Jean-François Regnard

Jean-François Regnard , born with Paris the February 7th 1655 and died in the castle of Cricket, close to Dourdan, the September 4th 1709, is a writer and Dramaturge French.

II came towards to Paris, there bought a load of treasurer of France, lived in ease and started to make comedies by pastime.

In addition to his comedies, there is of him a relation of his voyages, a small novel, the Provençale , which is only its own history, of various poetries, among which one notices a Satire against the husbands , in answer to the satire of Boileau against the women.

Biography

Born from commercial rich person who lived under the pillars of the Markets, Regnard was high carefully, but it appears to have shown, as of the college, a character independent and a taste of the pleasures which involved it soon without a romantic life and vagrant.

Having lost his father at the twenty years age, and being main of a rather considerable fortune, it solved to travel and went initially in Italy where, started to satisfy passion for the play which it kept all his life, it gained much money. With Bologna, it became in love with beautiful Of Provence and embarked with her and her husband for France. The ship was travelled by Algerian corsairs and the passengers sold with Algiers like slaves in 1678. It was acquired the good graces of its Master while governing his kitchen and, repurchased after two years of captivity, like its Of Provence one and manservant the beautiful, realizing: 12000 pounds which its family sent. It returned to France and, the noise being spread that the husband of its mistress had died, it prepared to marry it. It was a false report, and Regnard, to distract itself from its unhappy passion, started to travel again. In 1681, it visited, with some friends, the Flanders, the Holland, the Denmark, the Sweden: it advanced until in Lapland beyond Tornio. In this last region, where it had as travelling companions two French gentlemen, it registered on the top of the Melavara mountain it towards become famous:

Difficulty tandem stetimus nobis ubi defuit orbis .

“They is here that we stopped, where finishes the ground”

It went then in Poland, Turkey, Hungary and returned, at the end of 1682 or 1683, by the Germany, in France where it was fixed definitively.

Having bought a load of treasurer of France and being made receive lawyer at the Parliament, it remained in Paris, where its house, located street Richelieu, became a stay sought by the friends of the pleasure and good expensive, and by people of spirit, who charmed the spiritual liveliness of their host and the account of his voyages. One saw there frequently also large lords, inter alia Condé, and prince de Conti. Regnard describes that house and its pleasures in one of its Épîtres , imitated Horace. It spent the beautiful season to the castle of Cricket, which it had bought close to Dourdan, and where it composed most of its works. He initially worked for the Italian Théâtre (1688 - 96), then he made play French Théâtre several comedies which had a great success (1694 - 1708). He received also merry company there, uniting with the pleasures of the table those of hunting. He died there of indigestion.

Theater

Regnard was, after Molière, first comic French. It had thirty-three years when it started to write for the Theater-Italian; it had some thirty-nine when it made play its first part with the Th3e4atre Fran1cais, and forty and one when it gave to the Player , part in whom appeared to reappear the good comedy, dead since twenty-three years with Molière.

Cheerfulness, liveliness, the facility, funds inexhaustible of projections and features pleasant distinguish these works. Regnard seldom has the depth of the observation and the strong design of the characters but, if it does not make often think, it always makes laugh. It admirably seizes the ridiculous ones and paints highly them. He excels tying and untying the intrigue, and never lets languish the action. Its style has negligences, inaccuracies, even of the faults of versification, but these defects are repurchased by the naturalness, the frankness and the spirit of the dialog, by the flexibility and the ease of the worms. It was said that it drew its expressions from true the funds of the language. One reproached him a moral indifference, a Scepticisme epicurean which makes him consider the defect without indignation, provided that it is merry and spiritual, by taking manners of the end of, the passion of the play, hypocrisy, it left with the public the care to draw itself the consequences morals from the defects which it puts in scene.

From the point of view of art, one reproached him his tendency to exaggerate the joke, to turn the comic one to the buffoonery, not only in his jokes of the Theater-Italian, but also in some of his parts of the Th3e4atre Fran1cais, which made say to Joubert in a sententious and too absolute way: “Regnard is pleasant like the servant, and comic Molière like the Master. ” Voltaire said better: “Which is not liked the comedies of Regnard, is not worthy to admire Molière. ”

the Player , represented, for the first time, with Paris, the December 19th 1696, is that of the parts of Regnard which, the first, gave an high ranking on the French scene to its author.

The December 2nd 1697, Regnard made represent Inattentive the , in five acts, worms. This comedy fell into its innovation but, begun again thirty years later, it succeeds and remained with the repertory. It puts in scene the Ménalque of the Heather. Inattentive the , like Ménalque , forgets that he is married at the time when he has just obtained the hand of that which he likes. It was said that it is not a character there, a moral practice, but a defect of spirit, a defect of organization not very suitable to be carried with the theater, because it does not appear likely developments. But the part is run away by the pleasant features and the comic incidents.

Démocrite , in five acts, in worms, played the January 12th 1700, is a cold work by the bottom even of the subject, which puts in scene the philosopher Démocrite in love with its pupil. However some happy situations maintained it a long time with the theater. the unforeseen Return , in an act, in prose, played the February 11th 1700, is a part of a great cheerfulness, though entirely founded on the lies of a servant; the comic one, which is very natural there, never becomes low there. the Madnesses in love , in three acts, in worms, were played the February 15th 1701, with an entertainment entitled the Marriage of the Madness . The cheerfulness of the part goes until the buffoonery of the Commedia LED' arte, because Regnard took again the groundwork of an old Italian opera, Insane supposed the , on which it embroidered: heroin, Agathe, find thousand inventions pleasant to withdraw themselves from all the constraints which it has of horror. Its killer, Albert, thinking that Éraste and its servant are in his camp, entrust to them that its pupil became insane. Actually, Agathe simulates the madness to approach Éraste which she likes. Crispin promises to cure it while making pass his madness in the body of a body.

Ménechmes or the Twins , in five acts, in worms, was played the December 4th 1705. Regnard took again there with much success the subject covered by Plaute to draw from the resemblance of the two brothers a crowd of situations very diverting.

the Sole legatee , in five acts, in worms, played the February 9th 1708, is placed by criticisms above all the parts of Regnard, even of the Joueur ; it is at least that where the true nature of its talent is shown best in all its day, and it is perhaps the masterpiece of this comic cheerfulness which is restricted to make laugh. There is nothing more pleasant with the theater than the will of Crispin in this part where liveliness and the spirit are supported from one end to another.

The other parts that Regnard gave to the Th3e4atre Fran1cais, are: Await me under the elm , an act in prose (May 19th, 1694.), comedy that the Parfaict brothers allotted by error to Dufresny, that of Dufresny, which carries the same title, having been represented with the Theater-Italian; the Serenade , an act in prose (July 3rd, 1794); the Ball , an act in worms, played initially under the title of the Middle-class Cliff (June 14th, 1696; Critic of the Sole legatee , an act in prose (February 19th, 1708).

Its parts with the Theater-Italian are: the Divorce , three acts in prose (March 17th, 1688); Descent of Harlequin to the hells , scenes in prose (March 5th 1689); the Man with good fortunes , three acts in prose (January 10th, 1690); the Criticism of the Man with good fortunes , an act in prose (March 15th, 1690); wandering Girls , scenes in prose (August 24th, 1690); the Vain one or the Academy of the ladies , three acts in prose (January 17th, 1691); the Chinese , four acts in prose, with Dufresny (December 13rd, 1692); the Rod of Vulcan , an act in prose and towards mixed, with the same one (January 10th, 1693); Birth of Amadis , an act in prose and towards (February 10th, 1694); the Fair Saint-Germain , three acts in prose, with Dufresny (December 26th, 1695); the Continuation of the Saint-Germain Fair or Mummies of Egypt , an act prose and towards (March 19th, 1696).

Regnard has, moreover, makes represent in 1699, with the royal Académie of music, the Carnival of Venice , Ballet in three acts, with prolog. It left in manuscript, the Wishes , an act in free verse; Grape harvest or the Baillif d' Asnières , an act in worms, represented without success with the Theater of the Door Saint Martin's day, on March 15th 1823; Sapor , tragedy.

Regnard, in addition to its theater, wrote Épîtres , Satires , various Poésies , its Voyages and a Novel. Its Epistles and its Satires , where the imitations of old abound, has the defects of a versification neglected, incorrect, often prosaic, but it is there worms happy, easy and pleasant pieces. In a Epistle in Quinault , he had spoken about Boileau with praise. Later, it was scrambled with this last and made in] a Satire against the husbands, in answer to the Satire against the women . In 1695, Boileau, in its epistle With my worms , placed it among the bad writers: “In Sanlecque, in Regnard, compared Bellocq has. ”

Regnard was avenged by a violent satire, entitled the Tomb of Mr. Boileau-Despréaux , where it supposed that this one had died of sorrow because of the failure of its last works. The two adversaries were reconciled, Regnard dedicated to Boileau its Ménechmes (1706) and Boileau thus modified the worms of its epistle: “In Pinchêne. In Linière, compared Perrin. ”

Among the relations of voyages written by Regnard, the Voyage from Lapland is most curious. The others, Voyage from Flanders and Holland , Voyage from Denmark , Voyage from Sweden , Voyage from Poland , Voyage from Germany , are less interesting.

There is still of Regnard a Voyage in Normandy , prose interfered worms, and a Voyage to Chaumont , in the form of song. It made, on its voyage in Italy and its captivity in Algiers, a novel entitled Of Provence the , reported on a heroic tone, according to the fashion still reigning, but of an average and often incorrect style.

The first complete edition of its Œuvres was published in 1731 (Paris, 5 vol. in-12). Among the more recent editions, one distinguishes that from Alexandre Calame (Geneva, Droz, 1981), of Charles Mazouer (Geneva, Droz, 1994-1994), John Dunkley (Geneva, Droz, 1986).

Works of theater

Source

  • Gustave Vapereau, universal Dictionary of the literatures , Paris, Hatchet, 1876, p. 1707-9

Texts on line

  • complete Works , T. 1, T. 2, T. 3, T. 4, T. 5, T. 6, Paris, J.L.J. Brière, 1823
  • '' Voyage from Normandy: Letter with Artémise '' (1689).

External bonds

  • All its plays and their representations on site CÉSAR
  • Note on the '' Voyage of Lapland ''

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