Jean-Baptise Poquelin, better known by his popular stage name Moliere, was a famous 17th century French playwright and actor. He has been referred to as a master of French comedy, because the influence of his works has greatly shaped modern Western comedy due to the popularity of his plays. He was a well-known practitioner of the 'comedy of manners' style, and over the course of his life he wrote 24 plays.
The fact that his work is still being performed is just one visible indicator of the impact he had. However, his life and career were not easy despite his success. He met a number of obstacles in his pursuit of the theater from the authorities, the Catholic Church, to financial issues, to just pain difficulty acquiring an audience an first. Despite this, he remains as one of the fathers of modern comedy.
Life
Early Years
Jean-Baptiste Poquelin was born on January 15th in 1622 to his parents Jean Poquelin and Marie Cresse. He was born in Paris on a street called Rue Saint-Honore. Jean-Baptiste's parents were middle-class with his father working as that period's equivalent to an interior decorator of moden times. He sold furniture, tapestries, and other such furnishings to Paris's upper class. His mother died when he was only 10 years old As a young man, Jean-Baptiste attended a fashionable Jesuit school nammed the College de Clermont, in the Latin Quarter area of Paris. The College de Clermont itself was also attended by a number of French historic figures. While his father wanted him to follow in his footsteps career-wise, the young man had other plans for his own life.
In 1643 he began his life in the theater with the formation of a theatre company named Illustre Theatre. The membership of this company included nine others, one of whom was Jean-Baptiste's girlfriend Medeleine Bejart, an actress in her own right. While the exact date is not known, the earliest recorded instance of the stage name Moliere is on a document dated June 28, 1644 (Moore & Tobin, 1998). Jean-Baptiste's parents did not approve of his decision to become an actor, because acting was not considered a respectable profession at the time.
Rise to Prominence
There was little public interest in the theater in 17th century Paris, so competing with the more established theatre companies would be incredibly difficult as a new theatre company. Once they acquired their own theatre, the Illustre Theatre's attempts at making a name for themselves in Paris did not go well despite their efforts. They believed the cause of their lack of success was a problem with the theater they had chosen, and canceled the lease they had on it. When they tried their luck with another theater, converted from a tennis court, it produced similarly poor results and they went deeper into debt. Moliere ended up in prison for a eek after he pledged his own credit of the money owed. Members came and went (Matthews, 2004). In 1645 the remaining members of Illustre Theatre left Paris and became a traveling theatre troupe.
During this time is when Moliere started to write and star in his own plays. His first two known plays were written around this time, The Blunderer and The Amorous Quarrel (Price, 2013). This is when Moliere discovered his talent for comedy. There are records of the troupe showing up in a number of places in the French provinces. It can be said that this period of time was when Moliere learned and refined the skills that would make him such an influential figure in the history of western theater. This lasted for thirteen years before they finally returned to Paris in 1658. When the troupe returned to Paris, they acquired a sublease on the Theatre du Marais. This is when things started to look up for him. Moliere acquired the patronage of Philippe I, the Duke of Orleans and the brother of King Louis XIV, in later 1658 during a performance of a tragedy written by another author named Pierre Corneille (Shakespeare Theatre, n.d.).
The first of his more-well known plays that Moleire wrote after he returned to Paris was The Affected Ladies in 1659. The play was a comedy of manners that mocked the pretentiousness of upper-class women in Paris. This angered a number of important people at the time, and this was a recurring issue with Moleirre until his death in 1673. The content of his plays would lead him to gain enemies among politicians, artists, and even within the Catholic Church because he was willing to challenge everything about society. His patronage by the Duke of Orleans and later Louis XIV protected him somewhat because they were fans of his work. Moliere continued to write his play as he saw fit despite the negative attention.
In 1661, Moliere unveiled a play that would go on to become one of his most-well liked. This one was The School For Husbands, a play about two older men trying to marry the two younger women whom they have become the guardians of after their father's death, rather than women closer to their own age. This was ironic because one year later in 1662, Moliere's relationship with Madeleine seemed to turn sour as they began to live apart from each other, and he ended up marrying her daughter Armande. His detractors ued this as an opportunity to spread rumors that Armande was in fact Moliere's own daughter, given she was about 20 years younger than him (Shakespeare Theatre, n.d.).
Later Life
The later years of Jean-Baptiste Poquelin's life were the most successful parts of his career. He gained patronage from King Louis XIV after creating entertainment for the court, and he still provoked his enemies and detractors. He wrote more plays, but many about the obsessions of man. However his personal life was in contrast to that is his relationship with his wife had resulted in several instances of separation, while all but one of his children had died in infancy. This was also when the illness that would claim his life started to creep in. After he had first performed Tartruffe in 1664, a play about the hypocrisy of possessing qualities that one does not actually have, his health had been in decline. He had developed a bad cough that only seemed to worsen with time. His wife and others tried to convince him to rest until he felt better, but he refused knowing that his workers depended on their wages for support (Curtiss, 1973). Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, better known as Moliere, died on February 17, 1673.
It was during a performance of his own work The Imaginary Invalid, in which he was playing the part of Argan. He collapsed onstage after the curtain fell and was carried back to his home. Moliere did not have either of the priests present at the performance come to his side, due to the fact that acting was still under the church's ban (Matthews, 2004). Actors normally did not get an Extreme Unction unless they formally renounced the theater (Curtiss, 1973). However his wife had petitioned both the Archbishop and King Louis XIV, he was buried in a parish cemetery named St-Eustache, which was normally reserved for unbaptized infants.
The exact cause of Moliere's death is pulmonary tuberculosis, which he suffered with for years and most likely acquired during his stint in prison before he left Paris for 13 years. Of course, like everything else in life, Moliere liked to make fun of illness as seen in The Imaginary Invalid (Bernhard, 2015).
A statue of Moliere made by Jean-Antoine Houdon in 1781, currently standing in the Princeton University Art Museum in New Jersey
Jean-Baptise Poquelin, better known by his popular stage name Moliere, was a famous 17th century French playwright and actor. He has been referred to as a master of French comedy, because the influence of his works has greatly shaped modern Western comedy due to the popularity of his plays. He was a well-known practitioner of the 'comedy of manners' style, and over the course of his life he wrote 24 plays.
The fact that his work is still being performed is just one visible indicator of the impact he had. However, his life and career were not easy despite his success. He met a number of obstacles in his pursuit of the theater from the authorities, the Catholic Church, to financial issues, to just pain difficulty acquiring an audience an first. Despite this, he remains as one of the fathers of modern comedy.
Life
Early Years
Jean-Baptiste Poquelin was born on January 15th in 1622 to his parents Jean Poquelin and Marie Cresse. He was born in Paris on a street called Rue Saint-Honore. Jean-Baptiste's parents were middle-class with his father working as that period's equivalent to an interior decorator of moden times. He sold furniture, tapestries, and other such furnishings to Paris's upper class. His mother died when he was only 10 years old As a young man, Jean-Baptiste attended a fashionable Jesuit school nammed the College de Clermont, in the Latin Quarter area of Paris. The College de Clermont itself was also attended by a number of French historic figures. While his father wanted him to follow in his footsteps career-wise, the young man had other plans for his own life.In 1643 he began his life in the theater with the formation of a theatre company named Illustre Theatre. The membership of this company included nine others, one of whom was Jean-Baptiste's girlfriend Medeleine Bejart, an actress in her own right. While the exact date is not known, the earliest recorded instance of the stage name Moliere is on a document dated June 28, 1644 (Moore & Tobin, 1998). Jean-Baptiste's parents did not approve of his decision to become an actor, because acting was not considered a respectable profession at the time.
Rise to Prominence
There was little public interest in the theater in 17th century Paris, so competing with the more established theatre companies would be incredibly difficult as a new theatre company. Once they acquired their own theatre, the Illustre Theatre's attempts at making a name for themselves in Paris did not go well despite their efforts. They believed the cause of their lack of success was a problem with the theater they had chosen, and canceled the lease they had on it. When they tried their luck with another theater, converted from a tennis court, it produced similarly poor results and they went deeper into debt. Moliere ended up in prison for a eek after he pledged his own credit of the money owed. Members came and went (Matthews, 2004). In 1645 the remaining members of Illustre Theatre left Paris and became a traveling theatre troupe.During this time is when Moliere started to write and star in his own plays. His first two known plays were written around this time, The Blunderer and The Amorous Quarrel (Price, 2013). This is when Moliere discovered his talent for comedy. There are records of the troupe showing up in a number of places in the French provinces. It can be said that this period of time was when Moliere learned and refined the skills that would make him such an influential figure in the history of western theater. This lasted for thirteen years before they finally returned to Paris in 1658. When the troupe returned to Paris, they acquired a sublease on the Theatre du Marais. This is when things started to look up for him. Moliere acquired the patronage of Philippe I, the Duke of Orleans and the brother of King Louis XIV, in later 1658 during a performance of a tragedy written by another author named Pierre Corneille (Shakespeare Theatre, n.d.).
The first of his more-well known plays that Moleire wrote after he returned to Paris was The Affected Ladies in 1659. The play was a comedy of manners that mocked the pretentiousness of upper-class women in Paris. This angered a number of important people at the time, and this was a recurring issue with Moleirre until his death in 1673. The content of his plays would lead him to gain enemies among politicians, artists, and even within the Catholic Church because he was willing to challenge everything about society. His patronage by the Duke of Orleans and later Louis XIV protected him somewhat because they were fans of his work. Moliere continued to write his play as he saw fit despite the negative attention.
In 1661, Moliere unveiled a play that would go on to become one of his most-well liked. This one was The School For Husbands, a play about two older men trying to marry the two younger women whom they have become the guardians of after their father's death, rather than women closer to their own age. This was ironic because one year later in 1662, Moliere's relationship with Madeleine seemed to turn sour as they began to live apart from each other, and he ended up marrying her daughter Armande. His detractors ued this as an opportunity to spread rumors that Armande was in fact Moliere's own daughter, given she was about 20 years younger than him (Shakespeare Theatre, n.d.).
Later Life
The later years of Jean-Baptiste Poquelin's life were the most successful parts of his career. He gained patronage from King Louis XIV after creating entertainment for the court, and he still provoked his enemies and detractors. He wrote more plays, but many about the obsessions of man. However his personal life was in contrast to that is his relationship with his wife had resulted in several instances of separation, while all but one of his children had died in infancy. This was also when the illness that would claim his life started to creep in. After he had first performed Tartruffe in 1664, a play about the hypocrisy of possessing qualities that one does not actually have, his health had been in decline. He had developed a bad cough that only seemed to worsen with time. His wife and others tried to convince him to rest until he felt better, but he refused knowing that his workers depended on their wages for support (Curtiss, 1973). Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, better known as Moliere, died on February 17, 1673.It was during a performance of his own work The Imaginary Invalid, in which he was playing the part of Argan. He collapsed onstage after the curtain fell and was carried back to his home. Moliere did not have either of the priests present at the performance come to his side, due to the fact that acting was still under the church's ban (Matthews, 2004). Actors normally did not get an Extreme Unction unless they formally renounced the theater (Curtiss, 1973). However his wife had petitioned both the Archbishop and King Louis XIV, he was buried in a parish cemetery named St-Eustache, which was normally reserved for unbaptized infants.
The exact cause of Moliere's death is pulmonary tuberculosis, which he suffered with for years and most likely acquired during his stint in prison before he left Paris for 13 years. Of course, like everything else in life, Moliere liked to make fun of illness as seen in The Imaginary Invalid (Bernhard, 2015).
Plays Written By Moliere
This is a list of works written by Moliere.
References