uncle and guardian is also a bore (Scene One)

ACT TWO

In Act Two, Scene Six, we meet Dorante, a hunter, who reports that a gun was used during a chase. This scene was added between the Vaux representation and the performance at Fontainebleau, as requested by the King himself.

But the love story continues. After she tells him who the man was, Éraste asks her not to be angry. He loves her, so that he will not complain.

But after Act II, Scene iv, I doubt very much that he would call Orphise, jalouse and, although he is still rushing, Éraste has calmed down after the debate.

La Question d’amour

Given Éraste’s haste, Climène and Orante are also bores, but they ask Éraste to be the judge in the debate opposing them. Climène thinks that jealousy is a sign of love, but Orante does not. Orante says that jealous husbands could beat up their wife, which could cause a wife to leave, if she can support herself. At this point, Éraste passes judgment, and leaves promptly.

THE BORES

In Act Two, our bores are Alcippe who plays piquet (Scene Two), Climène and Orante, (Scene Four) and Dorante who went hunting and reports that a gun was used (Scene Six).

ACT THREE

At the beginning of Act Three, Éraste tells that Damis is hindering a marriage to Orphise. He is stopped by Caritidès, a pedant, who wishes Éraste to present a letter to the King on his behalf (iv). He then meets Ormin who believes France should have as many seaports as possible (v). Finally, he meets Filinte who warns Éraste that someone has made fun of him and that he should be careful.

In Scene Five he is joined by Damis himself, Orphise’s guardian. Eraste sees someone at Orphise’s door. Damis explains that he knows Éraste is to meet Orphise without witnesses. Damis will have La Rivière and L’Espine kill Éraste. But La Rivière and his friends decide to kill Damis first.

Damis is Orphise’s uncle and guardian, so as the career soldier he has been, Éraste defends Damis.

Bien qu’il m’ait voulu perdre, un point d’honneur me presse,/ De secourir ici l’oncle de ma maîtresse./ (À Damis.) Je suis à vous Monsieur. (Éraste, mettant la main à l’épée.)
Éraste seul et à Damis (III. v)
Though he would have killed me, honour urges me here to rescue the uncle of my mistress. (To Damis). I am on your side, Sir. (He draws his sword and attacks La Riviere and his companions; whom he puts to flight.)
Éraste alone and Éraste to Damis (III. 5)

Ô Ciel, par quel secours, D’un trépas assuré vais-je sauver mes jours! 795 À qui suis-je obligé d’un si rare service?
Damis, après leur fuite. (III. v)
[Heavens! By whose aid do I find myself saved from a certain death? To whom am I indebted for so rare a service?]
Damis (III. 5)

Quoi celui, dont j’avais résolu le trépas,/ Est celui, qui pour moi, vient d’employer son bras?/ Ah! c’en est trop, mon cœur est contraint de se rendre;/ Et quoi que votre amour, ce soir, ait pu prétendre/ 805 Ce trait si surprenant de générosité,/ Doit étouffer en moi toute animosité./ Je rougis de ma faute, et blâme mon caprice./ Ma haine, trop longtemps, vous a fait injustice;/ Et pour la condamner par un éclat fameux,/ 810 Je vous joins, dès ce soir, à l’objet de vos vœux.
Damis à Éraste (III. v)
[What! Eraste, whom I was resolved to have assassinated has just used his sword to defend me! Oh, this is too much; my heart is compelled to yield; whatever your love may have meditated tonight, this remarkable display of generosity ought to stifle all animosity. I blush for my crime, and blame my prejudice. My hatred has too long done you injustice! To show you openly I no longer entertain it, I unite you this very night to your love.]
Damis to Éraste (III. 5)

SCENE SIX
In Scene VI, a delighted Orphise says that she will marry Éraste.

Si c’est pour lui payer ce que vous lui devez,/ J’y consens, devant tout, aux jours qu’il a sauvés.
Orphise (III. vi)
[I owe everything to you; if, therefore, it is to pay him your debt, I consent, as he has saved your life.]
Orphise to Eraste (III. 6)

As for Éraste, he no longer knows whether he wakes or dreams.

Mon cœur est si surpris d’une telle merveille,/ 820 Qu’en ce ravissement, je doute, si je veille.
Éraste à tous (III. vi)
[My heart is so overwhelmed by this great miracle, that amidst this ecstasy, I doubt if I am awake.]
Éraste to Orphise and Damis (III. 6)

Finally, Damis is reassured and calls for a celebration.

Célébrons l’heureux sort, dont vous allez jouir; Et que nos violons viennent nous réjouir. (Comme les violons veulent jouer, on frappe fort à la porte.)
Damis à tous (III. vi)
[Let us celebrate the happy lot that awaits you; and let our violins put us in a joyful mood.]
Damis to all (III. 6)

THE BORES

In Act Three, the bores are Caritidés, a pedant, Ormin, who wishes Éraste to tell the King to build as many ports as possible in France, and Filinte, who has heard that Éraste is threatened. However, we have criminals: La Rivière and friends.

Lisandre par Moreau le Jeune

Les Fâcheux par Lalauze

Images: theatre-documentation.com

Conclusion

Despite the repetitive nature of the play, one can say that, overall, Les Fâcheux uses the comedic ‟all’s well that ends well formula,” ‟tout est bien qui finit bien.”

Yes, the question d’amour is answered. It is wiser not to be jealous. Act Two, Scene Four seems a play within a play, un théâtre dans le théâtre, more bores, but Orchise is not a ‟cruel fair one,” “une belle inhumaine,” (I. iv).

Si ce parfait amour, que vous prouvez si bien,/ Se fait vers votre objet un grand crime de rien,/ Ce que son cœur, pour vous, sent de feux légitimes,/ En revanche, lui fait un rien de tous vos crimes.
La Montagne à Éraste (I. i)
[If this perfect love, which you manifest so well, makes out of nothing a great crime against her whom you love; the pure flame which her heart feels for you on the other hand converts all your crimes into nothing.]
La Montagne to Éraste (I. 1)

In short, if Sostrate (Les Amants magnifiques), kills a boar, earning unknowingly the hand of a delighted Ériphile, matters are almost the same in Les Fâcheux. Éraste fights away La Rivière and his men, saving the life of Orphise’s guardian and turning enmity into gratitude on the part of Damis who wishes for him to marry Orchise. As in chivalry, Éraste serves and earns his lady’s hand. In fact, by defending Damis, Éraste makes himself a deus ex machina.

RELATED ARTICLES

Molière’s “Les Fâcheux,” “The Bores” (1) (12 December 2019)
Merciless Fatality (8 December 2019)
Dom Garcie de Navarre, details (7 December 2019)
Dom Garcie de Navarre (5 December 2019)
Les Amants magnifiques as a comédie-ballet
Molière’s “La Princesse d’Élide” (14 October 2019)
Molière’s “Les Amants magnifiques” (30 September 2019)
Vaux-le-Vicomte: Fouquet’s Rise and Fall (30 August 2013)
Molière page

Sources and Resources

Henri van Laun’s Preface
Les Fâcheux is a toutmolière.net publication
The Bores (vol. ii) is an Internet Archive publication
Henri van Laun is our translator
Theatre-documentation.com images belong to the BnF
others are Google images
Bold letters are mine

_________________________
[1] Cf. Maurice Rat, Œuvres complètes Molière (Paris: Pléiade 1956), pp. 860 -864.

Love to everyone 💕

horace1large

Molière: Nature vs Nurture

20 Friday Sep 2019

Posted by michelinewalker in Comedy, Metamorphosis, Molière

≈ 6 Comments

Tags

Amphitryon, Dénouement, deus ex machina, Molière, nature/nurture, pharmakos, sosie, Venus and the Cat

Æsop‘s Venus and the Cat by Arthur Rackham

Aarne-Thompson-Uther Index type 2031C
The Perry Index (#050)
Æsop’s Fables: Venus and the Cat (The Project Gutenberg [EBook #11339])
Fables d’Ésope: La Chatte et Aphrodite
The Cat and Venus (fablesofaesop.com)
La Fontaine: La Chatte métamorphosée en femme (II. xviii) FR (site officiel)
La Fontaine: The Cat Changed into a Woman (II. xviii) EN (site officiel)
Photo credit (image above): The Project Gutenberg [EBook #25433] p. 46

Our next play is Molière‘s Amphitryon. In Amphitryon, we have people who look alike, which leads to cuckoldry. One character is named Sosie. In French, un sosie is a “dead ringer,” a look-alike. Amphitryon is cuckolded.

Æsop’s Cat and Venus by Walter Crane

“Nature exceeds nurture.”

anagnorisis (recognition)
doublings
the deceiver deceived, le trompeur trompé
deus ex machina

However, before going further, I should point out, once again, that, in Molière, people seldom change. One could not talk Argan (The Imaginary Invalid) into thinking he is perfectly healthy. In The Miser, Harpagon remains a miser. The young couples marry because Molière brings in a second father, a doubling, who recognizes his children, (an anagnorisis, or recognition scene). He pays for the weddings. In l’École des femmes (The School for Wives), Arnolphe is so afraid his wife will be unfaithful that he adopts Agnès and has her brought up so she will know as little as possible. However, Agnès’ father, Enrique, returns suddenly and unexpectedly, an anagnorisis. He and Oronte, Horace’s father, were planning for Agnès and Horace to marry.

Molière may also use a deus ex machina, which he does in Dom Juan. But Dom Juan is also “hoisted by his own petard,” a happy ending borrowed from the farce’s plot formula. Dom Juan will not be convinced that the freedom he gives himself will cause eternal damnation, which it does. He is a deceiver deceived, le trompeur trompé.

As for Psyché, Jupiter, the king of the gods, is a deus ex machina. Cupid cannot transform Psyché into a goddess because he is a lesser god. Venus could revive Psyché but she would not allow her son to marry a mortal. That would be a mésalliance. Therefore, Jupiter transforms a mortal being into an immortal, or a goddess. In Tartuffe, Orgon’s family would be ruined if a prince did not intervene. The prince, “un prince ennemi de la fraude,” knows that Tartuffe is a criminal and, although Orgon has given Tartuffe an incriminating cassette, a forgiving prince does not use it to Orgon’s detriment. Yet, to a large extent, Orgon is Tartuffe and Tartuffe is Orgon. Consequently, Tartuffe is a pharmakós.[1]

Given his theatrical, or formulaic, happy endings, Molière’s Weltanschauung (world view) resembles Jean de La Fontaine’s. A cat may be metamorphosed into a woman, but if the metamorphosed woman hears a mouse, she will jump out of bed and pursue the mouse. Therefore, in the 17^th-century debate between nature & nurture, nature wins. (See The Cat and Venus.)

However, in 17^th-century France, one could buy an office and become a bourgeois. Molière’s father was quite wealthy. So, in 1631, he bought an office for his son Jean-Baptiste. Poquelin would be “valet de chambre ordinaire et tapissier du Roi” (“valet of the King’s chamber and keeper of carpets and upholstery”). (See Molière, en-wikipedia.org). In 1641, Molière was, briefly, a valet de chambre ordinaire et tapissier du Roi, but he loved the theater, which led to his founding l’Illustre-Théâtre, on 30 June 1643. In August 1645, Jean-Baptiste Poquelin was imprisoned for bankruptcy. His father paid most of his debts,[2] La Troupe de Molière then left for the provinces and did not return to Paris until the late 1650s. As I mentioned in an earlier post, no one knows why Molière chose to call himself Molière. He never told. In 17^th-century France, one could also become an honnête homme (a gentleman).

—ooo—

In short, Molière was a bourgeois and an honnête homme, but in his plays, usually comedic, nature is almost as implacable as tragedy’s destiny or fate. Dénouements, the deus ex machina especially, are “theatrical,” or formulaic. For instance, Molière may use a farcical plot formula in comedies moliéristes have called grandes comédies, thereby blurring the difference between his farces and grandes comédies. We are centuries away from existentialism.

My related article is particularly useful and more complete. I am updating my La Fontaine page, because the site officiel has been modified, for the better.

RELATED ARTICLE

The Cat Metamorphosed into a Mai d (The Cat Changed into a Woman), by Jean de La Fontaine, “La Chatte métamorphosée en femme” (II.18) (20 July 2013)

Sources and Resources

Aarne-Thompson-Uther Index, type 2031C
The Perry Index (#050)
Æsop’s Fables: Venus and the Cat (The Project Gutenberg’s [EBook #11339])
Fables d’Ésope: La Chatte et Aphrodite
La Fontaine: La Chatte métamorphosée en femme (II. xviii)
La Fontaine: The Cat Changed into a Woman (II. xviii)[3]

_________________________
[1] My PhD thesis was a study of the pharmakós in Molière. It is entitled: L’Impossible Entreprise : une étude sur le pharmakós dans le théâtre de Molière.
[2] Molière also paid debts, when he returned to Paris.
[3] I believe Château-Thierry has become La Fontaine’s site officiel.

Love to everyone 💕

Georges Brassens sings Le Cocu

EBook #11339

Molière’s “Médecin malgré lui”

25 Thursday Apr 2019

Posted by michelinewalker in Comedy, Molière

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

deus ex machina, Fear, kairos, Le Médecin malgré lui, Le Vilain mire, Satire on doctors, The Doctor in spite if himself, Three-Act Comedy

Le Médecin malgré lui, Edmond Geoffroy

LE MÉDECIN MALGRÉ LUI

Our dramatis personæ are

Géronte, père (father) de Lucinde.
Lucinde, fille (daughter) de Géronte.
Léandre, amant (lover) de Lucinde.
Sganarelle, mari (husband) de Martine.
Martine, femme (wife) de Sganarelle.
M. Robert, voisin (neighbour) de Sganarelle.
Valère, domestique (servant) de Géronte.
Lucas, mari (husband) de Jacqueline.
Jacqueline, nourrice (wet-nurse) chez Géronte, et femme de Lucas.
Thibaud, père (father) de Perrin. (peasant)
Perrin, fils (son) de Perrin.

Le Médecin malgré lui is:

a three-act comedy;
rooted in Le Vilain Mire (mire = doctor), a 13^th-century fabliau (most are obscene and some are scatological);
it was performed during the years Molière spent outside Paris, under different titles, and, before 1666, in Paris, under different titles;
it premièred in Paris, as Le Médecin malgré lui, on 6 August 1666, at the Théâtre du Palais-Royal;
according to Maurice Rat[1], it was preceded by, or played along a version of La Médecin malgré lui written by Donneau de Visé, entitled La Mère coquette (1665);
in the Vilain Mire, the king’s daughter can no longer speak because she has swallowed a fishbone;
other antecedents are Italian stories and El Acero de Madrid (Lope de Vega) and Tirso de Molina‘s La Fingida Arcadia;
Voltaire called it “très gaie et très bouffonne;”
much is borrowed or belongs to an oral tradition;
Henry Fielding‘s Mock Doctor is a translation and adaptation of Le Médecin malgré lui.
French composer Charles Gounod wrote an opera based on Le Médecin malgré lui.

Le Médecin malgré lui, François Boucher

ACT ONE

Martine beaten
neighbour intervenes
Martine’s revenge

Molière’s Médecin malgré lui (The Doctor in spite of himself) differs from Le Médecin volant (The Flying Doctor) and L’Amour médecin. Yes, mere clothes will transform Martine’s abusive husband into a doctor and will turn Léandre, our young lover, into an apothicary. But we have left the houses of well-to-do bourgeois to enter the dilapidated home Sganarelle shares with Martine and their children. He drinks away the money he earns as a woodcutter, while his wife takes care of four children.

J’ai quatre pauvres petits enfants sur les bras.
Martine à Sganarelle (I. I, p. 2)
[I have four little children on my hands.]
Martine to Sganarelle (I. 1, p. 4)

So he tells her to put them down:

Met-les à terre.
Martine à Sganarelle (I. I, p. 2)
[Try putting them down.]
Sganarelle à Martine (I. 1, p. 4)

A neighbour, who has heard screams, tries to rescue Martine, but she and Sganarelle push him away, which may indicate fear on the part of Martine:

Mêlez-vous de vos affaires.
Martine à Monsieur Robert (I. ii, p. 4)
[Mind your own business.]
Martine à Monsieur Robert (I. 2, p. 4)

Yet, Martine resents being married to Sganarelle and says so in I. iii, p. 5: I. 3, p. 9. Cocuage, cuckolding is used in mis-marriages. But Martine has a harsher revenge in mind and is mulling the question.

At this point, she bumps into Valère and Lucas who are employees of Géronte, an older man, as the word suggests, and a well-to-do bourgeois. They are looking for a doctor who would cure Lucinde, Géronte’s daughter. She know longer speaks. Martine claims her husband is the man they need, but that he will resist and may have to be beaten.

La folie de celui-ci est plus grande qu’on ne peut croire: car elle va, parfois, jusqu’à vouloir être battu, pour demeurer d’accord de sa capacité: et je vous donne avis que vous n’en viendrez pas à bout, qu’il n’avouera jamais, qu’il est médecin, s’il se le met en fantaisie, que vous ne preniez, chacun, un bâton, et ne le réduisiez à force de coups, à vous confesser à la fin, ce qu’il vous cachera d’abord. C’est ainsi que nous en usons, quand nous avons besoin de lui.
Martine à Valère et Lucas (I. iv, p. 7)
[This one’s even crazier than you might think, because he will even let himself be beaten while denying who he is, and I advise you not to ask him point blank, because he will never admit he is a doctor, so great is his eccentricity, unless you take a stick and reduce him by repeated blows to admit to you at last what he denied before. That’s how we go about it when we need his services.]
Martine to Valère and Lucas (I. 4, p. 11)

So beating Sganarelle is what Valère and Lucas must do to convince him that he is a doctor.

V. Puisque vous le voulez, il faut s’y résoudre. Ils prennent un bâton, et le frappent.
Sg. Ah! ah! ah! Messieurs, je suis tout ce qu’il vous plaira.
Valère à Sganarelle (I. v. p. 11)
[V. Since you insist on having it this way, then, we must convince you.
(They each take a stick and beat him.)]
Valère to Sganarelle (I. 5, pp. 17-18)

Valère and Lucas threaten more blows, so Sganarelle ends up accepting to be a doctor.

Le Médecin malgré lui, Edmond Hédouin

ACT TWO

Jacqueline to Géronte (marriage)
Sganarelle hits Géronte
meets Lucinde
flirts with the mild-maid
the young lovers
Léandre as apothecary
Sganarelle will help him

Sganarelle is about to be introduced to Géronte, but Jacqueline protests. All Lucinde needs is:

… un biau et bon mari, pour qui elle eût de l’amiquié
Jacqueline à Géronte (II. i, p. 13)
[a fine, handsome husband, one that she even likes.]
Jacqueline to Géronte (II. 1, p. 22)

Géronte insists that Léandre is not what Lucinde needs. Léandre has no money.

Ja. Que ne preniais-vous ce Monsieu Liandre, qui li touchait au cœur? Alle aurait été fort obéissante: et je m’en vas gager qu’il la prendrait li, comme alle est, si vous la li vouillais donner.
Gé. Ce Léandre n’est pas ce qu’il lui faut: il n’a pas du bien comme l’autre.
Jacqueline à Géronte (II. i, pp. 13-14)

[Ja. Why could you not contract with Mister Leandre, who touches her heart? She would have been very obedient; and I’d bet that he’d take her – even as is – if you arranged to give her to him.
Gé. This Leandre does not have what it takes. He lacks the means of the other.]
Jacqueline to Géronte (II. 1, p. 22)

When Sganarelle meets Géronte, he hits him with a bat (un bâton), which turns him into a doctor. They make up. He notices Jacqueline, the wet-nurse, and would like to be the baby she is looking after. Lucas, Jacqueline’s husband, objects:

Avec moi, tant qu’il vous plaira: mais avec ma femme, trêve de sarimonie.
Lucas à Sganarelle (II. ii, p.16)
[With me, share as much as you like. But with my wife, drop the ceremony.]
Lucas to Sganarelle (II. 2, p. 27)

Sganarelle meets Lucinde and says:

Voilà une malade qui n’est pas tant dégoûtante: et je tiens qu’un homme
bien sain s’en accommoderait assez.
Sganarelle à tous (II. iv, p. 17)
[This patient’s not too terribly repulsive, and I think a good healthy man might well improve her condition.]
Sganarelle to all (II. 4, p. 28)

Sganarelle speaks Latin, states that the liver is on the left side and the heart, on the right side. He uses a Hebrew word. Everyone is impressed. But Géronte tells him that one thing shocks him. The heart is on the left side and the liver on the right side. Sganarelle explains that doctors are using a new method.

He then suggests that Lucinde be served bread dipped in wine. However, he would like to examine Jacqueline who says she is just fine. He suggests a little blood-letting and a clyster, an enema. People who look very healthy may be sick. Géronte gives him money which he refuses as he takes it.

Léandre walks in to ask for Sganarelle’s assistance. Sganarelle is as uncouth as ever, but having learned that Lucinde is feigning illness to avoid marrying a man she does not love, Sganarelle accepts to assist in bringing the lovers together.

ACT THREE

clothes make the man (doctor, apothicary)
Sganarelle will be a doctor
Lucinde speaks
Léandre takes Lucinde away
Sganarelle to be hanged
Martine returns
Lovers return, Léandre’s inheritance
Géronte will allow the lovers to marry

Léandre is dressed as an apothecary. He hopes he will not be recognized and would appreciate knowing a few medical terms.

Il me semble que je ne suis pas mal ainsi, pour un apothicaire: et comme le
père ne m’a guère vu, ce changement d’habit, et de perruque, est assez capable, je crois, de me déguiser à ses yeux.
Léandre à Sganarelle (III. i, p. 23)
[It seems to me that I wouldn’t make a bad apothecary; and as her father has barely ever seen me, these clothes and this wig should be enough, I think, to disguise me.]
Léandre to Sganarelle (III. 1, p. 37)

Sganarelle tells him that he was made into a doctor, putting the clothes on, and will remain a doctor because it pays. Léandre pays him and everyone believes he is “a gifted man.”

Je ne sais point sur quoi cette imagination leur est venue: mais quand j’ai vu qu’à toute force, ils voulaient que je fusse médecin, je me suis résolu de l’être, aux dépens de qui il appartiendra. Cependant, vous ne sauriez croire comment l’erreur s’est répandue: et de quelle façon, chacun est endiablé à me croire habile homme.
Sganarelle à Léandre (III. ii, p. 23)
[I don’t know how this idea came to them; but when I saw that they would stop at nothing to have me be a doctor, I resolved to become one, at no matter whose expense. You wouldn’t believe how the error spread, and in what way each person was bound and determined to believe that I was a gifted man.]
Sganarelle to Léandre (III. 2, p. 38)

Thibaut and his son Perrin visit Sganarelle. Thibaut says that Perrin’s mother suffers from “hypocrisie,” (hypocrisy). Sganarelle will not hear Perrin until he is given deux écus. He then diagnoses hydropisie (dropsy). It could be that Perrin’s mother suffers from dropsy. (III. ii, p. 23-24; III. 2, p.

Géronte cannot find his daugther, nor Jacqueline, her husband. (Sc. 4.) But Géronte finds Sganarelle. The remedy prescribed by Sganarelle has not worked. He then sees the apothecary, whom Sganarelle needs. (Sc. 5.)

Jacqueline notices that Lucinde is walking. Géronte believes this will do her good. Meanwhile Sganarelle pulls Géronte away and holds him preventing him from seeing what the apothecary and his daughter are doing.

Cela lui fera du bien. Allez-vous-en, Monsieur l’Apothicaire, tâter un peu son pouls, afin que je raisonne tantôt, avec vous, de sa maladie. (En cet endroit, il tire Géronte à un bout du théâtre, et lui passant un bras sur les épaules, lui rabat la main sous le menton, avec laquelle il le fait retourner vers lui, lorsqu’il veut regarder ce que sa fille et l’apothicaire font ensemble, lui tenant, cependant, le discours suivant pour l’amuser.)
Sganarelle à l’apothicaire (III. vi, p. 27)
[That will do her good. (To Leandre.) Go on then, Mister Apothecary, take her pulse, so that I can confer with you about her illness. (At this point, he pulls Géronte to one end of the stage, and putting an arm on his shoulders, he puts his free hand under his chin, which he directs towards himself, as Géronte would rather gain a glimpse of what his daughter and the apothecary are doing. In so doing, Sganarelle delivers the following distracting discourse.)]
Sganarelle to the apothecary (III. 6, p. 43)

Sganarelle has just liberated Lucinde. Her lover is leading her out of the house.

Géronte says he will make sure his daughter does not see Léandre and Sganarelle agrees. But Lucinde reappears and tells her father:

Non, je ne suis point du tout capable de changer de sentiment.
Lucinde à Géronte (III. vi, p. 27)
[No, I am not at all capable of changing my feelings.]
Lucinde to Géronte (III. 6, p. 44)

Géronte’s first reaction is one of joy. His daughter can speak.

Voilà ma fille qui parle. Ô grande vertu du remède! Ô admirable médecin! Que je vous suis obligé, Monsieur, de cette guérison merveilleuse: et que puis-je faire pour vous après un tel service?
Géronte à Sganarelle (III. vi, p. 27)
[Look! My daughter’s talking! O great glorious remedy! O admirable doctor! How can I ever thank you for this amazing cure! And what could I ever do for you after such a service!]
Géronte to Sganarelle (III. 6, p. 44)

But now that she can speak, Lucinde speaks her mind. She will marry Léandre, not Horace.

Oui, mon père, j’ai recouvré la parole: mais je l’ai recouvrée pour vous dire, que je n’aurai jamais d’autre époux que Léandre, et que c’est inutilement que vous voulez me donner Horace.
Lucinde à Géronte (III. vi, p. 27)
[Yes, father, I’ve recovered my speech; but I have recovered it in order to tell you that I will have no other husband than Leandre, and that it is useless for you to force Horace on me.]
Lucinde to Géronte (III. 6, p. 44)
Et je me jetterai plutôt dans un couvent que d’épouser un homme que je n’aime point.
Lucinde à Géronte (III. vi, p. 28)
[And I would rather throw myself into a nunnery than marry a man I do not love at all.]
Lucinde to Géronte (III. 6, p. 45)
J’épouserai plutôt la mort.
Lucinde to Géronte (III. vi, p. 28)
[I would rather marry death.]
Lucinde to Géronte (III. 6, p. 45)[2]

Sganarelle calls the apothecary and suggests “a purgative flight” and matrimonium (marriage).

Pour moi, je n’y en vois qu’un seul [remède], qui est une prise de fuite purgative, que vous mêlerez comme il faut, avec deux drachmes de matrimonium en pilules.
Sganarelle à l’apothicaire (III. vi, p. 29)
For myself, I only see one way to do it, which is the taking of a purgative flight, that you will mix as you must with two grams of matrimonium and administer in pills.
Sganarelle to the apothecary (III. 6, p. 46)

Lucas reports that Lucinde has gone away with the apothecary. Sganarelle will be hanged.

Comment, m’assassiner de la façon. Allons, un commissaire, et qu’on
empêche qu’il ne sorte. Ah traître, je vous ferai punir par la justice.
Géronte à Lucas et Sganarelle (III. viii, p. 30)
Ah par ma fi, Monsieu le Médecin, vous serez pendu, ne bougez de là seulement.
Lucas à Sganarelle (III. viii, p. 30)
[What! Kill me in this way! Immediately, get me a Commissioner! And bar him from leaving! Traitor! I will have you punished by the letter of the law.]
Géronte to Sganarelle (III. 8, p. 48)
[Yes! Sir Doctor, you will hang. Don’t budge from the spot.]
Lucas to Sganarelle (III. 8, p. 48)

Le Médecin malgré lui, Grandville

Conclusion

deus ex machina (the inheritance)
kairos (at the opportune moment)

Martine, Sganarelle’s wife, has been looking for her husband and hears that he will be hanged. But Lucinde and Léandre return and Léandre asks for Lucinde’s hand saying that he has just come into a substantial inheritance. Hearing that Léandre has money convinces Géronte. His daughter may marry Léandre. All’s well that ends well.

Molière has used a deus ex machina and kairos so Sganarelle is not hanged. The young couple learns about Léandre’s inheritance and come to tell Géronte at exactly the right or opportune moment. Sganarelle is about to be hanged. Kairos is a device found in fairy tales, mainly. In ancient Greece, time had two dimensions: chronos and kairos. Moreover, it so happens that Martine, Sganarelle’s wife is looking for her husband. The Sganarelle Martine finds is not altogether the same as the husband who was tricked into blows. In fact, he has facilitated the young lovers’ marriage. He prescribed a quick flight and marriage, when Léandre was still an apothicary or disguised. Sganarelle is younger than Géronte, but Géronte is raising a baby. So, there also been a doubling of the father figure.

The conversation among doctors in L’Amour médecin is exemplary, but what Sganarelle has learned and told Léandre is also a good description of doctors. Doctors lack the means to cure most illnesses, but know that when a person is sick, he or she will seek the help of a doctor. Doctors get rich preying on the fear of death. They are parasites and impostors, or, simply put, hypocrites. They can only make believe they can help the sick.

My colleague Ralph Albanese Jr has written about the dynamism of fear in Molière. Lucinde would rather be dead than married to Horace. Sganarelle beats his wife; he is beaten by Valère and Lucas and he hits Géronte. Géronte fears Lucinde will not recover. This is genuine fear.

In short, Le Médecin malgré lui is a comedy, but it is farcical in that it includes physical humour: blows. But at the end of the play, the sticks have disappeared and Martine will be the wife of a respected doctor. The clothes fit and they make the man. They bring him patients and money. Most importantly, Léandre and Lucinde will marry, as comedy dictates.

RELATED ARTICLES

Molière page

Sources and Resources

all images are from théâtre.documentation.com
Le Médecin malgré lui is a toutmoliere.net publication
The Doctor in spite of himself is a translation by Brett B. Bodemer, 2011
Le Vilain Mire is a Wikisource publication

____________________
[1] Maurice Rat, ed., Œuvres complètes de Molière (Paris: Éditions Gallimard, coll. La Pléiade, 1956), p. 945.
[2] Cf. Rabelais, Tiers Livre, chap. XXXIV, où la femme qui a retrouvé l’usage de sa langue parle tant et tant « que le mari retourna au médicin pour remède de la faire taire. Le médicin répondit […] remède unique estre surdité du mary contre cesty interminable parlement de femme. » (toutmoliere.net)
“where a husband returns to the doctor for a remedy that will shut up his wife. The doctor responds […] that the only remedy is deafness on the part of the husband against this endless chatting of women.”

Love to everyone 💕

Charles Gounod – LE MÉDECIN MALGRÉ LUI – Sextet: “Eh bien! charmante demoiselle”
Han, hi, hon, han, han, hi, hon is Lucinde’s language.

le médecin malgré lui par Horace Vernet (1)

Lucas, Horace Vernet

Dom Juan, “grand seigneur méchant homme”

04 Monday Mar 2019

Posted by michelinewalker in Comedy, Molière

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Alexander Pushkin, Dargomyzhsky, Defiance, deus ex machina, Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, The Stone Guest

Don Giovanni by Angela Buscemi
www.teatrodimessina.it (Photo credit: Google Images)

In an earlier post on Molière‘s Dom Juan, which was first performed on 15 February 1665, I mentioned sources: Tirso de Molina‘s Trickster of Seville, the Stone Guest (1630) and the dramma giocoso. I also wrote that he was a descendant of Bergamo’s Brighella. Finally, I mentioned that Mozart had written an opera on our legendary figure: Don Giovanni (K. 527) and catalogued it as an opera buffa, a dramma giocoso. Mozart’s Don Giovanni is the most famous Don Juan. Mozart’s librettist was Lorenzo da Ponte.

In fact, I will now link Don Juan to Russian literature and music. In 1830, Russian poet Alexander Pushkin (1799-1837) wrote The Stone Guest. Pushkin’s The Stone Guest was adapted as an opera by Alexander Dargomyzhsky (14 February 1813 – February 1869) as The Stone Guest, which was left incomplete. Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov finished the opera which premièred in 1879. It was Alexander Dargomyzhsky‘s last opera. Rimsky-Korsakov adapted The Stone Guest a second time. The revised Stone Guest was first performed in 1907.[1]

Dom Juan features a duel. Ironically, Pushkin was killed in a duel. He was fatally wounded and died of peritonitis two days later, on 29 January 1837.

Duel_of_Pushkin_and_d'Anthes_(19th_century)

Duel of Alexander Pushkin and Georges d’Anthès (Alexander Pushkin, Wiki2.org)

Un Grand Seigneur méchant homme

The full title of Mozart’s Don Giovanni is The Rake punished or Don Giovanni. The complete title of Molière’s Dom Juan is Dom Juan ou Le Festin de pierre. The rake is an aristocrat and Sganarelle describes his master as a “grand seigneur méchant homme” (I. i , p. 4), a “great lord become an evil man.” (I. 1, p. 3). (Sganarelle to Gusman). If one cannot be a misanthrope and love Célimène, a mondaine, can one be a Great Lord and an evil man? Molière’s Alceste (The Misanthrope) and his Dom Juan are incongruous characters.

Here is our dramatis personæ

DON JUAN, son of Don Louis
SGANARELLE, valet of Don Juan
DONNA ELVIRA, wife of Don Juan
GUSMAN, horseman to Elvira
DON CARLOS, brother of Elvira
DON ALONSE, brother of Elvira
DON LOUIS, father of Don Juan
BEGGAR
CHARLOTTE, peasant-girl
MATHURINE, peasant-girl
PIERROT, peasant
THE STATUE OF THE COMMANDER
LA VIOLETTE, a lackey (laquais) of Don Juan
RAGOTIN, a lackey of Don Juan
M. DIMANCHE, merchant
LA RAMÉE, swordsman (spadassin)

ENTOURAGE OF DON JUAN ENTOURAGE OF DON CARLOS AND DON ALONSE
A GHOST

The Plot

The plot of Dom Juan differs from the classic “blondin berne le barbon” (the young man fools the old man). There are no young lovers opposing a senex iratus. But Dom Juan is a miles gloriosus. (See Alazṓn,Wiki2.org.) He meets two peasant-girls, Mathurine and Charlotte. He fancies Mathurine, but as soon as he sees Charlotte, he has a change of heart. Dom Juan’s fickleness leads to a quiproquo (a misundertanding) that provides comic relief, but he has fooled the girls and he has abandoned a wife, Done Elvire. His behaviour is not mere fickleness, it is defiance. Done Elvire’s brothers, Dom Carlos and Dom Alonze are roaming the land looking for Dom Juan and intending vengeance. Moreover, Dom Juan has killed the Commandeur and returned from exile, infringing a code of laws.

It should be noted that Sganarelle describes Dom Juan as a pèlerin, a pilgrim, which suggests that the Grand Seigneur may be moving from place to place. The play has a picaresque flavour. The picaresque is usually associated with novels that feature rogues rather than aristocrats, and Grands Seigneurs at that.

Yet, the play consists of a series of scenes where Dom Juan encounters persons who warn him that his defiance will not go unpunished. These somewhat loosely connected scenes depict an inferior Dom Juan, courting peasant-girls, etc. who ends up feigning devotion to give himself impunity. This may seem a lame plot.

However, comedy has many formulas, one of which is the farcical trompeur trompé, the deceiver deceived. If the society of the play cannot get the better of a bombastic Dom Juan, God can and does. It may be used sparingly as a theatrical device, but Dom Juan’s dénouement is a deus ex machina, a heavenly salvation.

—ooo—

ACT ONE

After the initial exchange between Gusman and Sganarelle, Sganarelle confirms Dom Juan’s suspicion that Sganarelle was speaking with Gusman, horseman to Done Elvire. The third scene of act one, is a conversation with Done Elvire and Dom Juan. Done Elvire does not convince Dom Juan that he has obligations. Marriage is a sacrament and Done Elvire is in love. Would that Dom Juan were lying:

Que ne me jurez-vous que vous êtes toujours dans les mêmes sentiments pour moi, que vous m’aimez toujours avec une ardeur sans égale, et que rien n’est capable de vous détacher de moi que la mort!
Done Elvire à Dom Juan (I. iii, p. 12)
[Why not say to me that affairs of ultimate consequence have obliged you to leave without your telling me; that you must, against your wishes, stay here for some small indefinite time, and that I have only to return from whence I came, in the assurance that you will follow my steps as soon as possible; that you burn to rejoin me, and that separated from me, you suffer what a body suffers when severed from its soul? This is how you should defend yourself, and not stutter and stammer as you do now.]
Done Elvire to Dom Juan (I. 3, p. 10)

His response is that he took her from a convent and that marrying her was sinful. His marriage was a transgression. He offended God Himself .

Madame, et j’ai ouvert les yeux de l’âme sur ce que je faisais. J’ai fait réflexion que pour vous épouser, je vous ai dérobée à la clôture d’un couvent, que vous avez rompu des vœux, qui vous engageaient autre part, et que le Ciel est fort jaloux de ces sortes de choses.
Dom Juan à Done Elvire (1. iii, p. 13)
[Some scruples, Madame, came to me, and opened the eyes of my soul to what I had done. I reflected that, in order to marry you, I had violated the sacred enclosure of a convent, and that you, to marry me, had broken the vows engaging you elsewhere.]
Dom Juan to Done Elvire (I. 3, p. 11)

ACT TWO

The first scenes of Act II are his encounters with Charlotte and Mathurine and a would-be husband to Charlotte, Pierrot. Pierrot has just saved Dom Juan who nearly drowned. Scene 4 is a lovely quiproquo. Both peasant-girls claim that Dom Juan will marry her, so Dom Juan walks back and forth, whispering lies to each peasant-girl.

At the end of act two, La Ramée warns Dom Juan that twelve men are looking for him. This is how he parts with the peasant girls. But he asks Sganarelle to wear his clothes:

Douze hommes à cheval vous cherchent, qui doivent arriver ici dans un moment,
je ne sais pas par quel moyen ils peuvent vous avoir suivi, mais j’ai appris cette nouvelle d’un paysan qu’ils ont interrogé, et auquel ils vous ont dépeint.
La Ramée à Dom Juan (II. v, p. 31)
[Twelve men on horseback are looking for you and might arrive here at any moment. I don’t know how they have followed you; but I learned of it from a peasant they had questioned. Time presses, and the sooner you leave the better.]
La Ramée to Dom Juan (II. 5, p. 28)

Dom Juan à Charlotte, Mathurine et Sganarelle (II.v, p. 31-32) FR

Une affaire pressante m’oblige de partir d’ici, mais je vous prie de vous ressouvenir de la parole que je vous ai donnée, et de croire que vous aurez de mes nouvelles avant qu’il soit demain au soir. Comme la partie n’est pas égale, il faut user de stratagème, et éluder adroitement le malheur qui me cherche, je veux que Sganarelle se revête de mes habits, et moi…
Dom Juan à Charlotte, Mathurine et Sganarelle (II. iv, p. 32)
[An urgent affair obliges me to leave; but I beg you to remember the word that I have given you, and to believe that you will hear from me before tomorrow night. As the party is not equal, I must resort to a stratagem, and deftly elude the misfortune that seeks me. Sganarelle, you shall put on my clothes [a mask], and for myself … ]
Dom Juan to Charlotte, Mathurine and Sganarelle (II. 5, p. 28)

ACT THREE

In Act III, Dom Juan meets a beggar who does not want money from him, but he is given money “out of love for humanity,” because he sees one man attacked by three. He doesn’t know the man is one of Done Elvire’s brothers.

Va, va, je te le donne pour l’amour de l’humanité, mais que vois-je là? Un homme attaqué par trois autres? La partie est trop inégale, et je ne dois pas souffrir cette lâcheté.
Dom Juan au Pauvre (III. ii, p. 39)
[Take it anyway, then. I give it to you out of love for humanity. But what do I see over there? One man attacked by three? The match is too lopsided, and I cannot allow such baseness.]
Dom Juan to the Beggar (III. 2, p. 34)

This episode buys him time. They want revenge, but aristocratic rules prevail.

Je sais la différence, mon frère, qu’un gentilhomme doit mettre entre l’un et l’autre, et la reconnaissance de l’obligation n’efface point en moi le ressentiment de l’injure : mais souffrez que je lui rende ici ce qu’il m’a prêté, que je m’acquitte sur-le-champ de la vie que je lui dois par un délai de notre vengeance, et lui laisse la liberté de jouir durant quelques jours du fruit de son bienfait.
Dom Carlos à son frère (III. iv, p. 43)
[I know the distinction, my brother, that a gentleman always makes between the one and the other, and my recognition of the obligation does not annul in me all the resentment of the injury; but allow me to render to him here what he has loaned to me, that I acquit myself of the life that I owe him, by offering a delay in our vengeance, and leaving him the liberty to enjoy, for several hours, some fruit from his fine deed.]
Dom Carlos to his brothers (III. 4, p. 37)

In scene four, Dom Juan asks Sganarelle to speak to the statue of the Commander. The statue lowers its head.

ACT FOUR

In Act IV, Scene three, Dom Juan speaks with Monsieur Dimanche. He owes him money. Dom Juan is a superb host, but he does not pay his debt.

In Scene four, Dom Juan’s father visits his son. Dom Juan is again very polite.

Apprenez enfin qu’un gentilhomme qui vit mal, est un monstre dans la nature, que la vertu est le premier titre de noblesse, que je regarde bien moins au nom qu’on signe, qu’aux actions qu’on fait, et que je ferais plus d’état du fils d’un crocheteur, qui serait honnête homme, que du fils d’un monarque qui vivrait comme vous.
Dom Louis à Dom Juan (IV. iv, pp. 55-56)
“Learn that a gentleman who lives in evil habits is a monster of nature, that virtue is the first title of nobility, and that I consider far less the name that one signs than the actions one has done, and that I would prefer to be the son of a weaver who was an honorable man, than the son of a monarch who lives as you do.”
Dom Louis to Dom Juan (IV. 4, p. 49)

After Dom Louis has spoken, Dom Juan offers him a seat. Dom Juan has not heard Dom Louis. When Dom Louis leaves and is barely out of hearing distance, Dom Juan tells him to die as soon as possible. (IV iv, p. 56) (IV.iv, p. 50.) In Scene six, Dom Juan speaks with Don Elvire very politely once again. Once again, he sees, but he does not hear. When she has left, Dom Juan tells Sganarelle that he was moved:

Sais-tu bien que j’ai encore senti quelque peu d’émotion pour elle …
Dom Juan à Sganarelle (IV. vii, p. 59)
[You know I think I felt a little glimmer of emotion for her, and even found something rather pleasurable in this new extravagance. Her careless clothes, languishing air and tears seemed to reawaken in me a few embers of a doused fire.]
Dom Juan to Sganarelle (IV. 7, p. 52)

In the last scene of Act IV (Scene eight), the Statue has arrived for dinner.

ACT FIVE

By Act V, Dom Juan is a faux-dévot. His father is extremely pleased, but Sganarelle knows the truth. Dom Carlos comes to avenge his sister. Dom Juan/Tartuffe repeats that the real transgression was to remove Done Elvire from a convent. (V.iii). In Scene five, a ghost arrives. Dom Juan will not repent:

“No, no, it will never be said, whatever happens, that I repented. Now, follow me.”
Dom Juan to the ghost (V.v, p. 61)
« Non, non, il ne sera pas dit, quoi qu’il arrive, que je sois capable de me repentir, allons, suis-moi. »
Dom Juan au spectre (V.v, p. 69)

In the last scene (V.vi: V.vi), the statue takes Dom Juan’s hand. Thunder strikes, Dom Juan feels the fire and falls into an abyss.

Sganarelle is precious. After so many years of service, he has lost his living. So he says: « Mes gages ! mes gages! » (V.vi)

« Ah! mes gages! mes gages! Voilà par sa mort un chacun satifait : Ciel offensé, lois violées, filles séduites, familles déshonorées, parents outragés, femmes mises à mal, maries poussés à bout ; tout le monde est content : il n’y a que moi seul de malheureux! Mes gages! mes gages! mes gages! » (1683). (footnote 137)
Sganarelle (V.vi)

Thunder resounds and great lightning-bolts surround Don Juan; the earth opens and takes him; and he exits in the great flames burning where he has fallen.

“Ah! My pay! My pay! Look at that, everyone satisfied with his death! Offended Heaven, violated laws, seduced daughters, dishonored families, outraged relatives, mistreated women, husbands pushed to the limit, everyone is content: no one is miserable but me, who, after so many years of service, have no other gratification than to see with my own eyes the impiety of my master chastised by the most horrible punishment in the world. My pay! My pay! My pay!”
Sganarelle (V.6, p. 62)

Conclusion

Dom Juan is probably the most enigmatic of Molière’s comedies. We do not see the traditional young lovers, engaged in a struggle (the agon). Dom Juan is a miles gloriosus or alazṓn, but he is not a convincing blocking character. As for the eirôn, it may be collective figure. We see a defiant and handsome aristocrat who flaunts every rule and believes he can get away with every transgression. His defiance has a metaphysical dimension. He thinks that he and God can sort everything out between themselves. From the beginning of the play, he trivializes God.

« Va, va, c’est une affaire entre le Ciel et moi, et nous la démêlerons bien ensemble, sans que tu t’en mettes en peine. »
Dom Juan à Sganarelle (I.ii, p. 7)

“That’s enough. It’s an issue between Heaven and me, and we get along just fine without you bothering yourself about it.” (I.ii, p. 7)

However, the statue leads him to a fiery abyss.

Dom Juan is un homme méchant, not a Grand Seigneur. But, as noted above, heaven strikes.

RELATED ARTICLES

Molière’ Dom Juan (25 February 2016)
Bergamo: Arlecchino & Brighella (23 July 2014)
The Figaro Trilogy (14 July 2014)
Picasso in Paris (9 July 2014)
Picasso’s Harlequin (3 July 2014)
Arlecchino, Arlequin, Harlequin (30 June 2014)
Pantalone: la Commedia dell’arte (20 June 2014)

Sources and Resources

Dom Juan is a toutmolière.net publication FR
Dom Juan is a digitalcommons calpoly.edu/ publication EN
The translator, French to English, is Brett B. Bodemer (2010)

____________________
[1] Rimsky-Korsakov’s Mozart and Salieri, Harlow Robinson, The New York Times, 16 August 1981. Alexan der Pushkin wrote a Mozart and Salieri. The common denominators are Pushkin and Mozart, not Don Juan.

Love to everyone 💕

Portrait of Francisco D’Andrade as Don Juan by Max Slevogt, 1912 (Wiki2.org.)

Molière’s Tartuffe & Northrop Frye

21 Monday Jul 2014

Posted by michelinewalker in Art, Canada, Comedy, Literature

≈ 8 Comments

Tags

Anatomy of Criticism, archetypes, comedy, conceptual framework, deus ex machina, Northrop Frye, pharmakos, streching archetypes

: Elmire, Tartuffe, by Tammy Grimes, 1977; costume by Zack Brown

This post is based on an article originally posted on 7 January 2012. In its earlier version, it had to do with Canadian literary critic Northrop Frye’s Anatomy of Criticism.[i] However, I used Molière‘s Le Tartuffe as an example. This time, the emphasis is on Molière’s Tartuffe.

Northrop Frye: a Conceptual Framework

Anatomy of Criticism: Four Essays was published by Northrop Frye in 1957. In his Polemical Introduction, Frye emphasizes the importance of approaching literature with “a conceptual framework,”[ii] so one can uncover a literary work’s organizing principles. In this regard, Frye refers to Aristotle’s Poetics (c. 335 BCE). However, he also reveals archetypes shared by comedy from the plays of Greek dramatists Aristophanes (c. 446 BCE – c.386 BCE) and Menander c. 341/92 BCE – c. 290 BCE) to Beaumarchais. (See list Greek dramatists in Ancient Greek Comedy, Wikipedia.)

Comedy: the characters as “archetypes”

Frye describes comedy as we know it. It is a genre where a young couple, or young couples, have to overcome obstacles, in order to marry. They are usually opposed by a pater familias, descendent of the heavy father of Roman New Comedy[iii] (Plautus [c. 254 –184 BCE] and Terence [195/185 –159 BCE]), to the more buffoon-like stock characters of the commedia dell’arte. Usually the young lovers (Mariane and Valère) are helped by servants, suivant-e-s, valets, confident-e-s,[iv] friends, siblings, a mother (Elmire) or, at times, an avuncular (good uncle) figure such as Le Tartuffe‘s Cléante. (Le Tartuffe or Tartuffe is the title of the play and Tartuffe, the name of the impostor who goes to prison at the end of the play). In Le Tartuffe, we have a complete cast.

The Plot: all’s well that ends well

Comedy has its archetypal figures and it is an “all’s-well-that-ends-well” narrative, but theories can be reductive. No two trees are alike. Therefore, although we require “a conceptual framework,” the goal is not merely to state that an author is using or not using a customary narrative and archetypal figures. In the case of Le Tartuffe, the impostor feigns devotion, yet covets Orgon’s wife and is also in possession of seriously incriminating information. In such circumstances, dramatists may use a deus ex machina to bring about the traditional happy ending of comedy. Therefore, Le Tartuffe is both the same as other comedies and unique.

Molière’s Le Tartuffe: the hypocrite

A play-within-a-play: the discovery

For instance, in Molière’s Le Tartuffe, Tartuffe who feigns piety, has so bewitched a vulnerable Orgon, the heavy father, that members of his family have to put on a little play-within-the-play to show Orgon, the comedy’s father, that Tartuffe is a hypocrite and that, far from turning his back on the pleasures of the flesh, he is “gros et gras” (“big and fat;” Act I, sc. iv) and wants to seduce Orgon’s wife, and nearly succeeds.

Hidden under a table, Orgon, the pater familias is made to see Tartuffe trying to seduce his wife and realizes, too late, that he has been fooled. Orgon’s daughter will not have to marry Tartuffe, but Orgon cannot get rid of the impostor, because Tartuffe is privy to knowledge that could cause Orgon to be thrown in jail.

Tartuffe dans la pièce du même nom de Molière. Gouache (XVIIIe siècle) de Fesch et Whirsker. Archives Larbor

Tartuffe dans la pièce du même nom de Molière. Gouache (XVIIIe siècle) de Fesch et Whirsker. (Photo credit: Larousse)

(Please click on the images in order to enlarge them.)

Monsieur Loyal, by Edmond Geffroy

**The Deus ex machina or divine intervention**

At the beginning of Act V, sc. iv, a huissier (a bailiff), Monsieur Loyal, depicted above, comes to notify Orgon that Tartuffe now owns Orgon’s house. Fortunately, given the conventions of comedy, the family will be saved. An exempt, or deus ex machina, arrives just in time, an instance of kairos* (the right timing) and an element of fairy tales, to tell the family that Tartuffe is a villain who will be thrown in jail. Orgon is saved by an insightful “Prince.”

*For the Greeks of Antiquity, time was kairos (the moment; vertical),

chronos (the duration; horizontal),

and aeon (eternity).

Therefore, Tartuffe is a play where characters favouring the traditional marriage of comedy have very little power. It is therefore a problematical play because it stretches the “all’s-well-that-ends-well” to its limits. Molière wrote several problematical plays. In the “Figaro trilogy,” Figaro can oust Bégearss, but Tartuffe owns Orgon’s House. There is no salvation from within the comedy itself, yet comedies have a happy ending. The young couple, Orgon’s daughter Mariane and Valère, must be free to marry.

The Pharmakos

Northrop Frye writes that “[t]he pharmakos is neither innocent nor guilty.”[v] Pharmakos is the Greek word for “scapegoat.” In Ancient Greece, the pharmakos was often sacrificed. In Molière’s Le Tartuffe, the pharmakos is not sacrificed, but he is vilified, although he is not entirely to blame. In Le Tartuffe, the villain has been empowered by Orgon, the father in the comedy. Orgon has let himself be blinded by his own needs. Therefore, the removal of the pharmakos is somewhat ritualistic. Tartuffe is a scapegoat.

In fact, there is nothing pious about Tartuffe, except in Orgon’s eyes and in the eyes of Orgon’s mother, Madame Pernelle. If everyone else sees Tartuffe as he is, Orgon is in dire need of Tartuffe. Tartuffe can lift (lever) sins away. What he says to Elmire, who does not want to sin by making love with Tartuffe, is evidence of seventeenth-century Jesuit casuistry (see Casuistry, or how to sin without sinning).

Si ce n’est que le Ciel qu’à mes vœux l’on oppose,

Lever un tel obstacle est à moi peu de chose,

Et cela ne doit pas retenir votre cœur.

If it’s only God that opposes my desire,
I’ll think up a way to make him conspire,
And that need not restrain your heart, my dear

(Act IV, sc. v)

Casuistry

Since he can make arrangements with God, Tartuffe allows Orgon to be tyrannical with impunity. Orgon’s family convinces the pater familias to hide under the table so he can hear and see his “frère,” as he calls Tartuffe, attempt to seduce his wife Elmire. So Orgon crouches under the table shielded by the tablecloth, a makeshift curtain, and, to his profound dismay, he learns the truth. He is so surprised that he has difficulty rescuing his poor wife.

Orgon has therefore learned the truth, but too late. Monsieur Loyal, beautifully depicted by Edmond Geffroy (20 July 1804 – 1895), an artist, actor, and member (sociétaire) of the Comédie-Française, is at the door ready to collect all of Orgon’s possessions Tartuffe has appropriated. Fortunately, a “Prince,” has seen the truth so Tartuffe, not Orgon, is arrested by l’Exempt. This allows members of Orgon’s family and servants (zanni) to be reunited at the end of the play.

Scene from Tartuffe, by
Jacobus Buys (Photo credit: Google images)

RELATED ARTICLES

Casuistry, or how to sin without sinning (5 March 2012)
Northrop Frye’s Anatomy of Criticism: an inspiration (7 January 2012)

Sources and Resources

Anatomy of Criticism, by Northrop Frye
Le Tartuffe is a Gutenberg Project publication [EBook #28488] EN
Tout Molière http://www.toutmoliere.net/IMG/pdf/tartuffe.pdf FR
Tammy Grimes as Elmire (1977), costume by Zack Brown
Jacobus Buys‘ print is available from Amazon.com

Northrop Frye

Northrop Frye, CC, FRSC (14 July 1912 – 23 January 1991) was born in Sherbrooke, Quebec. He was raised in New Brunswick, studied in Toronto (Victoria College, University of Toronto) and at Oxford (Merton College). He became a minister in the United Church, and then spent most of his life teaching at the University of Toronto (Victoria College), where he was an inspiration to his students as he has been to me.

He wrote his thesis on William Blake (28 November 1757 – 12 August 1827), one of English literature’s most fascinating figures. Entitled Fearful Symmetry, Frye’s thesis was published in 1947, but he has published numerous other studies, all of which are listed in Wikipedia’s entry on Northrop Frye.

[i] Northrop Frye, Anatomy of Criticism (Princeton, NJ: Princeton, 1973 [1957]).

[ii] See Commedia dell’arte, Wikipedia.

[iii] “commedia erudita.” Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. Encyclopædia Britannica Inc., 2014. Web. 21 Jul. 2014. <http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/top/127767/commedia-erudita>.

[iv] Frye, op. cit., p. 15.

[v] Frye, op. cit., p. 41.

Jean-Philippe Rameau – Pièces de clavecin en concert N° 5 (La Forqueray) / Il Giardino Armonico

Elmire & Tartuffe (Photo credit: Googles images)

7 January 2012

WordPress

revised 20 July 2014

Northrop Frye’s Anatomy of Criticism: an inspiration

07 Saturday Jan 2012

Posted by michelinewalker in Art, Canada, Comedy, Literature

≈ Comments Off on Northrop Frye’s Anatomy of Criticism: an inspiration

Tags

Anatomy of Criticism, archetype, comedy, deus ex machina, Les Arts Florissants, Molière, pharmakos, Tartuffe, William Blake, William Christie

The archetype of the Creator is a familiar image in Blake’s work. Here, the demiurgic figure Urizen prays before the world he has forged. The Song of Los is the third in a series of illuminated books painted by Blake and his wife, collectively known as the Continental Prophecies. (Caption and Photo credit: Wikipedia)

In the area of literary criticism, few books have inspired me as much as Canadian literary critic Northrop Frye’s Anatomy of Criticism.[i]

Northrop Frye

Anatomy of Criticism: Four Essays was published by Northrop Frye in 1957. In his Polemical Introduction, Frye notes the importance of approaching literature with “a conceptual framework,”[ii] so one can uncover a literary work’s organizing principles. In this regard, he refers to Aristotle’s Poetics.

“A Conceptual framework”

Of course! So I started examining how archetypes were used in the various works of Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, or Molière, France’s foremost comic dramatist.

Comedy: the characters as archetypes

Frye describes comedy as a genre where a young couple, or young couples, have to overcome obstacles, in order to marry. They are usually opposed by a pater familias, a descendent of the heavy father of Roman New Comedy (Plautus [c. 254–184 BCE] and Terence [195/185–159 BCE]) to the more buffoon-like stock characters of the commedia dell’arte. Usually the young lovers are helped by servants, suivant-e-s, valets, confident-e-s, friends, and, at times, a mother or an avuncular (good uncle) figure.

The Plot: all’s well that ends well

Comedy has its archetypal figures and it is an “all’s-well-that-ends-well” narrative, but theories can be reductive. We require “a conceptual framework,” but must also acquire a degree of eclecticism and develop personal theories. In the case of Molière, one has to analyze if and how he uses the “all’s-well-that-ends-well,” rather than simply state that he does or does not use customary narrative and archetypal characters.

Molière’s Tartuffe: the hypocrite

For instance, in Molière’s Tartuffe, Tartuffe who feigns piety, has so bewitched a vulnerable Orgon, the heavy father, that members of his family have to put on a little play-within-the-play to show Orgon that Tartuffe is a hypocrite and that, far from turning his back on the pleasures of the flesh, he in fact covets Orgon’s wife Elmire.

Hidden under a table, Orgon, the pater familias is made to see his “friend” trying to seduce his wife and realizes, too late, that he has been fooled. Orgon’s daughter will not have to marry Tartuffe, but Orgon cannot get rid of the impostor, because Tartuffe is privy to knowledge that could cause Orgon to be thrown in jail.

The Deus ex machina or divine intervention

Fortunately, an exempt or deus ex machina arrives just in time, an instance of kairos as in fairy tales, to tell the family that Tartuffe is a villain and save Orgon. So, here is a play, where characters opposing the traditional marriage of comedy have very little power. It is therefore a problematical play because it stretches the “all’s-well-that-ends-well” to its limits. Molière’s problematical plays are the ones I analyzed.

I am thankful to Northrop Frye because he gave me my starting-point: “The pharmakos is neither innocent nor guilty.”[iii] Pharmakos is the Greek word for scapegoat, the characters who are vilified but somewhat unjustly, which is, to a certain extent, Tartuffe’s case.

Other authors inspired me, (Sir James Frazer, Erich Auerbach, Paul Bénichou, etc.), but that precious seminal idea, I culled from Frye’s Anatomy of Criticism.

Urizen, William Blake (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Herman (“Norrie”) Northrop Frye, CC, FRSC (14 July 1912 – 23January 1991) was born in Sherbrooke, Quebec, my hometown. He was raised in New Brunswick, studied in Toronto (Victoria College, University of Toronto) and at Oxford (Merton College), became a minister in the United Church, and then spent most of his life teaching at the University of Toronto (Victoria College), where he was an inspiration to his students as he had been to me.

Frye is the author of The Anatomy of Criticism.[i]

He wrote his thesis on William Blake (28 November 1757 – 12 August 1827), one of English literature’s most fascinating figures. Entitled Fearful Symmetry, Frye’s thesis was published in 1947, but he has published numerous other studies, all of which are listed in Wikipedia’s entry on Northrop Frye.

Needless to say, literary critics often find their own personal path to analysing a work of literature. In my own humble writings, I have strayed from early mentors, but I would still recommend Anatomy of Criticism as compulsory reading to students of literature. Where Canadian literature is concerned, Frye’s Bush Garden, a short book, is an excellent way to enter the domain, particularly if one also reads Margaret Atwood‘s Survival, another short book.

Sources and Resources

Heilebrunn Timeline of Art History (Metropolitan Museum, NY)

[i] Northrop Frye, Anatomy of Criticism (Princeton, NJ: Princeton, 1973 [1957]).

[ii] Frye, op. cit., p. 15.

[iii] Frye, op. cit., p. 41.