Cambridge Companion To Moliere, The

Description:
A detailed introduction to Moliere and his plays, this Companion evokes his own theatrical career, his theatres, patrons, the performers and theatre staff with whom he worked, and the various publics he and his troupes entertained with such success. It looks at his particular brands of comedy and satire. L'Ecole des femmes, Le Tartuffe, Dom Juan, Le Misanthrope, L'Avare and Les Femmes savantes are examined from a variety of different viewpoints, and through the eyes of different ages and cultures. The comedies-ballets, a genre invented by Moliere and his collaborators, are re-instated to the central position which they held in his ouvre in Moliere's own lifetime; his two masterpieces in this genre, Le Bourgeois gentilhomme and Le Malade imaginaire, have chapters to themselves. Finally, the Companion looks at modern directors' theatre, exploring the central role played by productions of his work in successive 'revolutions' in the dramatic arts in France.

Review:
'The highest compliment that one can pay to this well-written, appropriately illustrated book is that it spurs us on to revisit Moliere. These essays demonstrate the appropriateness of the focus on Moliere in the past decade, first with the creation of the admirable toutmolier.net website, then with the publication of the eminently useful Moliere Encyclopedia in 2002, and now with the Cambridge Companion.' - Ronald W. Tobin, University of California, Santa Barbara

Table of Contents:
Preface; Acknowledgements; Chronology; 1. The career strategy of an actor turned playwright: 'de l'audace, encore de l'audace, toujours de l'audace' Marie-Claude Canova-Green; 2. The material conditions of Moliere's stage Jan Clarke; 3. The master and the mirror: Scaramouche and Moliere Stephen Knapper; 4. Moliere as satirist Larry F. Norman; 5. How (and why) not to take Moliere too seriously Richard Parish; 6. L'Avare or Harpagon's masterclass in comedy Robert McBride; 7. Laughter and irony in Le Misanthrope Andrew Calder; 8. Comedies-ballets Charles Mazouer; 9. Le Bourgeois gentilhomme: Moliere and music John S. Powell; 10. Medicine and entertainment in Le Malade imaginaire Julia Prest; 11. Moliere and the teaching of Frenchness: Les Femmes savantes as a case study Ralph Albanese, Jr.; 12. L'Ecole des femmes: matrimony and the laws of chance Roxanne Lalande; 13. Moliere nationalised: Tartuffe on the British stage from the Restoration to the present day Noel Peacock; 14. Landmark twentieth-century productions of Moliere: a transatlantic perspective on Moliere: mise en scene and its historiography Jim Carmody; 15. Dom Juan: the directors' play David Whitton; 16. 'Reculer pour mieux sauter': modern experimental theatre's debt to Moliere David Bradby; Select bibliography.

Author Biography:
David Bradby is Professor of Drama and Theatre Studies at Royal Holloway, University of London. Andrew Calder has recently retired from a Readership in the French Department at University College London.