Table Of ContentGEOFFREY BRERETON ON FRENCH
TRAGIC AND COMIC DRAMA
Volume 1
FRENCH TRAGIC
DRAMA IN
THE SIXTEENTH
AND SEVENTEENTH
CENTURIES
FRENCH TRAGIC
DRAMA IN
THE SIXTEENTH
AND SEVENTEENTH
CENTURIES
GEOFFREY BRERETON
First published in 1973 by Methuen & Co Ltd
This edition first published in 2022
by Routledge
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© 1973 Geoffrey Brereton
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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN: 978-1-032-24746-5 (Set)
ISBN: 978-1-032-25151-6 (Volume 1) (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-032-25155-4 (Volume 1) (pbk)
ISBN: 978-1-003-28182-5 (Volume 1) (ebk)
DOI: 10.4324/9781003281825
Publisher’s Note
The publisher has gone to great lengths to ensure the quality of this
reprint but points out that some imperfections in the original copies
may be apparent.
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The publisher has made every effort to trace copyright holders and
would welcome correspondence from those they have been unable
to trace.
French Tragic Drama
in the Sixteenth
and Seventeenth Centuries
GEOFFREY BRERETON
Methuen & Co Ltd
ii New Fetter Lane London EC4
First published in 1973
by Methuen & Co Ltd
ii New Fetter Lane, London EC4
© 1973 Geoffrey Brereton
Printed in Great Britain
by Richard Clay (The Chaucer Press) Ltd
Bungay, Suffolk
ISBN o 416 07630 o (hardback)
o 416 78920 X (paperback)
This tide is available in both hardback and
paperback editions. The paperback edition
is sold subject to the condition that it
shall not, by way of trade or otherwise,
be lent, resold, hired out or otherwise
circulated without the publisher's prior consent
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being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
Distributed in the USA by
HARPER & ROW PUBLISHERS, INC.
BARNES & NOBLE IMPORT DIVISION
CONTENTS
Foreword vii
Prologue 1
1 The Beginnings of French Tragedy 7
2 Robert Gamier 15
3 From Gamier to Hardy 38
4 Alexandre Hardy 58
5 Towards Classical Tragedy 100
6 Pierre Corneille: The First Period, 1629-1651 126
7 Corneille's Principal Contemporaries 166
8 Pierre Corneille: The Second Period, 1659-1674 193
9 Romanesque Tragedy: Thomas Corneille and
Quinault 220
10 Jean Racine 252
11 After Racine and Conclusion 282
Bibliography 294
Index 301
Tables
Tragedy, Tragicomedy and Pastoral, 1621-1648 101
Plays of P. Corneille and his main contemporaries,
1634-1654 167
Plays of the two Corneilles, Quinault and Racine,
1656-1678 221
FOREWORD
This book is designed as a single-volume survey of that important
period of French drama which runs from the first native tragedies of
the Renaissance to the culmination of 'classical* tragedy in the last
decades of Louis XIV's reign. The field is vast, and to cover it within
the limits that seem desirable if the book is to be of practical use and
interest to the student and the general reader the treatment is necessarily
selective. Comedy is omitted. Though many of its themes and situa-
tions occur in a different form in tragedy and, more particularly, in
tragicomedy, the undeniable relationship (which still awaits a thorough
investigation) is a matter of secondary importance in this period of
drama as a whole. But even after respecting the traditional separation
of the tragic and comic genres, one is still left with a wealth of
material, most aspects of which have been the subject of numerous
specialized studies. They include the contemporary movements of
thought and sensibility, the political background, and the social and
theatrical conditions which helped to shape the drama.
Account has been taken of all these wherever their relevance is
apparent, but the main stress is on the plays themselves seen as types
of drama, on the circumstances in which they were produced and their
reception by contemporaries. The basic method is descriptive, since
there is little value in critical interpretations if the works interpreted
are hardly known. Unfortunately this must often be the case. One
might assume a first-hand acquaintance with the plays of Corneille
and Racine, though, even here, perhaps not with all of them. But one
cannot do the same with Thomas Corneille, Quinault, Tristan, Du
Ryer, Rotrou, Hardy, Montchrestien, or even Gamier. This is largely
because of the inaccessibility of the works of these dramatists. In several
cases they can be found only in the original editions or in later editions
which have themselves become rare. This situation is slowly being
remedied (see Bibliography), but there are still many interesting plays
among the hundreds written which await a modern edition.
Academic and commercial considerations, in this case comple-
mentary, have focused excessive attention on Corneille and Racine, to
