THAR 281 1st Edition Lecture 4 Outline of Last Lecture I Inherently theatrical a Ceremony b Ritual II Theatre a Specific place b Present the experience c Real or imagined event Outline of Current Lecture I Tartuffe characters II Analyzing themes in Tartuffe III Deus Ex Machina IV Neoclassicism ideas a Verisimilitude b Unities c Decorum d Separation e Didacticism V Catholics vs Huguenots protestant a The Cid b Jean Recine c Moliere These notes represent a detailed interpretation of the professor s lecture GradeBuddy is best used as a supplement to your own notes not as a substitute VI Dance Current Lecture I II III IV V The play Tartuffe uses character characteristics from comedia dell arte traveling groups of about 10 men that had much richness with their make up and usually wore masks examples include an idiot father or sassy maid a 4 character types Pantalone high man with status Tartuffe Harlequin comic servant like a jester Il capitano acts like a tough mad but is easily scared and runs off stage shrieking Innamorat young foolish lovers that don t realize situations they are in Valere and Mariane Analyzing themes of Tartuffe Hypocrisy of religion and religious people High class does not mean high intelligent Orgon Gender roles the two most intelligent people in the play are the wife and maid Wild extremes hardly navigate anyone Orgon The law enforcer was very calm even though he basically said he is going to destroy orgon s life Danger of willful illusions Deus Ex Machina god in from the machine This means someone comes in at the very end and solves everything and everyone is happy ever after This happened when the king came in a basically said forget about everything I just solved it Neo classicism ideas a Verisimilitude most important belief that all things must be true in life Play should not break audience suspensions of beliefs meaning no violence because not actually happening no ghost because not actually real no soliloquies because no one just sits and talks to an inanimate object about what they are thinking b Unities Place action cannot take place in more than one place Ex A household one building Time action take place within 24 hours Action only one story can many little subplots but mostly one c Decorum character behave as society would portray that person d Separation comedy and tragedy are totally separate never mixed e Didacticism lesson can be learned from this Catholics vs Huguenots protestant much Italian influence in the neoclassicism period A women named Medicis thought that combine French and Italian theatre was great VI and so did Richelieu another elite Richelieu decided to open an academy in France to censor theatre and make sure plays follow the guidelines a The Cid was a Spanish based play bit some people wanted to recreate it into a neoclassicism play This had a complicated plot and violence therefore this play did not uphold the rules of which the academy censored The academy said no to this play Due to the academy s rules this led neoclassicism to be firmly established by the academy b Jean Recine one of the greatest neoclassicism dramatists He was a strict rule follower Phadra is his most famous writing that contained Greek elements especially because the play started close to the climax c Moliere the greatest of all writers He wrote his plays in rhyming couplets He fell in and out of favor by the authorities and the academy One of his writings Tartuffe was controversial at the beginning because of the hypocrisy in the play The authorities allowed the play to pass and was very popular but later banned Moliere s three most popular works are Tartuffe Miser and Misanthrope Dance begins to develop but was not like it is now The form was called Ballet However this was more like a catwalk to show off costumes The movements came from how they moved to show off what they were wearing Eventually the movement of the body was just as important as the costumes After this French neoclassicism fades away Theatre gets boring because there are not any more new ideas Also the king stops attending theatrical plays making the people stop because they follow what the king does